• Kurosawa’s Birthday Month, Day 2

    March is Akira Kurosawa month at Criterion. On the twenty-third, the great Japanese filmmaker would have been one hundred years old. For this centennial celebration, we will be posting trivia questions and other contests all month, and giving away a different Kurosawa poster, DVD, or Blu-ray disc every weekday.

    Today’s prompt:

    What was the first Kurosawa film you saw? Describe the experience briefly—when/where/how?

    Please respond by commenting below, and we’ll choose our favorite at the end of the day. You must leave a valid e-mail address to be eligible for the prize (Drunken Angel on DVD).

    Contests

392 comments

  • By Philip Tatler IV
    March 02, 2010
    01:29 PM

    RAN. I watched it on a rippley VHS I snagged at the library when I was about 15. I had graduated from Hawks and Welles and was moving over to Bergman, Kurosawa, Clouzot, etc. After I saw (and was gobsmacked) by the thing, I tried to impress the people I worked with at a coffee shop by gushing about it. I yammered on for a while before one of the guys said, "you do know it's pronounced 'rahn,' right? Not 'rann.'" I was a little mortified.
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  • By Landen Celano
    March 02, 2010
    01:29 PM

    I believe my first experience was with Yojimbo, and it was sadly after I saw A Fistful of Dollars. Leone's film promptly made me check out the source material, so I immediately Netflixed the Criterion disc and a few days later, I was basking in the glory of Toshiro Mifune's ultra entertaining performance in the confines of my tiny rented room in Los Angeles.
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  • By Wade Bowers
    March 02, 2010
    01:30 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I ever saw was Yojimbo. It was really late and I put it on as I was going to bed, thinking I would fall asleep. Well, I ended up staying up quite late that night because there was no way I was going to fall asleep to Yojimbo. I loved nearly everything about it. The action, humor, suspense, everything. The setting and characters are all very cool and fun to watch, and they are filmed beautifully. Mifune plays the part of Sanjuro the ronin to perfection. Yojimbo is now one of my favorite movies of all time.
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  • By Justin Roby
    March 02, 2010
    01:30 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I ever saw was "Ran" my first year working for UCR's media services department. I ran the video equipment during a history class's screening in 1994, and it was my first experience not only with Kurosawa, but also with the Lear story.
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  • By Michael Blocher
    March 02, 2010
    01:31 PM

    High and Low, in a college ethics class about 13 years ago. After having seen over 20 of his films, It remains my favorite...
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  • By Aimee Patrick
    March 02, 2010
    01:31 PM

    My 1st Kurosawa was 7 Samurai. I watched it on PBS, on a 12 inch screen in an over-heated room, by myself (cause everyone else left the room, since I wouldn't let them change the channel.) It was pure torture and glorious- all at the same time. I knew I had been forever changed by that experience, like the 1st time I saw 400 Blows and La Strada.
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  • By Nick Philpott
    March 02, 2010
    01:31 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was SEVEN SAMURAI. I watched it for my senior project I did in high school on differing theories on the concept of the Hero in modern film. I expected it to be an interesting experience, since I'd never seen a Japanese film before, much less one that was three hours long. I recall watching the first half and being so drained by the experience that I had to take a twenty minute nap during the intermission before I changed discs. It's an unbelievably beautiful film, and even back then, I found less that I wanted to use for my project and more that I just looked and went "Oh, so THAT'S where [Modern Director/writer] got that from. Neat."
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  • By David Graham
    March 02, 2010
    01:31 PM

    My 1st Kurosawa film was Ran, while in Med School. Growing up in South Dakota didn't give me much opportunity to see foreign films but seeing this made me feel as if a veil had been lifted. The use of color totally astounded me. To later find out how poor his eyesight was while making this made it even more the achievement.
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  • By Joseph J. Finn
    March 02, 2010
    01:32 PM

    My first Kurosawa was Ran; I was around 15, and I remember the lushness of the story and of the imagery so vividly. I especially remember the father demonstrating the parable of the bundle of arrows and the lone arrow, and how I could see just how badly this could all fall apart if the family did not stick together. It was years before I fully understood the themes Kurosawa was exploring there, but I'll never forget the joy of experiencing his vision for the first time.
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  • By Aaron Ford
    March 02, 2010
    01:32 PM

    SEVEN SAMURAI. I bought the criterion edition and locked my self away in my room and was glued to the TV for the entire running time. Must've been 20. soooo amazing!!!
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  • By Francisco L.
    March 02, 2010
    01:32 PM

    If my memory serves me right, it must be when I was 17, I bought a crappy video copy of Rashomon after reading much about the famous director. The quality of the image was mediocre, but it blew my mind (and I've seen the restored film on the big screen 10 years later).
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  • By Mathieu Langevin
    March 02, 2010
    01:34 PM

    The first Kurosawa film i saw was The Hidden Fortress.I was quite young at the time(about 17) but i remember vividly not really liking it,but really having fun trying to identified what exactly Georges Lucas plagiarized for the Star Wars movie.The two thief,the horse run in the wood,the swordplay,it was all there... So this movie,arguably not his best,gave me a hint of how influential this director was and has been and how ''oldie movie'' have been recycled on and on and on...and how cinema was a monolithic experience as a whole trough history,history as a wheel as Boetius would say....Of course,growing up,my taste have developed and i could look back and appreciate not only the Hidden Fortress but mostly the whole catalog of Kurosawa movie,Ran being my favorite,and the whole diaspora of japanese directors,moderns and classics.So thanks Akira for this cinematic epiphany.......
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  • By Patrick McAvoy
    March 02, 2010
    01:34 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Rashomon. My high school film studies teacher showed it to us. It was definitely an eye opening experience. I can remember after the movie ended thinking "That final sword fight was ridiculous! How cartoony and fake." But as I walked to my next class I thought more about what the film was about, and realized the meaning and reason for that scene's appearance and was taken back by how brilliant the film was. As a high schooler, that was one of the first time's I realized movies could do more than just entertain. I've been working in Film Production ever since!
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  • By Andrea Niceschwander
    March 02, 2010
    01:35 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I ever saw was Rashômon. During a movie night a friend of mine brought it over. After that, oh man, I was hooked.
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  • By Sam Smith
    March 02, 2010
    01:35 PM

    The first Kurosawa movie I ever saw was DREAMS. I watched with a friend during our first year at NYU studying cinema studies, in our hotel dorm room with the lights off. It was one of several films I watched at this time, when my eyes and mind were so eager and open, and the world of cinema was just out there waiting for me with so much to discover. It's an interesting first Kurosawa film to watch, but I can't think of another one that would have affected me so strongly at that time. It was one of the definitive film-watching experiences of my life.
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  • By Drew
    March 02, 2010
    01:35 PM

    I saw Rashômon on the big screen at a theater in North Carolina. It was the loudest movie experience I've ever had. The rain hurt my ears.
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  • By Dimestoreman
    March 02, 2010
    01:35 PM

    I believe my first Kurosawa film was Rashoman. I was watching it on TCM in my living room when my dad walked in. He looked at the TV, said, "lame," because he doesn't like foreign/old movies, but then he watched more and more and got sucked in till it was over. I still love Kurosawa.
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  • By Zachary Herrmann
    March 02, 2010
    01:36 PM

    The Seven Samurai was the first Kurosawa film I ever saw, my senior year of high school (yes, I know, late bloomer...). One of the teachers in my Easter Civilizations class announced that we would be watching The Seven Samurai in class, starting the next day. And I panicked. I had never seen a Kurosawa flick at that point, but I knew a film with the reputation like The Seven Samurai demanded respect. My class was chatty (that's polite) and after seeing what they did during Satyajiy Ray's The Home and The World...well, no one was going to spoil this movie for me. So I did what any logical movie nut would do -- went to the library right after school, rented the Criterion DVD and watched it that night. By way of coincidence, we ended up watching the film in my Film Studies class the following week. So I ended up watching the film 3 times in about a week's time. Completely worth it.
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  • By Craig Kennedy
    March 02, 2010
    01:36 PM

    I saw a scratchy broken print of Seven Samurai at the Neptune Theater in Seattle Washington in the 1980s. I have to admit at the time I dozed in the middle, but the final battle in the rain will stick in my mind forever. I later rented it on dual VHS cassettes and watched the whole thing and have been a fan ever since.
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  • By Ben
    March 02, 2010
    01:37 PM

