Dreams screenplay in English

I don’t know about the legality of this, but someone (I think Cinephilia & Beyond) has made a pdf copy available of the English translation of Kurosawa’s screenplay for Dreams, which you can access here.

It’s especially interesting because it includes also the sections that never made it to the final film. In some cases like the first dream (“Flying”), it seems pretty obvious why: the “I” ends up flying amongst stars and galaxies, which probably would have cost quite a bit to render in a satisfactory manner.

The other unfilmed dreams are “Asura”, which is probably Kurosawa’s most directly Buddhist piece (and perhaps therefore dropped from the internationally funded production), and “A Wonderful Dream”, which is quite literally a dream of world peace.

The order of the remaining sections is also quite different than in the finished work. “A Wonderful Dream” for instance replaces “A Village of Watermills” as the last dream, moving it much earlier in the sequence.

I first thought that this must be coming from the Akira Kurosawa Digital Archive, but on a closer look I remembered wrong as the archive doesn’t include an actual English translation of the screenplay, but a far more interesting book in which Kurosawa explains the film and his intentions somewhat, and which also includes location information and a detailed production journal, among other things. The catalogue number for that is 22.28.06.

Thanks for the link to the “Dreams” screenplay. I think you are right about the Asura segment which most likely only the Japanese would understand. A Wonderful Dream seemed more than a bit corny, as was Flying; a very little kid’s dream.

It sadly seems that the pdf file isn’t available anymore. Would any of the users here still happen to have a copy of it? I am asking as a screenwriting student looking to study my favourite filmmakers work. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

I have a pdf of the English language Dreams screenplay for anyone who wants it.

I also have:

Ikiru
Kagemusha
Ran
Seven Samurai
Throne of Blood
(and the unmade Mask of the Black Death)

If anyone has any others, I’d welcome them as well.

I have a pdf of the English language Dreams screenplay for anyone who wants it.

I also have:

Ikiru
Kagemusha
Ran
Seven Samurai
Throne of Blood
(and the unmade Mask of the Black Death)

If anyone has any others, I’d welcome them as well.

That’s a great collection, Higher and Lower. I only have Ran and The Mask of the Black Death myself. If you could provide a download link to the rest of them here, or email them through the address on my profile page, I would be beyond grateful to you.

Hornet- how can I get the pdf of Dreams? Thanks

Hornet- how can I get the pdf of Dreams? Thanks

Here’s a Google Drive link to some of Kurosawa’s screenplays that have been translated into English:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1gF5qe14gnfmNzUpMopMhrxcXrMZgPI2H?usp=sharing

You can find the pdf of Dreams there. Enjoy.

Thanks for those… 😉

Great idea on the Google Drive folder, Hornet!

If anyone else comes across any scripts that we don’t have in the “archive” here, please add them.

Thanks!

Thank you for sharing them.