Rashomon (1950)

Director: Akira Kurosawa

Cast: Toshiro Mifune, Machiko Kyō, Masayuki Mori, Takashi Shimura

Have I Seen It Before: Never. I have, however, watched at least five sitcom episodes over the last thirty years, so based on the law of averages alone, I’m familiar with the effect.

Did I Like It: There’s probably a warning that might need to be attached to any review of this film. No, it’s not that it’s sub-titled. Get comfortable with reading a movie. Not only are you limiting yourself, but do you ever miss really watching a movie without looking down at your phone? I’ve seen the future of active watching, and it is subtitled. No, this is a warning that, sight-unseen, one might be forgiven for thinking that this is another samurai adventure story in the vein of Yojimbo (1961), Seven Samurai (1954), or The Hidden Fortress (1958). It is a drama, and a harrowing one, but definitely one worth watching.

Ok, so I’m not 100 percent sure if the Japanese generally are just better than us cinematically, or if Kurosawa is better than everyone cinematically, but it is definitely one or the other. Thematically, there is something so central to the western identity that says “I am right, you are wrong” that every single Rashomon-rip off* hints that there is an objective truth and one of the story-tellers is right, and the others are wrong. What Kurosawa does is be content that everyone—victim and criminal; dead or living—has an equal level to their own delusion and deception.

*For all the shameless copying of the form done in American television, I can’t immediately think of a lot of American films that truck in the same construction. Vantage Point (2008), I guess, but that’s more of a question of what an individual can see, not so much a description of what they’re willing or able to see. So odd the divide on the device. Someone—please, not me—should write a paper on it.

Godzilla Minus One (2023)

Director: Takashi Yamazaki

Cast: Ryunosuke Kamiki, Minami Hamabe, Yuki Yamada, Munetaka Aoki

Have I Seen it Before: Nope.

Did I Like It: I’m really annoyed with this film. Deeply, so.

I got to November and I was really quite sure that I had my top five movies of the year all figured out.

Now? Now, I’m stuck either giving Tetris (2023) or Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023) the bad news that one of them gets relegated to the top ten with the likes of jokers like Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol. 3 (2023), or worse yet, The Flash (2023)*. It is easily my favorite action or sci-fi film of the year.

Not only is this one of the best movies of the year, it’s also moved me from being a relative Godzilla agnostic to an absolute believer in the King of All Monsters. I want to see all of the movies in the series now, and I might even try to get back into the recent American series. Matthew Broderick is probably still on his own.

I can’t readily think of a film that so winningly depicts the Japanese post-war experience, and that’s before we get to the giant lizard of it all.

And, man alive, has that lizard never looked better. There are sequences where’s he’s a frightening face that won’t die coming through the water. There are times where I’m relative sure that he’s just a guy in a suit. And it all works as a piece. Yes, even the lurching figure lumbering his way through Ginza works. I was surprised, too.

It might have helped that the crowd I watched it with was just about perfect. Monday afternoon. Maybe half a dozen people including myself. Spoilers, but when Shikishima (Kamiki) makes his escape from his plane just as Godzilla’s head explodes, we all cheered. All of us.

Please go see this movie. Do it with a crowd.

*This is why I don’t do a top ten list. It will force me to really reckon with how I feel about The Flash. This movie cost about 5% of what The Flash cost, and now my head hurts.