    Seven Samurai on my dad's beat up VHS copy. He introduced me to Japanese cinema at a very young age -- probably seven or eight (this would have been 1991 or so). And I've been hooked ever since.
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  • By Neil Sarver
    March 02, 2010
    01:37 PM

    My school thought it was a fantastic idea to bring in a crummy 16mm print of SEVEN SAMURAI to a group of 10 year olds. I remember that the action would catch us up for the periods that it was on, but we were constantly frustrated by our inability to catch on what was being said because of the muddy, overbright projection with white subtitles blended in to the movie. Yeah, I wish I had a better first story too, especially since he has, of course, since become one of my favorites. I believe my second experience was RASHOMON, which I watch during my early cinema development and being torn away from my desire to simply "find meaning" and other intellectual pursuits by the visceral energy, the need to be a part of it, to feel along with it.
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  • By Mike Denbo
    March 02, 2010
    01:37 PM

    Seven Samurai was the first I ever saw, but I was only 10 at the time and didn't really get much out of it. I don't think many people at that age will tolerate reading subtitles for that long. I didn't even really know what I had seen until just a few years ago, I heard that Criterion was using the PS3 for their Blu-Ray player of choice from the Playstation Blog. From there, I started exploring the website when I read the description to Kagemusha and just had to see it. I have since seen nearly a dozen of Kurosawa since then, including Seven Samurai two more times. So, I really count Kagemusha as the first Kurosawa film I truly appreciated.
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  • By Bill Melidoneas
    March 02, 2010
    01:37 PM

    My first Kurosawa experience was Rashomon. Still to this day (after seeing thousands of films through my film school years and the film buff years that have followed) Rashomon is one of my 10 favorite films of all-time (along with Seven Samurai). Rashomon for its 90 or so minutes blew my mind; the ferocity of Toshiro Mifune's performance captivated me beyond belief. In my teen years I was a huge Scorsese fan and when I found out how much Scorsese idolized Kurosawa it compelled to dig into the Kurosawa vault. I can see a big mirror between the Mifune / Kurosawa collaboration and the Scorsese / De Niro collaboration with De Niro portraying a lot of similar attributes to Toshiro especially in Taxi Driver. Rashomon for it's screenplay structure prompted me and interested in a career in screenwriting (one which I'm following right now). Rashomon and Kurosawa will always have a play in my cinematic heart, mind, and soul.
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  • By Amanda M.
    March 02, 2010
    01:38 PM

    When I was a child my parents loved foreign film and allowed us to watch much of it along with them. As a result my memories are not of Nickelodeon or the Disney Channel, but rather of Kubrick, Miyazaki, and Kurosawa. The first Kurosawa film I saw was Ran, and I must have been 12. I remember the colours, the intricacy and how fascinated I was with the story. This was one of many films that led into an appreciation for all film, an eventual film degree, and the job I have writing about film.
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  • By Mike Denbo
    March 02, 2010
    01:38 PM

    Seven Samurai was the first I ever saw, but I was only 10 at the time and didn't really get much out of it. I don't think many people at that age will tolerate reading subtitles for that long. I didn't even really know what I had seen until just a few years ago, I heard that Criterion was using the PS3 for their Blu-Ray player of choice from the Playstation Blog. From there, I started exploring the website when I read the description to Kagemusha and just had to see it. I have since seen nearly a dozen of Kurosawa since then, including Seven Samurai two more times. So, I really count Kagemusha as the first Kurosawa film I truly appreciated.
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  • By Colton Hammond
    March 02, 2010
    01:38 PM

    Seven Samurai My first Criterion!! It was a blind buy and I had no idea who or what The Criterion Collection. It was a perfect introduction to both Kurosawa and CC.
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  • By Doug tilley
    March 02, 2010
    01:38 PM

    Ran. I caught it on television in the 1990s in a (thankfully) widescreen version that immediately caught my attention. To that point I had been interested in the more exploitive samurai films, but I was left in awe by the images on display - particularly the burning of the castle which totally blew my mind. I recently revisited, and I think its power has only increased.
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  • By Samantha
    March 02, 2010
    01:38 PM

    I think it was Ran. I was in middle school and it was during the high school's "Fine Films Club" which I attended because I had friends in it and just knew I liked movies. It ended up shedding new light on the world of cinema for me, and Ran was one of the first that I saw there. While the story was incredible what I remember the most were the beautiful landscapes and buildings. Afterward we were driven home and chatted nonstop about the wonderful film. Of course, I attended every other club meaning after that as well!
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  • By Alex Zechiel
    March 02, 2010
    01:39 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Ikiru. I had heard from so many people that I should really get into Japanese cinema, Kurosawa in particular. I researched his films and found that many people considered Ikiru his best, even if it wasn't his most popular. I rented the film and watched it alone on a Friday night. It was the first time a movie made me cry in about 10 years, and I was bawling like a baby.
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  • By Evan
    March 02, 2010
    01:39 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Rashomon. I still remember everything about the experience, but if you ask the people I was watching it with, they'll tell you a different story.
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  • By J.D.
    March 02, 2010
    01:40 PM

    Ran, when I was 14. It was one of the first movies I ever got from Netflix, actually, lol. I absolutely adored every minute of it. Even if I watched it on my laptop (it was the only DVD player we had at the time, sadly), it was still amazingly immerse and gorgeous. MIEKO HARADA. ve only seen four of his films total so far (The Hidden Fortress, Rashomon and Throne of Blood - loved all three, too), but I do expect that to change soon!
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  • By David Karoll
    March 02, 2010
    01:41 PM

    I think my first Kurosawa film was Seven Samurai at the Nuart Theater in Santa Monica, CA sometime in the late 1980s. It sparked my passion for samurai, Kurosawa and Japanese cinema!
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  • By Josh Hornbeck
    March 02, 2010
    01:41 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was "Seven Samurai." It had been on my list of films to see for quite some time and I finally got around to renting it. I was blown away by the emotional texture of the film, as well as the spectacular action sequences and the gorgeous scene compositions. It made me want to come back to Kurosawa time and time again.
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  • By Coffin Jon
    March 02, 2010
    01:41 PM

    Ran on its theatrical run (no pun intended). I was a young budding Asian filmophile (now, I'm just an old one) and was going to the theater and the rental store to see every Asian movie I could get my hands on. I'd already seen most of Kurosawa's movies to that point and jumped at the opportunity to see one on the big screen. Needless to say, I was transfixed for the film's 2+ hour running time, a feat for a teenager at the time. To this day, I will jump at the chance to see the film when it comes through whatever town I'm living in. In fact, it's playing four times later this month in Palo Alto, CA and I plan to be there for each one of its showings.
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  • By Hartwell
    March 02, 2010
    01:41 PM

    My friend and I decided to do a back to back screening of Fistful of Dollars and Yojimbo while in our senior year of high school. We got sushi and had my older brother buy us a bottle of sake - we were going to be so "cultured"! We put on Yojimbo first, got to the end, rewound it and watched it again. We didn't end up watching Fistful until the next weekend. My first time seeing the trademark Toshiro Mifune swagger and laugh was life-changing.
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  • By Will
    March 02, 2010
    01:41 PM

    As a senior resident advisor at Emory University during my senior year, I was given a rather large programming budget with which to entertain my residents. However, all of my programming requirements were met by a school-mandated program within the residence hall, leaving that entire budget for me to play with and do as I wished. So I started a Foreign Film Society and used the money to rent movies and host dinners for whichever nation was represented in the film. Our first movie was Seven Samurai, and our feast included sushi, teriyaki, and non-alcoholic fizzy rice wine. The food was the perfect accompaniment to my first Kurosawa movie, and the perfect introduction of Kurosawa to myself and my residents. From then I've only fallen more in love with Kurosawa, especially as I learned of his deep love of Russian literature (my major was Russian lit!).
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  • By Mark Adkins
    March 02, 2010
    01:42 PM

    Kagemusha. I went into it knowing that people thought of it as a warm-up act to Ran, so expectations were a bit low. Ended up loving it. Every detail is so exquisitely placed. And the colors. Oh, the colors.
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  • By Bill Creed
    March 02, 2010
    01:42 PM

