Popular reviews

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  Review by Darren Carver-Balsiger ★★★½ 6

  Sanshiro Sugata was Akira Kurosawa's debut film, and popular and influential for its time. It is apparent straightway watching Sanshiro Sugata that Kurosawa understands how to construct an image effectively. His raw talent at making cinema is perhaps unmatched. Even in Sanshiro Sugata, we get crude glimpses of Kurosawa's distinctive style, from dynamic weather to screenwipes to action framed centrally with few closeups. The editing isn't as smooth as Kurosawa's later works, but overall this is an immediately strong technical effort.

  Sanshiro Sugata is a small sports drama regarding conflict between judo and jujitsu. Maybe there's a mild examination of how the modern judo and the traditional jijutsu represent different outlooks on the world, but really Sanshiro Sugata is fairly…

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  Review by BrandonHabes ★★★½ 10

  About ten minutes in I started to watch Kurosawa's debut as if I was a young George Lucas taking notes. I have no idea if Lucas ever saw this film, it probably doesn't matter, but there's enough thematic seeds and visual trademarks here that hint at the universe Lucas loved, and foreshadows the universe Kurosawa would continually perfect. We got transition "wipes," the hero's journey, an ancient warrior discipline, the culture clash of how that discipline is applied, mythic epiphanies, a character named Yano (Yoda?), and I think most tellingly, that mysterious, almost zen-like power behind the warrior's art that never seems fully understood by anyone who wants to wield it. In Kurosawa's world, this power isn't vied after by…

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  Review by Sally Jane Black

  Gloriously filmed, simple story of a man choosing the spiritual/human path in life. It seems to have a reverence for nature, as most of the film's most crucial moments take place amidst it, especially in water. Indeed, there's probably whole essays about the use of water in this film (still water for contemplation, rain for tumult, the plunging of enemies into still water for defeating them with a balanced mind, and so on).

  The film ranges from grainy and rough to sterling and bright in between cuts at times, a relic of its age and the fact that it's more or less a recovered film. I can't imagine what was cut, but I'd really love to see it some day. The scene on the stairs was especially noticeable in its differing picture quality. It actually made the clear moments that much more startling and beautiful, and it's not unwatchably bad at any point, anyway. Just a marked contrast.

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  Review by Mads Ej ★★★½

  Akira Kurosawa movies ranked: boxd.it/cOTI2

  This is Akira Kurosawa’s first movie and it really was a strong start of his career. 
  The story followed a young stubborn man, who starts to learn judo and grows as a person, while he becomes a master. 
  During the war parts of the movie was cut and lost, so we don’t have the full movie, but it was still very coherent, since some parts had text explaining what happened. At times stuff could happen a bit fast and we didn’t always get that much insight into the personal relationships between the characters, which may also be because of the lost footage. 
  Even though it is his first movie, Akira Kurosawa still showed great skills…

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  Review by Jake Cole ★★★½

  So much of Kurosawa is already here (the use of weather as both a compositional counterpoint and a cosmic reflection of the characters' moods; frame-rate manipulation for action, cutting on movement) that I wonder how much more fully formed this might have presented the director had his original edit survived the wartime censors. In judo, a defensive martial art that can be used to devastating offensive effect, he finds an immediate hook for both his innate mastery of action and his ability to communicate deeper ambivalence and criticism of said combat, and the judo scenes in this have such sublime form. The shot never cuts where you expect it, so that some flips are seen in full while other shots…

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  Review by CJ Roy ★★★★ 3

  Rain falling on structures and nature as it collects on a closed umbrella.

  The silence before a match, and the calm before grappling. The way a camera moves over its subjects during combat as if it was the martial art itself. The melancholy inside every throw, the kind known better as experience.

  A belief that people can learn and change, that a wall is just a wall and you can move past it.

  Johnnie To learned a lot from this, you can be certain.

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  Review by comrade_yui ★★★★ 4

  physical and emotional violence as the sublimation of a deeper purity

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  Review by claire 👁️ diane ★★★½ 1

  Kurosawa's camera is so visceral. I am struck by how deeply alive it is. Flip on the TV and watch for a moment. Anything. Think back then to this... Only after do you realize you were hearing true language spoken for the first time. It isn't yet fire, and it doesn't shake the world when it speaks. Indeed, the things it says are raw things. But the light -- the heat! A raw and beautiful intrusion that blooms, glows, burns in the quiet after -- like Sanshiro's lotus.

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  Review by Filipe Furtado ★★★½ 1

  Searching for purity one blow at a time.

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  Review by Dario Habulin ★★★

  Sanshiro Sugata is debut from Kurosawa and he did good job in directing part and showed how he was talented person in beginning of his carrere .
  Story had some nice elements of sports drama but also nice showcase of Japanese way of living and traditions expecely during that times .
  Acting was solid but not so great as yi was thinking it will be .
  Fight sequances are little outdated and not so great but I expected that before watching it .
  Sanshiro Sugata is one ok debut but far from being something great .

  
  🔜 The Most Beautiful

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  Review by Den_of_geeks ★★★½ 2

  My first Kurosawa film, which also happens to be his directorial debut. 

  Just a note: the version on criterion is a shorter version due to a good portion of it being destroyed.

  This film very effectively shows how young burning ambition can take over someone. Showing from multiple angles how people deal with the journey to be great, or to be the best. How it can lead to success, or how it can lead to downfall. Even if the characters are a bit shallow at times, it’s undeniable to me that this film effectively portrays its message, especially due to the missing footage in this cut.

  
  Also the sexual tension during some of those fights was insane

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  Review by Doug Dillaman ★★★ 1

  Apparently I missed some stupid Twitter discussion about whether film writers need to know about the canon. My ten cents:
  a) I take your assertions far more seriously if you're knowledgable, and I have little patience for writers who are incurious
  b) OTOH there's a wide variety of film writing that doesn't lean on untenable ill-informed assertion, some of it fantastic
  c) if you're not a good writer, it doesn't matter what you've seen
  d) all film writers have holes in their viewing knowledge somewhere
  e) some of the best writers have gaping holes, but have focused on areas where they explore in-depth in areas neglected by canon (Michael Sicinski and Vern jump immediately to mind)
  f) the utility of…