Throne of Blood

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Kumonosu-jô (Throne of Blood)

October 12th 2011 07:32

Akira Kurosawa’s version of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, Throne of Blood (1957) is regarded as one of the finest cinema adaptations of the bard’s work, and I can whole-heartedly agree. It is a masterful play on greed, megalomania, betrayal, and murder. But Shakespeare or not, it is a great and powerful story regardless: the man who is lead on by a phantom prophecy and the machinations of his manipulative wife, and with delusions of grandeur spinning his fragile ego, he commits murderous treason, only to have his best friend turn against him, and eventually, his entire army, at the eleventh hour. Throne of Blood packs a dark poetic punch.

Toshiro Mifune as Washizu

Hideo Oguni, Shinobu Hashimoto, Ryuzo Kikushima, and Kurosawa’s screenplay transposes the infamous Scottish tragedy to medieval Japan. After a great military victory, lords Washizu (Toshiro Mifune) and Miki (Akira Kubo) are lost in the dense Spider’s Web Forest (which is another of the movie’s English titles), where they meet a mysterious and androgynous old woman (Chieko Naniwa), all in white, who predicts great things for Washizu and great things for Miki's son. And sure enough, after the two warrior lords have had a bit of a giggle and are back at their castle to receive commendations for their work on the battlefield, the Emperor immediately promotes the pair of them … exactly as the white witch had predicated.

Isuzu Yamada as Asaji

The perpetually scowling Washizu, encouraged by his ambitious and scheming wife Asaji (Isuzu Yamada), yearns to make even more of the prophecy come true, even if it means killing the Emperor. And so, boil, boil, toil and trouble, the cauldron of contempt, corruption, and cold-blooded killing bubbles away, clouding their minds of any moral virtue. Greed feeds greed feeds greed.

Akira Kubo as Miki

Shot in high contrast black and white and sporting an elaborate production design, most of which is on location, but there are several impressive sets, especially in the forest. Kurosawa, who influenced many contemporary directors, and continues to do so, moves his camera like a restless animal (much of Scorsese’s dramatic and dynamic camerawork in his early movies is inspired by Kurosawa’s visual grammar.)

The costumes are stunning, including the surrealism of the forest shrubbery as camouflage for the enemy army. But it is the military attire that is most memorable, the body armour and helmets. The woman’s kimono’s, while not the most flattering costumes, are still an eyeful. Even in monochrome the look of the warriors and the women still paints a striking picture.

Chieko Naniwa as the ghost woman

Winning the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival Throne of Blood has become both a bona fide classic, but also something of a cult favourite amongst Samurai fans. Not to forget the literary kudos with the bard lovers. Curiously Shakespeare doesn’t receive a credit, not even as an inspiration.

Human pin-cushion!

One of the most memorable – and chilling – moments is when Washizu races back into the forest to see if he can coax another prophetic gem from the lips of the old ghost woman, one to his favour, of course. As he’s galloping along the trail the phantom figure of the white woman races past in the background ahead of Washizu. It’s a nightmarish moment of beauty. However, the penultimate image of horror beauty comes in the movie’s last fifteen minutes when Washizu realises that the absurd riddle-some prediction from the ghost woman; that he will not be defeated until the forest rises to the castle, is in fact occurring, he turns in desperation for support from his soldiers, shouting hysterically from the balcony.

His men stare back blankly, their faith lost, their loyalty in ruin. They can only reply with their bows. This famous scene was in fact done with real arrows. Those that hit the wooden planks beside Mifune were not done with special effects, but rather choreographed with expert archers. Mifune would wave his arms to brush away the arrows sticking from the planks, in turn indicating to the archers which direction he was planning on moving. Kurosawa used real arrows in order to get an authentic expression and exclamations of fear from his lead actor. The arrows that hit Washizu’s torso were fake bamboo prop arrows, including the one that passes through his neck, enhanced with fancy quick editing, but in the blur of the action it all looks horribly, brilliantly real, and the image of the mortally-wounded lord collapsing in front of his mutineers, the misty clouds swirling around him, is worth a thousand words.

Here’s the trailer:

Throne of Blood DVD is courtesy of Madman Entertainment, many thanks!

DVD cover art © 1957 Toho Co., Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

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