    My first Kurosawa was a double bill of The Seven Samurai and Ikiru at a rep cinema in DC in the seventies and both immediately leaped to the top of my favorite films. But what really blew me away was a few years later I was able to watch a 16mm copy of Drunken Angel on a flatbed Steenbeck movie editor and discover how incredible a director the K really is. Not only was the editing impeccable, I realized that each shot was its own set-up; he did not do a master shot and then shoot closeups - each shot was carefully composed and light. It was a revelation.
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  • By Heather-Victoria Hyche
    March 02, 2010
    01:42 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I had the pleasure of seeing was Seven Samurai at a Kurosawa film festival in Birmingham, Alabama. I had heard about the film before, but three friends of mine attended the festival with me, and they had no idea what to expect. We were ALL blown away! It was one of the most epic pieces of cinema we had ever seen. It is all we could talk about on the two hour drive home. The festival took place years ago, but it completely change the way I thought about cinema. I've always wanted to be a filmmaker, but Kurosawa definitely fueled the fire.
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  • By Jacob Olsen
    March 02, 2010
    01:43 PM

    Seven Samurai! Watched it on a rather lousy DVD at my house, appr. five years ago. It was, in fact, my first black and white japanese movie, and my first samurai movie as well. I have rewatched it two times since then.
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  • By Bennett
    March 02, 2010
    01:43 PM

    My freshman year of college, I was enrolled in a class called Film Narrative. I still remember sitting in the auditorium of Dale Hall in Norman, OK, staring up at Toshiro Mifune and becoming more fascinated by the elements of Rashoman as each story unfolded.
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  • By Michael
    March 02, 2010
    01:43 PM

    Rashomon. I'd heard of the so-called 'Rashomon Effect,' and was ashamed to have seen films that emulated its structure, but not the film itself. I watched it on DVD by myself, and knew I'd put off Kurosawa for far too long. If I hadn't seen it, I never would have realized that samurai cinema is my favorite film genre.
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  • By Sean Gleason
    March 02, 2010
    01:43 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was RAN. I was immediately awe-struck and walked around for a week saying nothing but, "You've got to see this! The colors, the COLORS!" It's one of the reasons I love film to this day.
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  • By Harry Eisel
    March 02, 2010
    01:43 PM

    Seven Samurai. One of the local universities used to have movie nights every weekend and showed some great, great films. I went with a bunch of college pals and we were , to a person, blown away by the film. This was back in the middle 70's so it wasn't like we could all run out to Blockbuster and rent it or any of his other films. It became a mission for us to locate showings of his other movies at local colleges and the few retrospective theaters or art houses that were around. Those were the good old days when getting some folks together to see a movie was an event. Today you just wait for the red Netflix envelope to show up. I don't even remember the last time I went to the movies with a bunch of friends....
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  • By Richard F
    March 02, 2010
    01:43 PM

    ,My first Kurosawa (you always remember your first, don't you?) was Seven Samurai. It was in a film history class and it was the first film I ever wrote a paper on. I reveled in Mifune's expressiveness, bathed in the story and marveled at the visuals. I was hooked, and more convinced than ever that abandoning my career and returning to school to pursue film studies had been the right choice. As I pursue a graduate qualification, and sometimes wonder if that confidence was misplaced, it's all I need to convince me to plow on.
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  • By Jaysin
    March 02, 2010
    01:44 PM

    The first film I ever saw by Kurosawa was Seven Samurai. I had heard about it for years and never really gave it a chance until I was in film school and was sick with pneumonia. I was holed up in my apartment for around a week when a friend came over with some rented movies, I had asked for anything long and engaging. She brought me Seven Samurai. I was floored at how perfect the characters were in the story. Immediately after finishing the film I restarted it with the commentary track by the Japanese film historian. After I healed up, I ran out and bought the 3 disc Criterion edition at Best Buy, watched everything on the discs and decided from then on I was a Kurosawa addict. I bought posters, dvds, hell I even tracked down alternate versions of the laserdisc and a laser disc player to play them on. There are only a few DVDs I am missing from the Kurosawa collection, that sits next to my Akira and Yojimbo statues, but there is nothing greater than sitting back with Seven Samurai every now and again to relive that emotion of, what is my opinion, the perfect film.
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  • By Keith
    March 02, 2010
    01:44 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was "The Hidden Fortress," watching it at home (on VHS, no less) for a paper in the very first film theory class I ever took. From the opening sequence of two figures wandering in a desert, one tall, one short, the metaphorical light bulb clicked on over my head "This is like Star Wars," and my lifelong interest in film as a scholarly subject was born. I watched that film with my best friend, who had never seen a black & white movie in his life -- and he was so riveted that he rewatched the final battle scenes immediately after we'd finished the movie -- and his opinion on black & white films was forever reversed.
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  • By nathan
    March 02, 2010
    01:44 PM

    Ran when/ fall,2005 where/ hist 111 (university of st. thomas) how/ with a bunch of other classmates unfortunately this was my first Kurosawa film, and i thought it was so boring and long. my first Kurosawa film that really sparked my appetite for his films was Yojimbo, after that I had to watch every single one of his films that were available on DVD. My favorites are his '40s-'50s ones. But alas, Ran was my first exposure to the master.
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  • By Sam
    March 02, 2010
    01:45 PM

    i believe it was Ran. on a widescreen VHS tape. i was a pre-teen/teen and got it as soon as i saw it in a store. no idea how i even knew about the film or why i even had a vague knowledge of Kurosawa at the time. i don't think i even watched the whole thing. wasn't impressed. that was then. jump to 15 years later and now i love the man's films :) i own close to a dozen Criterion Kurosawa films on disc and never hesitate to blind-buy. i'd say Throne of Blood and Stray Dog were the films responsible in getting me into Kurosawa. they were the films i first saw of his when i was older.
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  • By Alley Sabha
    March 02, 2010
    01:45 PM

    High & Low during a heavy snow storm an argument insued since half of the people snowed it agreed we would have much rather have watched it over again then any of the other movies we were left with i.e. addicted to love
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  • By Jeremy Eric Tenenbaum
    March 02, 2010
    01:45 PM

    All I remember was the sun above the trees. And the passing under, and the black passing leaves and still sun. And I remember it was summer-hot, and then I remember flies and wet skin. I was, maybe, thirteen years old. Back behind my house was a small wall of woods, to me profoundly deep. These woods reminded me of my woods. And sometimes, in mine, I would trip along and stare up at the sun through the treeleaves. And that's what I remember: the familiar lonely scratching through the brush, passing under the bright black leaves. And that was "Rashomon."
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  • By Jeremy McCombs
    March 02, 2010
    01:46 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I experienced was Sanjuro. I know, not somewhere most people start within his lexicon but there I was. If you haven't seen it, the film is a followup to Yojimbo, and a vastly superior film I must say (although I'm sure most would disagree). Mifune's wandering spirit drew me in and the mastery of storytelling and visuals had me instantly hungering for more. I quickly hunted down as much Kurosawa as I could (most of it from Criterion), and devoured it. Kurosawa quickly became my favourite film maker. A constant source of entertainment and pure inspiration.
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  • By Eric Rice
    March 02, 2010
    01:46 PM

    Yojimbo was my first. A friend brought a VHS copy over to our house when I was in college in San Diego in the early 1990's. I had recently begun to read a great deal of Chandler and Hammett and someone mentioned the possible contribution of Hammett's "Red harvest" which I couldn't yet track down. The experience of sitting and watching as Yojimbo slowly revealed itself was akin to being eating an extravagant meal - as cliche as it sounds I knew I had a wonderful future ahead of experiencing more and more Kurosawa, Mifune and (unbeknownst to me at the time) Nakadai collaborations :) Overall favorites: Stray Dog, followed closely by High and Low. Criterion rocks!
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  • By Brad Pearson
    March 02, 2010
    01:46 PM

    The first full Kurosawa film I experienced was "Ran" when I was 17. A channel was running a Kurosawa marathon and after catching the ending of Throne of Blood my interest was piqued. When they said Ran was up next and my dad and I sat and watched it. He gave a running commentary about the similarities to King Lear as I watched one glorious visual after another. Later that night I watched an encore presentation and found it even more fascinating. After that, I watched any Kurosawa I could get my hands on and that year decided to go to college to study film. Ran was shown in my Introduction to Film Class and when the teacher joked that it might be hard for anyone with ADD to watch. I informed him that I had ADD and I was able to sit through it, twice.
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  • By Matt Blevins
    March 02, 2010
    01:47 PM

