Rashomon

Widely considered one of the greatest films of all time, Akira Kurosawa’s Rashomon is the film which, more than any other, opened Japanese cinema to Western audiences after it won the Grand Prize at the Venice Film Festival. The enigmatic film was based on stories by Ryunosuke Akutagawa but achieves a perfection on film that is entirely its own.

Set in ninth-century Kyoto, Rashomon is a psychological thriller told from four points of view: a woman, her murdered husband (speaking from beyond the grave), his attacker, and a woodcutter who witnessed the crime. With the exquisite cinematography, memorable sound design, and shocking revelations, Kurosawa’s masterpiece probes the very nature of truth and justice.

Film website: www.janusfilms.com/films/1048

In Japanese with English subtitles