Cardiac161

So looking forward to seeing this.


It's quite surprising there hasn't been a documentary based on Toshiro Mifune (though I know there may have been a couple that were made solely for Japanese audiences years ago).

Highly recommend also reading The Emperor and the Wolf which is a fantastic account of the lives and collaborative/separate works of Kurosawa and Mifune .

Solid Snake

I think he was probably one of the best ever, if not the best to this day. Much better than those in the eras he encompassed in Japan or the rest of the world. Especially most of all the big name US actors who were shit compared to him. Mifune was insanely strong as an actor. He didn't need star power. He could back up his stardom w/ his skill. Bogart? Crap. Hepburn? Not even worth the load that made her. Either of the Hepburns. Heston? Horseshit. Mifune was a god in acting. None of those stars of the past were worth the time of the day compared to Mifune. He had variety in talent. Insanely varied in his craft.

Very few in the past and today could even be at his level of talent. Amazing actor.

inri222

Look up Tatsuya Nakadai (star of Kagemusha & Ran). The collaborations between Nakadai and Masaki Kobayashi are just as good as some of the ones by Mifune and Kurosawa.

DaveyJoe

Hara Kiri is my favorite Japanese movie/performance of the 60s.

danfindlay

Tatsuya Nakadai, Takeshi Shimura and Toshiro Mifune. I will watch anything featuring these three. I can't wait to see this documentary. I just got to watch The Seven Samurai on the big screen a couple weeks ago with my brother. Special one night showing. Truly fantastic to see it in a theater even if it did highlight the issues with the print. Every time I watch Kurosawa direct or one of these three men act I notice something new that makes me appreciate them more. I can't wait to watch this documentary.

Solid Snake

Takashi Shimura makes me sad. not for his talent but how Kurosawa had something really good w/ him but then started to not use him so much as Mifune became bigger.

danfindlay

Ikiru, him sitting on the swing....wow.

dom56

I enjoyed watching Mifune in samurai films but I also like his work on modern films like High and Low and The Bad Sleep Well.

bluetoast

I need to check this out. Going to be seeing Throne of Blood in theaters this Sunday as well.

Solid Snake

Throne of Blood has the look that I'd love to see it in a theater.

Ash Ketchum

I just watched Kurosawa's THE QUIET DUEL (1949) for the first time, another one starring Mifune and Shimura. Very melodramatic and quite a change of pace for Mifune. Quite a contrast with the similarly themed DRUNKEN ANGEL (1948) from a year earlier with the same stars/director combo, only Mifune plays a doctor this time. If you've never seen DRUNKEN ANGEL, you're in for a treat. That was Mifune's first role for Kurosawa, a reckless young gangster with tuberculosis who refuses Dr. Shimura's order to stop drinking.

Mifune in DRUNKEN ANGEL:

Solid Snake

I love Mifune a lot for how he was in I Live in Fear.

B5Erik

Toshiro Mifune is one of my all time favorite actors. He may be my singular favorite, I don't know - all I do know is that I love him regardless of what role he's playing. I've never seen him give anything less than a good performance, and usually he was spectacular.

My daughter loves him, too. Kikuchiyo won her over, then she came to love The Hidden Fortress and liked Yojimbo.

He was amazing. I just watched Shogun for the first time, and he owns every scene he's in. He had the gravitas to play that role and give it the weight it needed.

Ash Ketchum

I recently watched Mifune's first Hollywood film, GRAND PRIX (1966), for the first time. In it, he plays a Japanese automaker who hires a disgraced American driver, James Garner, to race in the Grand Prix for him. Mifune's performance is ruined by having Paul Frees, the famous cartoon voice actor (Boris Badenov) and dubber for Godzilla movies, do Mifune's voice for when he speaks English. It takes you completely out of the movie. Better they should have left his lines in Japanese and had an interpreter translate them for Garner. But that would have made an already interminable movie even longer.

Solid Snake

Now with the culture you've grown into and the one to where we are now? Yes. It more than likely takes you of it. In that time though? It wasn't uncommon to have dubbing shit like that, you know that too. I've gotten used to it as much as it irks me.

Paff

Then you might be a bit disappointed by The Last Samurai; I saw it two weeks ago (it was the closing night film of my film festival), and his non-samurai roles are mostly glossed over. The focus is on the action films. But I'm with you, I like his work in contemporary dramatic films. I really enjoyed his performance in Stray Dog.

It will be an enjoyable experience. My first time seeing it was theatrically (on a double bill with Stray Dog), and the audience's reaction to the wife's (aka Lady Macbeth) machinations was fantastic.

Ash Ketchum

True, if I had seen it at the time the effect would have been different because I hadn't yet seen any of Mifune's Japanese films and wouldn't know his voice. Nor was I aware of Paul Frees. But I didn't see it until 50 years later.

Ash Ketchum

I went to see this yesterday. It has a lot of good stuff in it, chiefly interviews with people who worked with him, including four of his leading ladies (one of whom, Terumi Niki, from RED BEARD, remains absolutely gorgeous) and good ol' Yoshio Tsuchiya, who many of you may know from his frequent appearances in Godzilla movies. (He was the lead alien, Controller X, in GODZILLA VS. MONSTER ZERO.) Not to mention Haruo Nakajima, who played Godzilla and one of the bandits in SEVEN SAMURAI in the same year!

But there's no forceful presence in the filmmaking and no forceful personalities to guide us into Mifune's life. Why didn't they interview Tatsuya Nakadai? He's still around and available. (I saw him speak in NYC a few years ago.) Why didn't they dig up interview footage with Mifune and Kurosawa? I remember seeing Mifune being interviewed in a TV documentary--and speaking English--40-odd years ago. That documentary isn't even listed on IMDB.

It's definitely worth seeing, but it could have been much better.

Here's a review by Owen Gleiberman in Variety that pretty much sums up my feelings on the film:
http://variety.com/2016/film/reviews...ne-1201926856/

And here's a shot of Tsuchiya from the film:

dom56

^^
Nice read. Clicking on the link, what pic is that from?

Ash Ketchum

That's Alain Delon with Mifune in RED SUN (1972). Charles Bronson stars. The only time a member of the Seven Samurai and the Magnificent Seven teamed up on screen. And Alain Delon played LE SAMOURAI.

dom56

Never saw Red Sun. It's any good?

Solid Snake

Pretty badass flick...

dom56

Sound like fun. Tried to rent it from Netflix, unfortunately doesn't seen to be out yet on region 1.

E Unit

Yeah, if you like Mifune, it is very much worth watching. I picked up the Region B release from Paul_SD at the beginning of the year. Very much worth it.

I'm looking forward to seeing this doc, even though it should have been more thorough.

Ash Ketchum

The doc really only covers a handful of period roles Mifune did for Kurosawa: RASHOMON, SEVEN SAMURAI, THRONE OF BLOOD, YOJIMBO and RED BEARD. Important collaborations, to be sure, but I wanted more. I would have loved some discussion of HIGH AND LOW, esp. if they could have gotten Tatsuya Nakadai on camera.


P.S. I haven't seen RED SUN in many years, but I remember liking it a lot. It's easily Mifune's best role in a non-Japanese film. And it's his own voice.