    Like so many others my first experience with Kurosawa was with Seven Samurai. I was 21 years old and I was not yet an ardent cinephile at the time so I wasn't familiar with his body of work. A friend had heard about his work and decided to track some of it down. He went to many video stores but to no avail as none of the bubbly coed clerks had ever heard of the master filmmaker. Somehow he eventually tracked a copy of Seven Samurai down and we gave it a go. The lengthy run time, subtitles, and the fact that it was in black and white put the defenses up of this mush minded young idiot but it slowly worked its magic on me until I was so entranced that I could not look away. That was one of my first experiences dipping my toes in the waters of art house cinema and now nearly a decade later I have never looked back. I have absorbed most of Kurosawa's oeuvre and though Seven Samurai is not my favorite film from his body of work, (that would probably be Dersu Uzala, which I would pay tremendous sums of money to see a Criterion release of) few film experiences have had as significant an impact on my love for the medium than that first experience.
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  • By John Jakaboski
    March 02, 2010
    01:47 PM

    The Temple Cinematheque's calendar description of Seven Samurai was intriguing enough to take me to the center-city Philadelphia building with a beautiful Art-Deco facade. I was going to find out just what it was like to see a film by the great Kurosawa, whose name was just starting to register in my awareness through the stream of contemporary culture. I was a freshman at Temple University, and it was 1983. I was riveted and thrilled by the dynamic story-telling, the acting of Toshiro Mifune, and the humanistic treatment of the tale. How I loved the rain!
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  • By Matt Komar
    March 02, 2010
    01:47 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was The Seven Samurai a few ago. I think I was 15 at the time and it was a Criterion DVD. It was a long day to say the least, but it was a great experience. I've been loving Kurosawa since then.
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  • By RJ Lozada
    March 02, 2010
    01:47 PM

    Rashomon. Summer time. It was part of a series of Kurosawa films from a television cable channel. I was 16. Midway through the summertime continuing a steady diet of Kurosawa, I decided to record the films off the VCR for repeat viewings. One major weekend of films (Hidden Fortress, Dodeskaden, Throne of Blood) fell on a weekend of the party of parties in high school - everyone that I knew was going to be there, I didn't intend to miss it. I didn't know how to set the timer on the VCR, and my parents couldn't be bothered... but I didn't want to miss any of the films. So I did both - I went to the party AND drove home almost every 1.5 hours to switch tapes, supervise the recordings. Came away with some poorly dubbed qualities, but the core of that night (the fun with friends), and the relish in anticipation from 'scoring' so many educational films made that memorable. Kurosawa and Mifune still stand as a pivotal figures in my storytelling capacity.
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  • By Bryan alexander
    March 02, 2010
    01:47 PM

    My parents took me to see "dreams" when I was around 6 or 7. Describing the way that made me feel is tough. I remember feeling frightened and confused at first. But by the end of it I was completely immersed. My parents had both fallen asleep yet I was completely wide eyed and glued to the screen. When the lights went up something had changed in me. I felt a newfound sense of artistic freedom.
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  • By Kevin Parmer
    March 02, 2010
    01:47 PM

    I believe my first Kurosawa film was one of his later ones, 1990s "Dreams." I was still in college (Univ. of North Texas) and went to an Asian film festival on campus with my roommate. We specifically chose to catch "Dreams" that afternoon since it had a rather intriguing synopsis. Needless to say, we were both mesmerized by the beautiful atmospheric sets utlized in each of the eight stories comprising the film. The stories and imagery remained in my thoughts for a long time afterwards, especially the hauntingly beautiful scenes in 'Sunshine Through the Rain,' 'The Blizzard' and the amazing painted scenery of the Van Gogh story. I didn't know until the credits rolled that Van Gogh was played by Martin Scorsese; just goes to show the respect Kurosawa garnered from fellow directors for the amazing vision he possessed.
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  • By Zach
    March 02, 2010
    01:49 PM

    Borrowed Red Beard (Criterion) from a friend in college and was overwhelmed. Even at 185 minutes, restarted it when it was over the first time. Thus began a cinephilia that has taken me into graduate school with the goal of turning a love into a career.
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  • By Charlie Poekel
    March 02, 2010
    01:49 PM

    In high school English we watched Ran, but I admittedly, and in hindsight regrettably, slept most of the time. Therefore I consider Ikiru to my first Kurosawa. I watched it in college and fell in love with it. It's amazing how the often the story of someone re-discovering themselves in the presence of youth is used these days. It seems Ikiru is being remade many times a year to some extent.
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  • By Rufus de Rham
    March 02, 2010
    01:49 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was Seven Samurai on VHS followed immediately by High and Low. I was 13 and on my grandparents couch and the viewing experience cemented my desire to study cinema. Now at 26 High and Low and Seven Samurai are films I watch at least once a year just to remind myself of what it was like to see something so amazing for the first time.
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  • By Matthew Lang
    March 02, 2010
    01:50 PM

    My first Kurosawa experience looms large for many crucial reasons, among which the format and title coincide to play a pivotal role. I vividly recall leaving my local (now defunct) independent video store, struggling under the weight of my selections, (which, given the time, were all on VHS) with Kurosawa's Seven Samurai sitting atop the plastic tower. Praise for the movie abounded, and the need to split it between two tapes only piqued my rampant interest. I knew I was taking an all important step as a cinephile, but no one's word (not Sight and Sound's, not the countless director's who lauded it, nor the clerk at the store who spent the better part of 20 minutes lost in praise at the mere mention of the title) could prepare me for the experience. I admit, the only 2 tape movie I could recall at that point was Titanic, and all my memories of that film relate to its seemingly endless duration. I was worried Seven Samurai would feel like a 2 tape experience. But I was amazed by how wrong that assumption proved to be. Every frame, word and shot was immersive, and changing tapes had no impact on the process I was involved in. 3 hours were over in the blink of an eye, and Kurosawa had a new, highly loyal, fan.
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  • By Jeffrey Konkel
    March 02, 2010
    01:50 PM

    The first Kurosawa I saw was Seven Samurai. I was probably 23 or 24 at the time. It knocked me out: The cinematography, acting and world view all captivated me from the first scene to the last. The film began my love affair not only with the films of Kurosawa, but foreign film in general. I've seen the film many times since, and it never fails to invoke those initial feelings of wonderment.
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  • By Chris MaGee
    March 02, 2010
    01:51 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was "Ran". It was screening on the local public broadcasting network here in Ontario and my older sister, who schooled me in all things culturally edifying when I was young, sat me down to watch it with her. The sad thing was that I was too much of a goofy teenager at that time to appreciate what I was seeing. How old was I...? 13-years-old? Something like that. The battle sequence at the end impressed me to no end with its crowds of extras and flaming arrows, but it was the getting there that was rough, at least for the spastic boy I was at the time. I remember finding Lord Hidetora's court fool to be alternately annoying and hilarious, which might have been Kurosawa's point, but I don't think it was Kurosawa's or the actor Peter's intention to have a pimply, 13-year-old tie his mop of long hair into a top knot and start impersonating Peter's over-the-top performance. What a dopey kid I was. Maybe for my crimes against cinema I shouldn't even win the DVD. Would serve me right.
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  • By Matt
    March 02, 2010
    01:51 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I watched was Throne of Blood. I was in a class about Shakespeare and the film adaptations of his plays. We never watched the film in class, but I knew Kurosawa also did a few other translations of Shakepeare's plays, so I decided to do my final paper and presentation on Kurosawa, Noh theatre, and Throne of Blood. Kurosawa has been my favorite ever since.
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  • By Josh G.
    March 02, 2010
    01:51 PM

    About 6 or 7 years ago it was a boring day with almost nothing on TV. As I flipped through the usual garbage that was on, I stopped on a Japanese movie that was just starting and was intrigued. The only foreign film I have every watched before this would be the occasional Godzilla that would play late on a Friday night. This movie, that I could not stop watching and was enthralled by, was Akira Kurosawa's HIGH AND LOW. It was so much more interesting than anything I had ever seen, the characters, the story and the suspense kept me hooked and it became one of my favorite films of all time, not only getting me hooked on Akira Kurowsawa films but also drawing me away from the usual big budget blockbusters.
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  • By Scott Nye
    March 02, 2010
    01:52 PM

    A little over two years ago, in college, on a date, I went to see RASHOMON at the Harvard Film Archive. Just the fact that she was interested, mixed with the ensuing discussion, convinced me she was worth sticking with.
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  • By Michael
    March 02, 2010
    01:52 PM

