Akira Kurosawa News, Information and Discussion
News archive for January, 2007
An article on Toru Takemitsu
31 January, 2007The New Yorker has an article on the Japanese composer Toru Takemitsu (1930-1996), who is best known to those passionate about Akira Kurosawa’s movies for his scores for Ran and More...
AKN&I Returns From Maintenance: New Domain
29 January, 2007 (4 comments)The maintenance phase should now be over, and things are back in full operation. Comment sections are open again, so feel free to leave your thoughts! The most visible change More...
AKN&I Maintenance: Comments Temporarily Closed
28 January, 2007The next couple of days will see some changes in the way this website is hosted, and in order to keep everything running smoothly and prevent any more loss of More...
DigitallyObsessed reviews Yojimbo and Sanjuro DVDs
28 January, 2007Digitally Obsessed has a fairly long review of Criterion’s Yojimbo and Sanjuro discs. The movies are given top ratings, as is the video transfer, while audio and extras receive “only” B+. I also like the way they list the specs in a table format. See here for the reviews.
Yojimbo / Sanjuro DVD Review at Audiophile Audition
26 January, 2007 (1 comment)Here is yet another mid-length review of Criterion’s take on Kurosawa’s Yojimbo and Sanjuro movies by Audiophile Audition. The films get 5/5 stars, and the discussion is similar to what More...
70 Hours of Film Footage Available from the Making of Ran?
26 January, 2007 (6 comments)Someone has recently posted a 5-minute long video on YouTube that shows behind-the-scenes activity from the shooting of Kurosawa’s late classic movie Ran. As the documentary-like film plays, and narrator More...
AKNI Comment Editing
24 January, 2007 (9 comments)Due to popular demand, comment editing is now available on this website. The solution is time-based, so at the moment you have 15 minutes after your original post to edit More...
Criterion’s Yojimbo and Sanjuro out on Tuesday
22 January, 2007 (25 comments)This is just a reminder to those of you who live in the US that Criterion’s new Yojimbo and Sanjuro DVDs will be available on Tuesday. The new high More...
AKNI Style Changes
22 January, 2007 (8 comments)There have been some relatively minor changes to the design of this website in the past couple of days. Hopefully, navigation around the site is now a bit simpler, and More...
Two Kurosawa mentions
21 January, 2007If you happen to be in Tokyo on Monday and enjoy contemporary dance, you may be interested to know that a production called Sokerissa! will be staged at three o’clock More...
Two ‘Waiting on the Weather’ related links
20 January, 2007 (8 comments)The Japan Times has two articles related to Teruyo Nogami’s Waiting on the Weather — Making Movies with Akira Kurosawa. Firstly, there is a relatively short (but positive) review of the book. Secondly, and perhaps more interestingly, there is an interview with Teruyo Nogami about the book and Kurosawa in general.
Criterion’s Seven Samurai Makes Sound & Vision’s Top 10 DVDs and CDs of 2006
20 January, 2007 (11 comments)Sound & Vision, which calls itself the world’s largest entertainment equipment magazine, has given us yet another top 10 of 2006 list. In this one, Criterion’s triple-DVD take on Akira More...
Article: Senseis and samurais - the gory films of Akira Kurosawa
19 January, 2007Written in connection with the current Akira Kurosawa retrospective in Santa Monica, USA, the following article published in the Daily Trojan is a brief look at the depiction of war More...
DVD File review of Criterion’s Yojimbo and Sanjuro
17 January, 2007DVD File has reviewed Criterion’s new Yojimbo and Sanjuro releases, and as expected gives thumbs up for the product. There is nothing really new in the review, but just for the completeness’s sake, here is the link.
DVD Talk reviews Criterion’s new Yojimbo and Sanjuro
15 January, 2007DVD Talk has reviewed Criterion’s new Yojimbo and Sanjuro releases, and the verdict is what we have wanted to hear — the movies are, indeed, hugely upgraded from Criterion’s original releases. (Then again, after the Seven Samurai release, I don’t think anyone had any doubts about this?) For the full review, head to DVD Talk.
Article: Kurosawa’s Red Harvests
12 January, 2007 (1 comment)The online edition of Tuesday’s New York Sun has a two-page article on the new Yojimbo and Sanjuro releases from Criterion. The write-up looks at both the influences as well as the background to the two films. See here for the article.
An Article on ‘See What I Wanna See’ (the “Rashomon musical”)
7 January, 2007The Boston Globe has a two-page article on Michael John LaChiusa’s See What I Wanna See, a musical originally inspired by Akira Kurosawa’s Rashomon and further developed from Ryunosuke Akutagawa’s More...
Seven Samurai tops DVD Talk’s Top 10 DVDs of 2006
2 January, 2007 (1 comment)Although they themselves call it “arbitrary, non-inclusive, anglocentric and all wrong. It shuns indie films in favor of big studio ones, it’s seriously lacking in TV on DVD, and is More...
Further YouTube videos
1 January, 2007There are two new (and unrelated) YouTube videos taking inspiration from Akira Kurosawa. The first one calls itself a horror version of Akira Kurosawa’s Ikiru, although I am not entirely sure why. Perhaps a more interesting entry, then, is this paper-cut animated Sanshiro video, where you can relive the final battle from Kurosawa’s Sanshiro Sugata. Well, sort of.
First Episode of Samurai 7 on YouTube
1 January, 2007 (10 comments)Someone has uploaded the full first episode of Samurai 7, the anime series based on Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai, to YouTube. In case you have been wondering how well (or how More...