Rashomon (1950)
IMDB Rating: 8.4
Storyline:
A priest, a woodcutter and another man are taking refuge from a
rainstorm in the shell of a former gatehouse called Rashômon. The priest
and the woodcutter are recounting te story of a murdered samurai whose
body the woodcutter discovered three days earlier in a forest grove.
Both were summoned to testify at the murder trial, the priest who ran
into the samurai and his wife traveling through the forest just before
the murder occurred. Three other people who testified at the trial are
supposedly the only direct witnesses: a notorious bandit named Tajômaru,
who allegedly murdered the samurai and raped his wife; the white veil
cloaked wife of the samurai; and the samurai himself who testifies
through the use of a medium. The three tell a similarly structured story
- that Tajômaru kidnapped and bound the samurai so that he could rape
- the wife – but which ultimately contradict each other, the motivations
- and the actual killing being what differ. The woodcutter reveals at
- Rashômon that he