    My first Kurosawa movie was, like for many others, Rashomon. I saw it at the beginning of my interest in art films, having heard it was a classic. Upon finishing it, the sensation I felt was comparable to waking up. Only 2001: A Space Odyssey had evoked such a feeling in me prior to that day. My brain was wrestling with theories and possibilities long after the movie was over, something I had done with most films up to that point, but never to such a degree as with Rashomon. I won't lie and say it was the single most significant movie viewing experience of my cinematic life, but it did lead me on to watching other Kurosawa classics (and thusly discovering new favorites like Red Beard, Throne of Blood, and Ran), and I think that Kurosawa streak is what most importantly defined auteurism for me as I noticed stylistic and thematic parallels within his filmography. I'd say it stands out amongst many other first viewings as the launching point (or one of them, at least) for my ongoing interest in film, so I give my thanks to Kurosawa and Rashomon for alerting me to a whole new world of cinema, the existence of which I had seen flickers of previously but into which I had yet to take that decisive plunge; Rashomon was undoubtedly one of the most important catalysts.
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  • By Shane
    March 02, 2010
    01:52 PM

    Rashomon. 1991 - I rented it on VHS from the local independent video store, when uptown west-side Toronto still had such things. The shop owner knew I was a cinephile, despite being a 19 y.o. kid; he introduced me to so many great films, it was the best kind of film school - and significantly cheaper, too! (He owned 2 stores, he said, and apparently David Cronenberg was a regular customer at the other one, which was in a much better part of town.)
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  • By willie hines
    March 02, 2010
    01:52 PM

    My first Kurosawa experience was The Hidden Fortress. A grey Sunday afternoon, a day off with the family, brunch on my plate and a martini in my hand. The opening scene alone was worth the price of admission: the long distance shot of the two thieves across the plain, arguing with each other and then the soldiers' face comes right into the foreground, looking like a Noh death mask as he is hunted down and killed by the soldiers on horseback. Intense. The story moves briskly and the bumbling thieves are the perfect comedic foil to the seriousness of their mission.
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  • By Jesse M
    March 02, 2010
    01:53 PM

    DREAMS. An interesting experience, seeing a foreign world through such sensitive eyes. I remember being a little bewildered by the intense imagery, the long sequences ('The Blizzard') and the mad colors in some of the selections. I was still pretty conditioned to love action movies and Disney cartoons at the time, I think. I particularly enjoyed 'The Tunnel,' and remember it best of the shorts.
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  • By Arturo Hernandez
    March 02, 2010
    01:53 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was Seven Samurai, which I saw in a film history class when I was 18. It is still one of my favorite Kurosawa films.
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  • By Mike Robbins
    March 02, 2010
    01:53 PM

    First Kurosawa film I was aware of was 'Ran'. It was a big deal when it released in the U.S. I was 14 and didn't know what the fuss was about, but blockbuster directors like Spielberg and Lucas were making a big deal about it. First film I watched was 'Seven Samurai' in very poor quality pan-and-scan on PBS when I was a teenager. Very hard for a 3 hour movie in poor quality to capture a kid's attention. Now, it's my favorite film. It was a revelation to me when film restoration became more common...I remember seeing the re-release restoration of David Lean's "Lawrence of Arabia" in the theater in my late teens. Thanks Criterion, for fighting the good fight! BTW, you guys should add "American Astronaut" to the collection. I'm sure Cory McAbee would license it cheap, and it's a brilliant film.
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  • By Hugo Rios
    March 02, 2010
    01:53 PM

    I saw Ran, alone, and while I clearly remember how I was diving into a new world, eagerly waiting scene after scene for more revelations, nothing could prepare me for the devastating beauty of those final moments when Tsurumaru waits for his dead sister, while the sun, indifferent, sets on the background; A magnificent illustration of the human condition.
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  • By Seth Just
    March 02, 2010
    01:53 PM

    It was 2004 when I saw my first Kurosawa film...Seven Samurai (which was also my first Criterion!). I was 15 years old and my older sister worked at Hollywood Video, so she brought it home for her and I to watch. We watched the first half together, but I watched the second half alone. This is one of my favorite film viewings in my history. Never before have I been so enthralled. Kurosawa's direction in this gave me the real understanding of mise-en-scène. Seven Samurai truly defined, for me, what an epic masterpiece is.
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  • By Renato D
    March 02, 2010
    01:54 PM

    It was IKIRU. At the time, in high school, I was (and I think I still am) really obsessed about the meaning of life and this film really struck me hard. At the edge of his own existence what do you think your life was worth for? The quest for significance was touching and at the same time thought provoking. A very personal film for Kurosawa and one of his best works, unfortunately not one of his well known films.
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  • By Thomas Lansdale
    March 02, 2010
    01:54 PM

    Probably 21 or 22 at MTSU - I knew I was about to move back to Texas and I had to take the chance to check out some art films before I moved back home and had zero selection. MTSU had (has?) a VHS library with some classic art films that you can check out and watch there on little tv's with headphones. I believe with Seven Samurai I was able to check out my own little room and watch it. It was an exciting time, some days I would watch 4 or 5 films. In one day I might see Mon Oncle, 8 1/2, Wild Strawberries and Yojimbo all for the first time - a cinematic overload. Of course, I did not absorb them quite like that, but luckily Criterion has great DVD's of all these films that I can watch over and over again. Thanks!
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  • By Abel Alvarez
    March 02, 2010
    01:54 PM

    First one I saw was Rashomon on Turner Classic Movies. It challenged my understanding of what types of stories films could tell, how they told them, and my understanding of truth. As a High School student I was only just beginning to grow in my appreciation for film and the powers of the medium. To see a master like Kurosawa use that medium turned me into a fan of film--and ultimately of his films. It remains my favorite of the films I've seen by him. I have taken every story told to me with a grain of salt since then.
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  • By Mario Villalobos
    March 02, 2010
    01:54 PM

    RASHOMON I saw this in the summer of 2004. I was accepted to film school and started school in the Fall. As part of their welcome package they sent me included a page of 100+ films to see. One of them was Rashomon. I Netflixed it, got the Criterion DVD, and watched it at home. I watched it alone because this was before I really had any hardcore film friends, and no one in my family liked these types of movies. I liked it. I didn't understand it fully until I studied it and Kurosawa in school, but this was a great gateway into my love for great cinema and to Criterion, too!
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  • By Jake Weisman
    March 02, 2010
    01:55 PM

    When I was 16 I was fortunate enough to be able to spend a summer in the small historical town of Vitré, France. However, I could not speak French, and my hosts could not speak English, so I spent a lot of time wandering solo around town or barricaded (self-imposed) in the small loft of my host's home. One day I found a dvd of Red Beard, like a treasure map, in a small closet in the loft. I had no idea what it was. It was extra strange because my host did not own any other DVDs. I had brought a small laptop with me over the summer, and watched Red Beard several times a week for the 6 weeks I was there. In all honesty, at 16, I did not have a full appreciation of Kurosawa. But eventually the movie felt less foreign than the home where I was staying. Years later, when I finally saw Rashomon, I remembered, "oh yeah, THAT GUY! He helped me through a lonely, lost, French summer."
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  • By Robert Peterson
    March 02, 2010
    01:56 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was RASHOMON, probably when I had just started high school in 2000. My father had realized my love and affection for films of all genres, new or old, and decided that it was one of the most important films that I had yet to see, so he rented it for us to watch. It blew me away, obviously. RASHOMON opened up the world of Kurosawa to me, and I quickly became obsessed with his masterful use of cinema.
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  • By Andrew Bacon
    March 02, 2010
    01:56 PM

    I saw Seven Samurai for the first time two years ago when I was sixteen. I was channel surfing and ran across it playing on TCM, so I stopped and watched it all the way through. Not only was it my first Kurosawa film, but it was my first foreign film. Still love it to this day, and it helped open my eyes to the world of film.
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  • By Dan
    March 02, 2010
    01:56 PM

    My first was Yojimbo. I had begun taping movies off of Turner Classic Movies in high school, movies that I was "supposed to see", Movies like Lawrence of Arabia and Vertigo. Going into it, I had no idea how much I would come to love this movie. I thought it was alright, but I wasn't ready for the gallows humor and overtly Western feel to it, aspects I only appreciated later. I couldn't have made a better choice.
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  • By Craig Skinner
    March 02, 2010
    01:56 PM

    Rashomon: Also the first subtitled film I ever saw. My dad had recorded it off TV and I watched it with him one rainy Sunday afternoon. I was probably only about 8 or 9. Is a pretty special film memory for me.
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  • By Rob Glenn
    March 02, 2010
    01:56 PM

