53.20003
$10.24
"Stylistically arresting, unbearably tense, darkly funny and devastatingly bleak..."Sight and Sound 3 stars out of 5 -- "Shion Sono's horror smuggles blackly witty satirical stabs at masculinity into its shrill shock assaults."Total Film "[D]eliciously warped....COLD FISH charts the twisted alliance of two tropical-fish salesmen with baleful glee."New York Times42.89585
$12.48
BOOK REVIEWS COMING SOON!!!!32.40749
$30.75
31.83629
$62.96
22.68525
$31.50
16.20375
$79.14
16.20375
$38.46
15.17987
$186.91
14.65843
$33.41
12.963
$8.04
11.34262
$48.48
11.34262
$35.64
"This Dostoevsky adaptation is as close as Kurosawa came to making a full-blown melodrama." Sight and Sound9.36077
$18.96
"...Meticulous and perfectionist as ever, Kurosawa had an entire small town constructed for the film..."Sight and Sound "[B]eguiling..." Uncut9.342098
$31.82
3 stars out of 5 -- "[U]nderneath there's still the love and regard for characters caught up in the plights of their lives; Kurosawa is one of the great humanists of cinema."Chicago Sun-Times9.339539
$22.92
"...Pulpish..." -- Rating: B Entertainment Weekly "...Rarely has [Kurosawa]...been so witty or even as subversive..." New York Times9.322341
$18.96
"...Probably the most influential action movie made....[The film] cemented Akira Kurosawa's rep as one of cinema's all-time greats..."Total Film9.310564
$31.19
"...Probably the most influential action movie made....[The film] cemented Akira Kurosawa's rep as one of cinema's all-time greats..."Total Film9.310564
$30.34
"...Sweeping..." -- RecommendedPremiere "...Kurosawa directs RAN with the easy grace that comes of a lifetime's experience..." Sight and Sound "...Brisk and vital, elegiac and contemplative, intimate and epic, tragic yet shot through with humor. It combines the energy of youth with the perspective of maturity..." Los Angeles Times "...The film is visually magnificent. Kurosawa refined everything he learned about battle scenes in KAGEMUSHA and the earlier samurai epics..." Chicago Sun-Times "...A deft switch on Shakespeare's King Lear....[A] stirring epic about familial deceit..." USA Today "The film] still packs a punch 19 years after its original release." Uncut "Transposing King Lear to feudal Japan, Akira Kurosawa delivers this visual feast of Shakespeare, No theater, and action epics." Entertainment Weekly Ranked #9 in Entertainment Weekly's Top Ten DVDs Of The Year -- "With his last great masterpiece, Akira Kurosawa accomplished the remarkable -- improving upon Shakespeare." Entertainment Weekly 5 stars out of 5 -- "Intimate and epic, beautiful and savage, RAN glides between astonishing action sequences and forceful drama..."Total Film9.294288
$18.19
"...One of the truest presentations of Shakespeare's tragedy..."Los Angeles Times "...Kurosawa's visual daring is sustained to the very end....This stands as one of the most successful translations of Shakespeare to film..." Sight and Sound9.28736
$15.92
"...One of the truest presentations of Shakespeare's tragedy..."Los Angeles Times "...Kurosawa's visual daring is sustained to the very end....This stands as one of the most successful translations of Shakespeare to film..." Sight and Sound9.28736
$31.19
"...A small gangster/neorealist masterpiece..." -- Rating: A- Entertainment Weekly "...One of Akira Kurosawa's early significant movies....The director reaps a lot of atmosphere here shooting in muddy street settings..." USA Today "Kurosawa's noirish melodrama has a lyricism and depth his epics don't always achieve." Uncut "With its central image of a thick, toxic pond, the film makes potent use of disease as a metaphor for the state of post-war Japan." Sight and Sound9.277319
$31.68
