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ActionDramaHistory

Ran

- In a mad world, only the mad are sane.

With Ran, legendary director Akira Kurosawa reimagines Shakespeare's King Lear as a singular historical epic set in sixteenth-century Japan. Majestic in scope, the film is Kurosawa's late-life masterpiece, a profound examination of the folly of war and the crumbling of one family under the weight of betrayal, greed, and the insatiable thirst for power.

Release Date : 1985-06-01

Language :Japanese

Adult : false

Status : Released

Production Company : Nippon Herald FilmsGreenwich Film ProductionHerald AceTOHO

Production Country : JapanFrance

Alternative Titles :

Cast

Tatsuya Nakadai

Character Name : Lord Hidetora Ichimonji

Original Name : 仲代達矢

Gender : Male

Akira Terao

Character Name : Taro Takatora Ichimonji

Original Name : 寺尾聰

Gender : Male

Jinpachi Nezu

Character Name : Jiro Masatora Ichimonji

Original Name : 根津甚八

Gender : Male

Daisuke Ryū

Character Name : Saburo Naotora Ichimonji

Original Name : 隆大介

Gender : Male

Mieko Harada

Character Name : Lady Kaede

Original Name : 原田美枝子

Gender : Female

Yoshiko Miyazaki

Character Name : Lady Sue

Original Name : 宮崎美子

Gender : Female

Mansai Nomura

Character Name : Tsurumaru

Original Name : 二世野村萬斎

Gender : Male

Hisashi Igawa

Character Name : Shuri Kurogane

Original Name : 井川比佐志

Gender : Male

Shinnosuke Ikehata

Character Name : Kyoami

Original Name : 池畑慎之介

Gender : Male

Masayuki Yui

Character Name : Tango Hirayama

Original Name : 油井昌由樹

Gender : Male

Kazuo Kato

Character Name : Kageyu Ikoma

Original Name : 加藤和夫

Gender : Male

Norio Matsui

Character Name : Shumenosuke Ogura

Original Name : 松井範雄

Gender : Male

Toshiya Ito

Character Name : Mondo Naganuma

Original Name : 伊藤 敏八

Gender : Male

Heihachiro Suzuki

Character Name : Fujimaki's General

Original Name : Heihachiro Suzuki

Gender : Male

Kenji Kodama

Character Name : Samon Shirane

Original Name : 児玉謙次

Gender : Male

Haruko Tōgō

Character Name : Kaede's lady in waiting

Original Name : 東郷晴子

Gender : Female

Reiko Nanjo

Character Name : Hideota's concubine

Original Name : 南條玲子

Gender : Female

Tokie Kanda

Character Name : Sue's lady in waiting

Original Name : Tokie Kanda

Gender : Female

Sawako Kochi

Character Name : Hidetora's concubine

Original Name : Sawako Kochi

Gender : Male

Kumeko Otowa

Character Name : Sue's lady in waiting

Original Name : 音羽久米子

Gender : Female

Takeshi Katō

Character Name : Koyota Hatakeyama

Original Name : 加藤武

Gender : Male

Jun Tazaki

Character Name : Seiji Ayabe

Original Name : 田崎潤

Gender : Male

Hitoshi Ueki

Character Name : Nobuhiro Fujimaki

Original Name : 植木等

Gender : Male

Takao Zushi

Character Name :

Original Name : 頭師孝雄

Gender : Male

Yoshitaka Zushi

Character Name :

Original Name : 頭師佳孝

Gender : Male

Tetsuo Yamashita

Character Name :

Original Name : Tetsuo Yamashita

Gender : Male

Akihiko Sugizaki

Character Name :

Original Name : Akihiko Sugizaki

Gender : Male

Masaaki Sasaki

Character Name :

Original Name : Masaaki Sasaki

Gender : Male

Satoru Fukasaku

Character Name : (uncredited)

Original Name : Satoru Fukasaku

Gender : Male

Susumu Terajima

Character Name : Foot soldier (uncredited)

Original Name : 寺島進

Gender : Male

Reviews

F

Filipe Manuel Neto

@FilipeManuelNeto

2023-04-23

**A good film, full of detail and historical verisimilitude, but painfully long without needing to be.** I've already seen two of Akira Kurosawa's most renowned films and, quite frankly, I still can't understand why this Japanese director is so commonly considered a cinematic genius. His films are quite good, they're meticulous, there's a lot of attention to detail, but they're not particularly unforgettable… that's what I think. This film is an adaptation of the plot of “King Lear”, by Shakespeare: a warlord, in the middle of the Japanese feudal era, decides to withdraw and divide his lands, power and castles among his three sons. Only one of them disagrees and warns him that it is highly unlikely that they will stay together as brothers, which provokes the old father's wrath. However, the future proves true for the younger son's words when the two older brothers despise their father and conflicts begin. Driven mad and accompanied only by a fool, the old man ends up mad while the brothers fight each other. I won't talk about the cast because I don't know these actors. I can only say that they worked well, within the context and the type of film we are talking about. There is an excessive stylization, both in terms of interpretation and in terms of dialogues, which sounds theatrical, forced, but I don't know if that was on purpose. On a technical level, the film has a lot of points in its favor, starting with an excellent cinematography, very colorful and with good lighting. The sets are superb, in particular the castles, recreated to the smallest detail, and the costumes are also good, beautiful and historically credible. I don't think I'll be being unfair if I say that this film probably has some of the best war scenes in period films set in Japan. There is no CGI, special effects have been used judiciously, and the war has been recreated to be as authentic as possible, with hundreds of extras dressed to the nines and a lot of effort on the part of the production. For a historian, you can't ask for more. The big problem with this movie is that it wasn't made to entertain but to make you think, and it's full of scenes and sequences designed to make the viewer think about what they're watching. It's something that would work, if it weren't sometimes overly cryptic. The audience needs to understand what the director wants to convey, and that often doesn't happen. Furthermore, it is a film that does not spare the audience: it starts very well, it ends very well, but everything in between is unbearably prolonged and distended. What could be said or done in two minutes is done in five minutes, and there are a lot of dialogues and scenes that don't seem to have any function other than to make the film take longer.