    My first Kurosawa was Dreams and I saw it in the theaters on its first run in the States. I was an ignorant filmgoer at the time and all I knew was that I wanted to know more, see more and understand more about film. I admit that a lot of it went over my head and my ridiculous reaction to the mountainclimbers ("why can't we see their breathe? It's supposed to be cold! So fakey") is embarassing now.
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  • By zach
    March 02, 2010
    01:57 PM

    Ran was not the first Kurosawa I saw, but I consider it to be the first film of his I "saw." I went to see it alone in a theater. It was slightly crowded, and the film was very quiet, almost silent at parts. You could hear if anyone moved, sipped a drink, or even reached for their popcorn. For almost three hours there was this intense communal experience in the theater like we were all holding our breath the whole time. At the end credits, when it was all over, one person just abruptly said "WOW" out loud. This word summed up the film for me. We all exited again in near silence.
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  • By Kelly Lewadniuk
    March 02, 2010
    01:58 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was Rashomon in high school the year before I entered film studies at university. It was on TCM and I had heard so much about him I felt I had to watch and had to enjoy. I watched, and between the beautiful cinematography, particularly the thick black rain and Toshiro Mifune acting like a caged tiger I couldn't have enjoyed it more. Afterwards I began seeking out every Kurosawa film I could Throne of Blood, than Seven Samurai, than Ikiru and it went on and on and continues today.
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  • By Rachel JM.
    March 02, 2010
    01:58 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Ikiru. I've only discovered his greatness in the past year or so, actually. Last summer, on a whim, I decided to take an international film course through the local community college, and Ikiru was on the syllabus. I was very struck by the imagery and the themes presented in the film; the slower pace didn't even register, despite the fact that I am generally fondest of films with something of a furious pace, like screwball comedies and adventure movies.That film definitely helped open up my cinematic horizons, and now my netflix que has as many criterion collection films in it as it does modern ones.
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  • By Lade Iluyomade
    March 02, 2010
    01:58 PM

    The first time I saw an Akira Kurosawa film was after I watched Star Wars on May 2006, in my Boxing Camp. I used to think Star Wars was one of the most original things ever written, until I found out it was influenced by Kurosawa’s RED HARVEST, which I watched immediately after I found out. After I watched Red Harvest, I realized that Kurosawa had great influence. Now I call him the “ORIGINAL Star Wars author”. That was the beginning of my Kurosawa phase.
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  • By Eric Ellenberg
    March 02, 2010
    01:58 PM

    Seven Samurai. Nineteen years old. 2 am. A Wednesday, if memory serves. I'd been reading a lot about post-war Japan, westerns, and some Kurosawa guy. "Genius" and "master" were the adjectives commonly employed in his honor. I had to see something of his. All signs pointed to Seven Samurai. Three and a half hours later, I emerged from the mud, the squalor, the sorrow, the hunger, the strife, the pride, the laughter, and the nobility of this film. A masterpiece in the truest sense.
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  • By Ted Schrubbe
    March 02, 2010
    01:58 PM

    Seven Samurai, in FILM 114 during undergraduate year 2 at Marquette. It was the only film shown in the class that didn't put me to sleep. I loved it and bought it that day.
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  • By Cam
    March 02, 2010
    01:59 PM

    Seven Samurai. I was 13 or so and it was a 35mm print was at the Rhodes Theater in Atlanta. I went with my best friend and his parents. His parents were the ones who wanted to go, but we tagged along. I had never seen anything like it. I grew up watching mainstream Hollywood stuff, so it was incredible to see a whole new world in front of me (and a different language...and SAMURAI!!) At the intermission point, my friend's parents were surprised to find out the film was actually 3 1/2 hours long. They asked if we wanted to leave since it was going to be so long. My friend and I said "No way, this is awesome!!"
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  • By Jones
    March 02, 2010
    01:59 PM

    Sanjuro. I rented it on impulse from a library in highschool (2001), despite having not seen Yojimbo and only knowing Kurosawa as an important Japanese director. While Stray Dog and High and Low are by far my Kurosawa favorites, Toshiro Mifune's swagger in Sanjuro was my gateway to older Japanese cinema and one of my favorite "that other guy" actors of all time: Tatsuya Nakadai
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  • By Jared
    March 02, 2010
    02:00 PM

    It was 9pm or so on a weekday of Finals week in my Junior year of college. I had just finished my hardest test and was looking to go out and party, but all my friends still had finals left to go. I wasn't much of a film buff yet, but I was looking to be one. I had watched my way through the AFI top 100 and wanted to start going through other movies generally considered to be among the greatest. I meandered over to the school library and picked up their copy of Seven Samurai (I think it was the almost complete 203 minute version of the film?...this was in 2004). It probably took me until 2am to finish the film. I had thought my only company would be a bottle of cheap red wine, but that turned out not to be the case. My roommate was studying in the living room while I watched, and said he wouldn't be too distracted by an "old foreign movie". Not the case. After the introduction of Takashi Shimura's Kambei character, he was as hooked as I was. When the next semester started, we went to the library and got all of the Kurosawa they had and watched through them. Five or six years later, I have seen thirty or so Kurosawa films. Seven Samurai remains one of my favorites, along with Ikiru, Drunken Angel, and The Bad Sleep Well. Honestly though, all of them are so damn good, I think any one of them would have gotten me hooked.
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  • By Roy Baugher
    March 02, 2010
    02:01 PM

    "Dreams" was the first Kurosawa film I saw. I learned about the film from the Siskel & Ebert TV show, when they reviewed it. When the film finally came to the local independent theater, I went to go see it. Afterwards, it made me want to view his other films, such as Ran, Throne of Blood, etc.
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  • By DC
    March 02, 2010
    02:01 PM

    The Hidden Fortress / 15 years ago / in my high school film class / VHS
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  • By Carlos L.
    March 02, 2010
    02:01 PM

    'Seven Samurai' was the first Kurosawa movie I ever saw. I had just got really into movies a few months prior and I kept hearing about it, but I had a prejudice against "old black & white movies" and thus had never got around to seeing it. Then I find out a local movie club will be screening the movie on the weekend and I decided: "well, if I'm ever gonna enjoy the movie it's gonna be in a big screen". So, on a cold afternoon I grab my winter gear, go have lunch with the girlfriend and then we head down to the theatre for the screening... ... I was blown away by the movie! In what a way! It completely changed the way I saw B&W classics and really got me into them; and into Kurosawa too... up to that point, all I knew about him was that he had been a big influence in the movie 'The last samurai'; I had no idea what I was missing and I'm so glad I decided to go see the movie.
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  • By Cameron Dutra
    March 02, 2010
    02:02 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was unfortunately in 2010! It was Dreams, I loved it and immediately rented Seven Samurai as a result, and loved that even more! Dreams was very relevant to where I am in my life at the moment. I am in love with short stories and films, as well as Japanese culture. Currently my favorite author is Haruki Murakami, so Dreams played well for my interests. Dreams also inspired me to make a short film with flowers in every single shot, I loved the relationship portrayed between humans and nature exemplified in every dream. I am a bit embarrassed at my lack of Kurosawa knowledge and am hoping to see and or own many of his films. The ironic part is I am a film student and am 21 but just have never been exposed to so many great films since taking film classes and finding out about criterion collection. In fact I go to my public library about once a week and search Criterion collection and just choose randomly and have seen so many great films as a result. Thanks for what you do.
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  • By Trey Lawson
    March 02, 2010
    02:03 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I ever saw was Throne of Blood. I had heard the title, but knew very little about it at the time. When I saw it coming on the IFC channel I tuned in and was shocked to discover it was an adaptation of Macbeth. To this day it remains my favorite of his period films, and is one of the all-time great Shakesperean screen adaptations.
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  • By Sue
    March 02, 2010
    02:04 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Rashomon. There was a small theatre located near my college where I and my friends got our first introduction to foreign films. The Seventh Seal, The 400 Blows, Swept Away, then one Sunday afternoon Rashomon. None of my friends liked it, but I was transfixed. I couldn't stop talking about it, they couldn't wait for me to get over it. I never did.
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  • By Matthew Velez
    March 02, 2010
    02:04 PM

    "Throne of Blood" was the first film at saw and it was in my Japanese Theater and Film class. I was very familiar with the story of Macbeth and Akira Kurosawa's gift of story telling completely blew me out of the water. Not only did I become a huge fan of Kurosawa, but I developed a passion for cinematography which made me change schools!
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  • By Shaun
    March 02, 2010
    02:04 PM

