Barnes & Noble

In Throne of Blood, director Akira Kurosawa combines 15th-century samurai history with elements of Noh theater for a brilliant retelling of Shakespeare's Macbeth. The peerless Toshiro Mifune stars as Washizu, a decorated samurai who, along with his warrior friend Miki (Akira Kubo), encounters an evil spirit prophesying a change in the royal order -- specifically, Washizu will rule, followed by Miki's son. Despite his efforts to alter fate, Washizu is cajoled by his manipulative wife (Isuzu Yamada, in the Lady Macbeth role) into taking over the kingdom by force, a bloody act unleashing a brutal chain of events that eventually tears apart the kingdom. Like Kurosawa's Ran, his King Lear film made nearly three decades later, Throne of Blood uses the bare essentials of Shakespeare's drama to enact a grand history lesson on feudal Japan, replete with period costumes, intense melodrama, swarms of flying arrows, and, in this case, lush black-and-white cinematography. Aside from the always-charismatic presence of Mifune, what makes the film special is Kurosawa's integration of techniques based in Japan's traditional Noh theater. The bare sets, expressive soundtrack, and stylized performances enhance the story to a new level above that of play-on-film; the battle scenes are even expressionist in nature. The experience is best described not as a mere Shakespeare adaptation but as a sublime transposition. Tony Nigro

All Movie Guide

One of the most successful Shakespeare adaptations for the screen, Akira Kurosawa's Throne of Blood strips away Macbeth's minor characters and long soliloquies, turns the witch scenes into a strange supernatural encounter, and transforms the Scottish landscape into a misty visage of feudal Japan. Kurosawa masterfully employs style and composition to create a closed world in which the film's tragic outcome seems pre-ordained. Such visual motifs as fog, wind, and rain, juxtaposed with the austere interior of Washizu's castle, create an eerie, foreboding feel, while Kurosawa's use of stark blacks and whites, coupled with his persistent use of hard edits, seem to place the characters in stylistic confinement. Not unlike Michelangelo Antonioni's L'avventura (1960), Kurosawa uses repetition, such as the image of Washizu's emerging from the fog, to suggest the futility of the characters' actions. Rarely has a Kurosawa film been rendered with such bleakness. Throne of Blood is a visually brilliant, emotionally powerful masterpiece from one of the true masters of cinema. Jonathan Crow

Product Details

• UPC: 037429175828
• Source: CRITERION
• Region Code: 1
• Aspect Ratio: Pre-1954 Standard (1.33.1)
• Presentation: B&W
• Sound: Dolby Digital Mono
• Language: Japanese
• Subtitles: English
• Time: 1:49:00
• Sales Rank: 6,235

This DVD is also available as part of a box set:

• Essential Art House, Vol. 4
• AK 100 - 25 Films by Akira Kurosawa

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