This movie might well encapsulate Akira Kurosawa's ambivalent relationship with the Japanese movie-going public, because if you watch this movie keeping Frank Capra in the back of your mind, you can see that it hits all the clichés of a Capra film, which is about as un-Japanese as you can be in terms of style. And yet, when the movie is over, you suddenly realize that it doesn't end the way a Capra movie would end. It isn't that upbeat. The ending might not have been enough to win back the Japanese audience at the time, but it certainly strikes the American viewer as an unexpected, almost realistic ending.
Toshiro Mifune is the handsome leading man here, but his character has little character. Yoshiko "Shirley" Yamaguchi as the female lead is nice to look at, too, and has a beautiful voice. (She was known as the Japanese Judy Garland - if you can imagine Judy being caught up in a World War II propaganda scandal.) The trouble with both nominal leads is that they are ciphers. He is an eccentric painter and she is a popular songstress. They are stoic throughout their victimization by a tabloid that prints a photo of them together and then prints an unverified (and untrue) story that has them carrying on a torrid love affair.
But Takashi Shimura is the principal reason to watch the movie. He plays an ambulance chasing attorney who presents himself to Mifune's character after learning that he is suing the tabloid. The lawyer wants to be an honest man but falls far short, and he agonizes over it while continuing to do it. At the last moment, he tries to redeem himself only to bring ruin upon his own head. (He also tells the audience a significant sociological fact: That in 1950, Japan had little more than three percent the number of lawyers that the United States had. This reflected a different attitude toward the legal system in Japan, one that would find suing a tabloid over a scandalous story as being less socially acceptable than would have been in the U.S. in the same era.)
Also worth mentioning are Yoko Katsuragi as the lawyer's tubercular daughter who tugs at the heartstrings of the painter (and the Capra-universe audience) and Eitaro Ozawa as the cynical publisher who seeks to ensure his victory in court by exploiting the cardinal weaknesses of the plaintiffs' attorney. Ozawa makes a good villain, smiling complacently at his own cleverness. Katsuragi is the Tiny Tim of the piece, but her lawyer father is the guilt-ridden Scrooge and Bob Cratchit rolled into one (which only reinforces what I said about Shimura having the plum role; imagine Scrooge and Cratchit battling within a single soul).
Toshiro Mifune is the handsome leading man here, but his character has little character. Yoshiko "Shirley" Yamaguchi as the female lead is nice to look at, too, and has a beautiful voice. (She was known as the Japanese Judy Garland - if you can imagine Judy being caught up in a World War II propaganda scandal.) The trouble with both nominal leads is that they are ciphers. He is an eccentric painter and she is a popular songstress. They are stoic throughout their victimization by a tabloid that prints a photo of them together and then prints an unverified (and untrue) story that has them carrying on a torrid love affair.
But Takashi Shimura is the principal reason to watch the movie. He plays an ambulance chasing attorney who presents himself to Mifune's character after learning that he is suing the tabloid. The lawyer wants to be an honest man but falls far short, and he agonizes over it while continuing to do it. At the last moment, he tries to redeem himself only to bring ruin upon his own head. (He also tells the audience a significant sociological fact: That in 1950, Japan had little more than three percent the number of lawyers that the United States had. This reflected a different attitude toward the legal system in Japan, one that would find suing a tabloid over a scandalous story as being less socially acceptable than would have been in the U.S. in the same era.)
Also worth mentioning are Yoko Katsuragi as the lawyer's tubercular daughter who tugs at the heartstrings of the painter (and the Capra-universe audience) and Eitaro Ozawa as the cynical publisher who seeks to ensure his victory in court by exploiting the cardinal weaknesses of the plaintiffs' attorney. Ozawa makes a good villain, smiling complacently at his own cleverness. Katsuragi is the Tiny Tim of the piece, but her lawyer father is the guilt-ridden Scrooge and Bob Cratchit rolled into one (which only reinforces what I said about Shimura having the plum role; imagine Scrooge and Cratchit battling within a single soul).