    My first Kurosawa experience was High and Low. It was winter break of my sophomore year at Ohio University. Having my seasonal job fall through, and being an Audio Post Production for Moving Image major, I made the goal of watching as many films as i could during break. It was essentially self-assigned homework/research; if I'm going to be making and studying films, I'd better be well versed in them. I'd taken suggestions from other film enthusiast friends, and had already developed an interest in some of the more modern Japanese filmmakers; Takashi Miike, Shinya Tsukamoto, etc. So I went to the library and grabbed High & Low, a recommendation from the only person at my high school I could even talk to about films. Impressed, I returned to the library and also checked out Ran, Seven Samurai, Stray Dog, Dreams, and Ikiru to watch before break ended, and my girlfriend at the time bought me Rashomon and Ikiru for my birthday, shortly after. This is also the same period of time where I fell in love with Criterion, and started really paying attention to what they do.
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  • By Mark
    March 02, 2010
    02:06 PM

    The Seven Samurai. I watched it late one night while I was tripping acid. Man that was fun!
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  • By Scout Tafoya
    March 02, 2010
    02:08 PM

    I was maybe nine years old when I purchased a thick laminated copy of Entertainment Weekly's 100 Greatest Movies of All Time from a super market checkout line while shopping with my mother. I had few friends and movies were what I did with my time (that bit hasn't changed much). I was just beginning to realize that I wasn't the only who saw there were key differences between the movies that typically wound up on commercials or bus adverts and the ones that I wanted to own and watch over and over again. So when presented with something as definitive as this, I decided to watch everyone of them and though it took me quite a few years I managed to track down everything from Celine and Julie Go Boating to L'Age d'or and all the Hollywood standbys in between. I saw everything in English rather quickly but it became evident that the foreign films were not going to be easy for someone like me who had very little money and few resources. That's why when I saw that Seven Samurai would be showing on TCM in its uncut form my twelve year old self jumped at the chance. I drank tons of coffee that Sunday night (for that is when they show foreign films, typically at two in the morning, as was the case that night) and waited for everyone to go to sleep and crept downstairs to my living room and watched the whole thing not two feet from the television, mesmerized. I think I knew that this film would stay with me when Mifune delivers his furious tirade against the samurai while wearing the armour of the deceased. There was a rawness, a kind of uncomfortable honesty, that I had never seen before. The following day I went to school exhausted but I also couldn't hide my smile; I knew something they didn't. In the coming weeks I went out of my way to see everything that Kurosawa had left his mark on but nothing ever quite lived up to that first time.
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  • By Justin
    March 02, 2010
    02:08 PM

    Seven Samurai The firs. Kurosawa film I saw was Seven Samurai. I was a junior in high school and I remember very little besides that.
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  • By Felipe Contreras
    March 02, 2010
    02:09 PM

    I first saw Dreams (Los Sueños de Akira Kurosawa in spanish) when I was 10-12 years old (maybe a little older) in a school-free afternoon and I got a glimpse of the movie while surfing the channels on Cinemax (here in Chile Cinemax is some kind of an artsy channel) the movie blew my mind away and was exceeded greatly mi childish comprehension. But it clearly planted a seed about films in general, and now I simply love them. It changed my life for ever.
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  • By FARAH SH.
    March 02, 2010
    02:10 PM

    I met Akira Kurosawa for the first time, about a year ago on the wall of my room where "Ikiru" ("To live") was projected. A year has pass and I guess the spirit of "Ikiru" is still floating around... I saw it haunting many other movies that were projected on my wall.
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  • By KATE
    March 02, 2010
    02:10 PM

    First Kurosawa may have also been my first trip to Film Forum, when I was around 13 or 14 years old. I saw Seven Samurai and remember my friend complaining about how uncomfortable the seats were three hours later, but I really had not noticed. My dad had a pretty substantial collection of Criterion laserdiscs, and when I got home I discovered that Seven Samurai was the only Kurosawa one he had at that point, so I watched it again.
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  • By Rob Ikegami
    March 02, 2010
    02:10 PM

    When I was around 11, I found my dad in the living room watching an old black and white Japanese film on turner classic movies. Around that age, I hated everything he watched...and vice versa I'm sure. When I began watching, I was, of course, bewitchingly drawn in to the story. How could you not be? We watched it until the end and then moved on with our separate lives. My father died from cancer some years later. I own Seven Samurai now, have watched it at least 15 times, and Kurosawa is my absolute favorite film director. Looking back, that viewing of Seven Samurai was the first and maybe only time my dad, Keith, and I ever bonded over a film. And when I tell people it is the greatest film ever made, I don't know if I'm saying that because it is, or because of the feeling I have when I think about it because of that viewing.
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  • By Lionel English
    March 02, 2010
    02:12 PM

    I first saw Ran at a local art house theater that is no longer there. I want to say I was a college freshman, but the dates don't jibe--I must have been a sophmore, at least, and this would have been during the original US theatrical run. I had not yet seen many foreign language nor art house films, and I was amazed on a number of levels--by the stunning color, costumes, and settings; the epic scope; the tragedy (relatively rare in mainstream multiplex movies), the ruthless Lady Kaede. And more generally, the idea that there was a whole world of cinema out there I knew nothing about. Ran introduced me to Kurosawa, and to Japanese cinema, and, I believe, to world cinema and the US art house.
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  • By Tim Balzer
    March 02, 2010
    02:13 PM

    SEVEN SAMURAI. A family friend suggested it to me based on my film interests. I found the 2 tape VHS at the bottom of a flea market bin and the rest was history. An amazing history. That involved a lot of blood. And cool hats.
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  • By Renee Dooley
    March 02, 2010
    02:13 PM

    In the late 80's /early 90's , I worked at the Detroit Institute of Arts in a position known as a 'Red Coat ". It was basically a customer service job, with one of the duties being ushering the DFT afternoon and evening film series. Once all the audiance was seated we could watch the film. Thanks to that job at the Detroit Film Theatre I saw my first Kurosawa film, "Throne of Blood" and got hooked on Japanese films.
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  • By John Henrik Welle
    March 02, 2010
    02:14 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Ran. I rented it on VHS in 1987 I think, I was about 15 years old. I don't really know what made me rent it, I suppose I had read a good review. It was far different than any kind of film I used to watch with my friends. So of course I ended up seeing it alone. I remember being impressed by the scene with the burning fortress. I didn't see a Kurosawa film again for maybe 10 years when I saw Ran once more. Now I've seen about 25 of his 30 films. Actually, I've always ended up seeing Kurosawa films alone. My friends have bad taste for films. :-)
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  • By Ray O.
    March 02, 2010
    02:14 PM

    During summer of 2008, I found myself without a job, and no one was hiring. So, I got myself a Netflix account and determined to educate myself about good cinema (had to be productive somehow), and the first Kurosawa movie I saw was Yojimbo. For some reason, the first time I watched the movie, I was not impressed by it (probably just too much exposure to mainstream "we love CGI" Hollywood). However, after I saw Seven Samurai (which absolutely blew me away--made me completely rethink what the term "epic movie" means), I went back and watched Yojimbo and Sanjuro back to back. Nowadays, when I want to introduce people to Kurosawa, I lend them my copies of Yojimbo and Sanjuro.
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  • By Dan ®
    March 02, 2010
    02:14 PM

    Dreams. I once found a copy of a Leonard Maltin guide to movies and at the time DVD and NetFlix were mere pipedreams. So, listen to this kids, I scanned the entire book and highlighted all of the movies that sounded like they might be of interest. After doing that task I then began to call all of the local movie rental places and asking them to look up a few titles. One of them was AK's Dreams. It was truly magical and it along with a few other films opened up the doors and my eyes to non-American cinema for me.
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  • By Fredy Pardo
    March 02, 2010
    02:14 PM

    My first AK movie was "Dreams" and I watch it back in summer 2004 while looking for Martin Scorcesse and Robert de Niro movies. I was impressed that Marting Scorcesse was acting in one of his movies!!! I could not believe it that one director was acting for another one. Then and there I realized that AK must be a very special director. I started to find out who he was was. Then after that I have been buying and watching all his movies. I got kind of addicted to his movies and my children make fun of me but still they don't doubt that he is the best! Fredy Pardo
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  • By Mark Judkins
    March 02, 2010
    02:15 PM