3 stars out of 5 -- "J-horror maestro Kiyoshi Kurosawa turns losing face into a living nightmare in this disconcerting saga..."Empire 4 stars out of 5 -- "Coming on like a reworking of Laurence Cantet's TIME OUT....The satire on Japanese obsessions hits home."Total Film "[T]here is more than a touch of horror to its story of a salaryman whose downsizing sets off a series of cataclysmic events."New York Times 4 stars out of 5 -- "TOKYO SONATA probes Japanese society with an incisiveness and lucidity that renders it all the more relevant and universal....[With] striking cinematography, a spare script and naturalistic performances..."Box Office "[I]nventive Japanese filmmaker Kiyoshi Kurosawa finds just the right melancholy tone to suit a new and all to familiar kind of horror: economic downsizing." -- Grade: A-Entertainment Weekly "TOKYO SONATA is bold, acutely observant and universal in its wide-ranging concerns and implications....So strong a director is Kurosawa that he not only can get away with piling on disasters but makes his picture all the more powerful as a result."Los Angeles Times 3.5 stars out of 5 -- "All of the performances have perfect pitch; the young son engages us in the same way as the hero of Truffaut's THE 400 BLOWS."Chicago Sun-Times Included in Chicago Sun-Times's "The Best Foreign Films Of 2009" -- "[Kurosawa] derails our expectations with two totally unexpected scenes..."Chicago Sun-Times9.275073
$19.35
"[With] superb tension-racheting sequences..." Uncut "Kurosawa expertly balances cop-thriller elements with quieter, more personal moments." Sight and Sound "[A]n epic doozy....Witness its many intricately timed sequences..." -- Grade: A-Entertainment Weekly9.272135
$31.80
"[With] superb tension-racheting sequences..."Uncut "Kurosawa expertly balances cop-thriller elements with quieter, more personal moments."Sight and Sound "[A]n epic doozy....Witness its many intricately timed sequences..." -- Grade: A-Entertainment Weekly9.272135
$30.03
"...What really gives the film its impact is less the multi-layered narrative than the dynamic direction and powerhouse performance from Toshiro Mifune..." Sight and Sound "A look at RASHOMON's exquisite visuals makes it apparent that Sergio Leone's westerns were inspired by more than just Akira Kurosawa's plots." Premiere 5 stars out of 5 -- "[A] taut study of the subjectivity of truth....RASHOMON's intricate moves have been borrowed by a legion of Hollywood imitators, from THE USUAL SUSPECTS to VANTAGE POINT."Empire 4 stars out of 5 -- "Audiences were captivated by the lyrical beauty of Kurosawa's direction and the dynamic power of his editing, zipping the narrative along with hard-edged horizontal wipes."Total Film "The wonder of RASHOMON is that while the shadowplay of truth and memory is going on, we are absorbed by what we trust is an unfolding story."Chicago Sun-Times "Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa's 1950 RASHOMON has had such a profound cultural influence that there is even a psychosociological phenomenon named after it."Washington Post9.268466
$15.32
"...What really gives the film its impact is less the multi-layered narrative than the dynamic direction and powerhouse performance from Toshiro Mifune..."Sight and Sound "A look at RASHOMON's exquisite visuals makes it apparent that Sergio Leone's westerns were inspired by more than just Akira Kurosawa's plots."Premiere 5 stars out of 5 -- "[A] taut study of the subjectivity of truth....RASHOMON's intricate moves have been borrowed by a legion of Hollywood imitators, from THE USUAL SUSPECTS to VANTAGE POINT."Empire 4 stars out of 5 -- "Audiences were captivated by the lyrical beauty of Kurosawa's direction and the dynamic power of his editing, zipping the narrative along with hard-edged horizontal wipes."Total Film "The wonder of RASHOMON is that while the shadowplay of truth and memory is going on, we are absorbed by what we trust is an unfolding story."Chicago Sun-Times "Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa's 1950 RASHOMON has had such a profound cultural influence that there is even a psychosociological phenomenon named after it."Washington Post9.268466
$31.19
