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nDreams (1990)
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nDirector:nAkira Kurosawa, Ishiro Honda
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nCast: Akira Terao, Martin Scorcese
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nWhen you are on your way to becoming a true FilmnConnoisseur, you simply have to see the works of certain directors who don’tnjust make movies for profit, they make films for the purest reasons, the lovenof the cinematic art form and to explore among other things, human nature.nLegendary directors make their films because films can be honest and pure, theyncan be direct and undeniable. You know how the saying goes “A picture speaksnlouder than a thousand words”. And so,nhere I am once again visiting Akira Kurosawa, one of the greatest directors whonever lived. I’m still catching up with his body of work to this day, but everyntime I do watch one of his films I am blown away by two things. Number one thenbeauty of the images, be they black and white or in color, and secondly I amnblown away by how intimate his stories are. Kurosawa’s films might be aboutnSamurai’s and temples and epic wars, but he takes his camera and whittles thenstory down to what really matters: human actions, human emotions, human nature.
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nGoing into Dreams it’s important to know that it’s annanthology film consisting of eight different stories which are all based onnAkira Kurosawa’s own dreams. So this is a very personal film, with Kurosawantouching upon some very personal subject matter. Throughout the film, we have ancharacter simple called ‘I’, who connects the short films. This character is a representationnof Kurosawa himself, as he observes humanity. Basically, the film is Kurosawa’snobservations on life and how he sees the world. It spans many areas of life,nart, war, death, the afterlife, it’s all encompassing. Above all, what Kurosawa’snDreams does is place a mirror against humanity, begging us to both analyzenourselves individually and as a collective as well.
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nFor example, one of the shorts is about a nuclear powernplant that blows up. The imagery of this short film is amazing because we seenMount Fuji being engulfed in wave after wave of fire and explosions. Now thisnstory is epic in scale, but Kurosawa doesn’t focus on buildings falling and carsnexploding the way that Roland Emmerich would, no, instead he focuses on a groupnof three people, at the shore, realizing the radioactive fallout is going tonkill them and they have nowhere to go. Does life have meaning in their last fewnmoments? Should you give up and commit suicide? Or do you enjoy your lastnmoments of life? This is what I’m talking about! Real human emotions, importantnsituations. The backdrop is epic, but the focus is intimate and personal, whichnis a characteristic of Kurosawa’s films.
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nThis was a film that Kurosawa was having a hard time gettingnmade because it made revolutionary statements against nuclear energy. Producersndidn’t want to produce a film that would criticize the government. So Kurosawa branchednout to Steven Spielberg, who convinced Warner Brothers to distribute the film. Kurosawanhad things to say about humanity and nothing was going to stop him from makingnhis truthful film. How truthful is this film? Well, for example, on the story ‘MountnFuji in Red’ Kurosawa basically calls the government ‘liars’ for callingnNuclear Power Plants “safe”. On the short film entitled ‘The Tunnel’, a retirednmilitary general encounters all of the soldiers who died under his command,nplacing the blame on him and his superiors for sending them to their deaths. Andnthese are just two of the eight stories. The thing is that these shorts speaknof undeniable truths, however harsh they might sound to whomever. But you knownhow things go in this world we live in, you say the truth, you get in trouble, whichnis the reason why I appreciate films that are brave and truthful like this one.
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nAside from including beautiful, thought provoking insightsnon life, the film is also a beauty to look at. My favorite of the shorts has anpainter visiting an art museum showcasing Van Gogh’s paintings. The artistnlooks at the paintings so much that he ends up going inside the paintings,nwalking through them, and actually meeting Van Gogh himself, who by the way isnplayed by none other than Martin Scorcese himself! This is my favorite shortnfilm in Dreams because it talks about the creative/artistic process. Alsonbecause Kurosawa managed to successfully recreate some of Van Gogh’s paintings,nits amazing. Bottom line is with Dreams you get a beautiful looking film thatnhas a lot to say. It’s the kind of film that a director makes at the end of hisncareer, you know, the kind that resumes everything the director has learnednabout life, the most important things, the themes that truly, really matter; thenactions that have to be criticized; the experiences and emotions that need tonbe remembered and passed on from generation to generation. Kind of like what Chaplin did with Limelight (1952)nor Ridley Scott did with Prometheus (2012), films that are made by directors atnthe end of their career, which inevitably turn out more profound than theirnearlier films, because these directors have lived full lives and have so muchnmore to say. So that’s what Dreams is all about. Kurosawa would go on to make twonmore films after Dreams: Rhapsody in August (1991) and Maadadayo (1993). WithnDreams you get Kurosawa at the end of his career, at his most insightful, givingnus his last opinion on how things are in the world. A beautiful, thoughtnprovoking film.
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nRating: 5 out of 5
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