Everything about Throne Of Blood totally explained
is a
1957 film directed by
Akira Kurosawa, which transposes the plot of
William Shakespeare's play
Macbeth to medieval
Japan. It is regarded as one of Kurosawa's best films, and by many critics as one of the best film adaptations of
Macbeth, despite having almost none of the play's script.
Plot
Kurosawa follows the events of
Macbeth fairly closely, although Kurosawa’s Washizu Taketori (played by
Toshirō Mifune) is arguably less evil than Macbeth, while his wife Asaji is even nastier than
Lady Macbeth. As with the play, the main character's comrade (General Miki, played by
Minoru Chiaki) is killed when he's perceived as a threat to the throne, only to return as a ghost.
There is no
Macduff character in this picture; hence Washizu doesn't meet his end in a duel. Instead, in a spectacular scene he's shot by his own archers and stumbles forward like a porcupine before being shot in the neck. He slowly descends the stairs and dies, collapsing dramatically on the fog-soaked ground.
Production
Kurosawa was an admirer of
Noh drama, and acknowledged the stylistic influence it had on
Throne of Blood. This influence can be seen in many aspects of the film, from the staging, to the characterizations, to the editing and direction.
Washizu's famous death scene, in which his own archers turn upon him and fill his body with arrows, was in fact performed with real arrows, a choice made to help Mifune produce realistic facial expressions of fear. The arrows seen to impact the wooden walls were not superimposed or faked by
special effects (this is disputed, however, as cables are visible several times during the sequence), but instead shot by choreographed archers. During filming, Mifune waved his arms, ostensibly because his character was trying to brush away the arrows embedded in the planks; this indicated to the archers the direction in which Mifune wanted to move.
Reception
The American literary critic
Harold Bloom judged it "the most successful film version of
Macbeth, though it departs very far from the specifics of the play."
In popular culture
In an episode of popular TV show
Smallville, Lex Luthor claims that a sword that's hanging on the wall of his study is a prop from
Throne of Blood, his "favorite Akira Kurosawa movie".
Further Information
Get more info on 'Throne Of Blood'.
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