End of SCANDAL

“…At the end of the picture, the two of them [? — surely Richie is misremembering this] walk past the wall on their way to probable happiness. Now time has passed, it has rained, the posters are torn and ragged, one cannot tell which is Yoshiko, which Mifune..”

Am I missing something? The last time we see Aoe and Sayo is at the post-trial press conference. They do not walk past the poster wall, as far as I can tell. Was Richie mistaken?

LS

Not the best way he worded it, but the two sentences have no direct connection.

The wall he is referring to is the wall blocking happiness, with the wall being the entire scandal. They wouldn’t be walking together, since they have no romantic relationship, but they walk together in the same fight.

( I find Richie sometimes uses terms that can be confused for various things, and no one appears to be for sure what he is referring to)

The next sentence, which used the words “Now time has passed” is not referring to the previous sentence, but the time shift that happens when Hiruta chases his hat. If time didnt pass, then the poster would be in good condition, as the trial was advertisement for the magazine.

So Richie is simply referring to the posters being smeared and torn, going unrecognized and lacking the ability to tell whom it is about to someone previous unaware of the scandal- thus triggering the notion that false text and image come and go.

Of course, this is just my take on it.

I did do a frame by frame on the last scene and Mifune nor Yamaguchi do not appear on screen, so decide what you will.

I like this movie, but it really fails to ever develop into anything, too many things are left opened. If Kurosawa’s goal was to point out moral decline, he didnt really leave us with a punch, but instead faded off.