"...What really gives the film its impact is less the multi-layered narrative than the dynamic direction and powerhouse performance from Toshiro Mifune..."Sight and Sound "A look at RASHOMON's exquisite visuals makes it apparent that Sergio Leone's westerns were inspired by more than just Akira Kurosawa's plots."Premiere 5 stars out of 5 -- "[A] taut study of the subjectivity of truth....RASHOMON's intricate moves have been borrowed by a legion of Hollywood imitators, from THE USUAL SUSPECTS to VANTAGE POINT."Empire 4 stars out of 5 -- "Audiences were captivated by the lyrical beauty of Kurosawa's direction and the dynamic power of his editing, zipping the narrative along with hard-edged horizontal wipes."Total Film "The wonder of RASHOMON is that while the shadowplay of truth and memory is going on, we are absorbed by what we trust is an unfolding story."Chicago Sun-Times "Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa's 1950 RASHOMON has had such a profound cultural influence that there is even a psychosociological phenomenon named after it."Washington Post9.268466
$23.30
"...[Kurosawa's] swansong..."Sight and Sound "...There's an abundance of striking imagery throughout, particularly in early vignettes that celebrate childhood innocence..." -- 3 out of 4 stars USA Today "...Grand....The magical and mysterious are mixed with the practical, funny and polemical..."New York Times "...[The tales'] awesome visual beauty encourages a degree of patience that's usually well rewarded..."Entertainment Weekly "...AKIRA KUROSAWA'S DREAMS contains some of the most beautiful images ever conceived by the man who is widely regarded as the world's greatest living director..."Los Angeles Times9.264004
$17.53
"Kurosawa reworks HAMLET as a tale of corporate skullduggery in '60s Tokyo." Uncut "Toshiro Mifune brings real edge to his role as the wronged son out to avenge his father..." Sight and Sound "BAD feels stunningly topical, it has a cool title, and Mifune boils brightly..." Entertainment Weekly "This is a great movie, brimming with heart-pounding tension..." Rolling Stone9.263814
$24.62
"...A sweeping epic of the times of clan wars in 16th century Japan....Tatsuya Nakadai is extraordinary..." Variety "...[Kurosawa's] most physically elaborate, most awesome film, full of magnificent views....Majestic..." New York Times "...[A] classic..." USA Today "[O]ften breathtaking..." Entertainment Weekly 3 stars out of 5 -- "Primarily a chamber piece shot in muted tones, it switches to exaggerated colour for a couple of large-scale battles..."Total Film "[S]hot in spectacular fashion. The use of colour and landscape is hugely impressive..."Sight and Sound9.248931
$30.69
"...There's no lack of stunningly choreographed action scenes....[With a] final, breathtaking showdown..." Sight and Sound "...SANJURO exhibits all of Kurosawa's formal beauty while parodying the conventions of the Japanese action film..." Total Film "The climactic duel shows the great Japanese director at his controlled, no-frills best." Uncut9.229534
$33.30
4 stars out of 4 -- "The tale is elegantly simple....A cinephile's dream."Rolling Stone9.221368
$52.86
"...There's no lack of stunningly choreographed action scenes....[With a] final, breathtaking showdown..." Sight and Sound "...SANJURO exhibits all of Kurosawa's formal beauty while parodying the conventions of the Japanese action film..." Total Film "The climactic duel shows the great Japanese director at his controlled, no-frills best." Uncut9.220744
$33.40
"...Kurosawa opens his story with a deliberate, low-key pacing, although at the end there is rage against the dying of the light..." Chicago Sun-Times "...Kurosawa never lets us forget that Watanabe's courage is as great as that of any warrior....A tale of heroism..." Sight and Sound "[An] extraordinary urban epic with an unusual two-part story construction that turns out to be the right narrative choice."USA Today "[With] storytelling brio, sharp observation, and incredible emotional power..."Premiere "Takashi Shimura delivers a fine, understated performance..." Uncut 4 stars out of 5 -- "[T]his moving melodrama continued Kurosawa's revolt against narrative linearity....This is a masterpiece of humanist cinema..."Empire9.21384
$15.78
"...Kurosawa opens his story with a deliberate, low-key pacing, although at the end there is rage against the dying of the light..." Chicago Sun-Times "...Kurosawa never lets us forget that Watanabe's courage is as great as that of any warrior....A tale of heroism..." Sight and Sound "[An] extraordinary urban epic with an unusual two-part story construction that turns out to be the right narrative choice."USA Today "[With] storytelling brio, sharp observation, and incredible emotional power..."Premiere "Takashi Shimura delivers a fine, understated performance..." Uncut 4 stars out of 5 -- "[T]his moving melodrama continued Kurosawa's revolt against narrative linearity....This is a masterpiece of humanist cinema..."Empire9.21384
$31.19
"[A] consistently unpredictable film....One of the more hopeful films the director has made to date, not to mention an ambitious new departure in style." Film Comment "BRIGHT FUTURE casts its spell by drawing out the horror of everyday existence bit by bit, and then tossing in some otherworldly weirdness that makes the hair on the back of your neck try to run for cover."New York Times "[T]he most spellbinding aspect of BRIGHT FUTURE is that the surrealism sustains its own squiddish logic, concluding with one of the most breathtaking film finales of the year." Entertainment Weekly "Confounding the supernatural genre, Kurosawa is a thoughtful stylist looking at fate..."Chicago Sun-Times "There's a dreamy, Lynchian quality to this wayward urban tale of two disaffected friends..."Sight and Sound9.210128
$17.69
"...Witty and surprisingly reflective....The result is a good little action picture with plenty of smarts and a nonchalant air..." Los Angeles Times "...Akira Kurosawa's THE SEVEN SAMURAI is not only a great film in its own right, but the source of a genre that would flow through the rest of the century..." Chicago Sun-Times "...THE SEVEN SAMURAI is still a movie that matters..." USA Today "...[A] forceful action movie, perhaps most startling because its heroes never lose sight of their honor and humanity..." Premiere "[S]till one of the most stirring adventure stories in the movies..."New York Times 4 stars out of 4 -- "[A]n adventure film with a complex emotional core -- that Hollywood has been imitating for years."Rolling Stone9.208872
$43.88
"...Witty and surprisingly reflective....The result is a good little action picture with plenty of smarts and a nonchalant air..." Los Angeles Times "...Akira Kurosawa's THE SEVEN SAMURAI is not only a great film in its own right, but the source of a genre that would flow through the rest of the century..." Chicago Sun-Times "...THE SEVEN SAMURAI is still a movie that matters..." USA Today "...[A] forceful action movie, perhaps most startling because its heroes never lose sight of their honor and humanity..." Premiere "[S]till one of the most stirring adventure stories in the movies..."New York Times 4 stars out of 4 -- "[A]n adventure film with a complex emotional core -- that Hollywood has been imitating for years."Rolling Stone9.208872
$44.05
4 stars out of 4 -- "The tale is elegantly simple....A cinephile's dream."Rolling Stone9.186206
$60.42
"...A rousing action-adventure...[and] a portrait of and an elegy to spiritual purity." -- Rating: A Entertainment Weekly "As in many Sokurov and Tarkovsky films, the landscape is as important as any character..."Sight and Sound9.186206
$20.10
"...[The film] blends intimate characterisation with vast vistas....The CinemaScope cinematography lends sweep..."Total Film9.167741
$24.63
"...[The film] blends intimate characterisation with vast vistas....The CinemaScope cinematography lends sweep..."Total Film9.16774
$15.47
3 stars out of 4 -- "PULSE possesses the dark art to make your pulse pound and your hair stand on end -- with no cheating." Rolling Stone "[I]mpressively well executed, making skillful use of distorted sound and unnatural movement....Nicely eerie..." Sight and Sound 3 stars out of 5 -- "There are enough unsettling images for genre fans, but this is less full-on shocker than quiet meditation on the loneliness of Tokyo." Uncut9.156847
$12.32
9.155309
$31.69
"...Haunting and persuasive....A beautifully made film, put together with elegance, control and a confident precision..." Los Angeles Times9.155309
$25.42
9.151042
$10.96
9.080717
$16.18