    Rashômon was the first Kurosawa film I saw. It was at my university's international cinema when I was in college. It was a film that stuck in my mind for days. Unfortunately my university edited it for content so soon after I went to my local library so see the full version and it was there I discovered the many other Kurosawa masterpieces! I've been a fan ever since!
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  • By Giovanni Radtke
    March 02, 2010
    02:16 PM

    Seven Samurai I was 13 years old and just roaming around a blockbuster and saw it on the shelf and just gave it a whirl, fastest 3 and a half hours of my life, it not only got me interested in Kurosawa, but it also got me interested in classic cinema and foreign cinema in general.
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  • By Jordan
    March 02, 2010
    02:16 PM

    Seven Samurai. I saw it on a VHS copy from local blockbuster in maybe 1999/2000, and I could hardly see half the subtitles because they were white-on-white.
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  • By Mark Ayala
    March 02, 2010
    02:18 PM

    High and Low was my first on got me on the track to see all the Kurosawa has had to offer. I just rented it after I was delving into Japanese cinema. A friend was confused why I had seen so many Japanese films, but had yet to see any Kurosawa so he told me to take "High and Low" after I overheard him talking about it to someone. Mixture of social commentary, thriller and suspense sold me on Kurosawa's talent. Since then, I've seen twenty of his films and plan on watching the next ten soon.
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  • By Joshua Fu
    March 02, 2010
    02:18 PM

    My first Kurosawa was "Ikiru," which I saw on a whim because it was playing at a local arthouse theater. Oh man, was I blown away- one of the most life-affirming and beautifully shot films I've ever seen. By the end of the movie, everyone was crying, completely moved by Shimura's performance. The only theater-going experience that's gotten even close was seeing "It's a Wonderful Life" in a crowded theater on Christmas Eve.
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  • By Sean Robison
    March 02, 2010
    02:20 PM

    Saw Seven Samurai on the original Criterion DVD. It was the first three-hour plus film I had ever seen where I didn't realize three hours had passed. By the time the film ended, I thought "wow.. that was fast", only to realize over three hours had gone by. Very, very few films reach that genius-level of quality.
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  • By dan
    March 02, 2010
    02:20 PM

    I was 18 working at an independent video rental store with a very small foreign film section (maybe 12 movies) . It was a very slow day and I had been playing the normal new release movies we often played on the stores television when a friend of mine came in to visit. He wandered the store a bit and came back with Yojimbo. Neither of us had ever heard of it, let alone seen it, but there was something about the idea of a samurai bodyguard that really appealed to us so I put it in the VCR (yes, it was that long ago). From the very first scene where Mifune throws a stick in the air to decide his direction all the way to his climactic battle with the gun-toting Unosuke I was completely glued to the television, luckily few customers interrupted the viewing. I had had a similar experience a few years before when I first watched Brazil, and again a year or so later when I first saw The Seventh Seal. These movies were my introduction to the world of directors, whereas before I payed more attention to actors, and I have never looked back.
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  • By Greg Hybbeneth
    March 02, 2010
    02:21 PM

    I'm pretty sure my first Kurosawa flick was Rashomon. I was a freshman in high school, so it was probably 1996. I watched it one night on PBS. I ended up writing a paper on some of his films for a history class. That may have been my first experience with foreign/subtitled films.
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  • By Miguel Angel Tarango
    March 02, 2010
    02:21 PM

    I first was introduced to Akira Kurusawa as a film student when I was an undergraduate at the University of Texas at El Paso in a course titled Introduction to the Art of the Motion Picture. I had always had a love affair with the cinema but it wasn't until I was exposed to Seven Samurai that I was completely blown away by the pureness and rawness of the cinema! I had grown up in the late 70's and 80's and was mostly exposed to the sentiment of Spielberg and others. It was this film that showed me just how powerful a film could be without special effects and by relying on performances, stunts, and a good script told by a master storyteller. I am forever transformed by this film and still hold my Criterion DVD of Seven Samurai close to my heart, it was the first DVD I ever purchased.
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  • By Jeremy
    March 02, 2010
    02:22 PM

    Seven Samurai, early spring, years ago. A Chicago movie-night in, a fierce rainstorm out. Me, the artist and cinema buff; my wife, the writer and Japanese history student. Blanketed in colorful black and white.
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  • By Matthew
    March 02, 2010
    02:22 PM

    Seven Samurai. I think it was around the time I had just started high school, and it came on T. V. My dad insisted on me watching it; and I've been in love ever since. ^_^
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  • By Ryan Graham
    March 02, 2010
    02:22 PM

    An old friend of mine had been trying to get me to watch classic films for a long time--several years. Sometime in 2004, I believe, I gave in and sat down to watch a film he had suggested over and over. Seven Samurai. It not only introduced me to Kurosawa, it introduced me to classic films in general.
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  • By Jean-Pascal Strüwer
    March 02, 2010
    02:25 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Seven Samurai and I was 7 years old. That was in 1984 on Swedish TV. When I saw it again, this time 26 years old, it was as I remembered every single scene when I saw it for the first time. It indirectly made a profound mark on me as a kid and I could go back in time and feel the same way I did for the first time I saw it. A masterpiece without a doubt!
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  • By JPS
    March 02, 2010
    02:25 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Seven Samurai and I was 7 years old. That was in 1984 on Swedish TV. When I saw it again, this time 26 years old, it was as I remembered every single scene when I saw it for the first time. It indirectly made a profound mark on me as a kid and I could go back in time and feel the same way I did for the first time I saw it. A masterpiece without a doubt!
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  • By Tommy Laird
    March 02, 2010
    02:25 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I watched was Rashômon. It was about a year ago during the TCM days of Oscar. I saw that it was going to be on TV, and my film major friend told me that I needed to see Kurosawa films, so I DVR'd it and watched it during a day of light classes. I will be honest here, I was not as big of a fan of it as I was hoping to be, but that has not deterred me from more Kurosawa films.
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  • By Justin Alvarez
    March 02, 2010
    02:26 PM

    Rashomon my freshmen year of high school. All I can say is utter awe at how well-made it is. I knew if I could make a film 1/100th as good as it, I'd be okay.
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  • By Jonathan Glover
    March 02, 2010
    02:27 PM

    My first exposure to Kurosawa was actually via the Criterion edition of Ran in my first year of college. On a bit of a "fuedal Japan" kick after tearing through my dad's copy of Taiko, I got into similarly themed video games. After reading a game review comparing said game to Kurosawa's Ran, I decided to hunt a copy down, paying -- gasp, yeah -- full retail at Suncoast, the only in my small, rural hometown that carried "them far'n films." My dad and I watched it that night, both enjoying the meticulously coreographed battle scenes for completely different reasons. A week later, what I think was a region-free, HK bootleg of Seven Samurai arrived... my dad had puchased it from eBay. As I grow older, my very, very blue collar father and I have less and less in common, him having little time for art and culture and me a struggling writer making the majority of my income writing about, "Hey, what do you know?", video games, at the moment trying to break into film criticism. But he always, and quite excitedly, has time to sit down and watch a newly acquired Kurosawa chanbara with me.
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  • By Terence Smith
    March 02, 2010
    02:28 PM

    My first Kurosawa film that I saw was of course, Seven Samurai. It was a lazy saturday afternoon. It had been rainy all day. So, I went down to my local video store and rented it on DVD. It was one of the first Criterion Collection movies that I saw. In that day, I watched a several hour epic of gripping drama and action. In the climax of the film, being in the same dark and dreary weather that was depicted in the film. I watched one of the most beautiful pieces of filmmaking that my young mind ever saw. It was then, that I discovered, that film was a vanishing art form. Both brilliant and unique. I have been a Kurosawa fan ever since that day, is one of my most beloved idols, and have seen every movie.
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  • By James Beyer
    March 02, 2010
    02:28 PM

    "Ikiru" was the first Kurosawa film I saw. One summer in college, my philosophy professor had several people over to his house to watch the film, and followed with a discussion and a Japanese woman explaining several things. I was blown away and it's still one of my favorite films.
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  • By Lisa
    March 02, 2010
    02:29 PM

    "The Seven Samurai" was my first Kurosawa movie. I watched it at my husband's behest, plus I had noticed that it had one of the actors from "Godzilla", so it had to be good! After that I was hooked and can happily say that I have hooked my children as well.
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  • By Andrew Crossley
    March 02, 2010
    02:29 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I watched was Yojimbo. It was a cool December day. You know those kinds of days right around Christmas when no one wants to do anything except wear pajamas all day and eat junk food? It was one of those days. I had gotten both Yojimbo and Sanjuro out from the video store and I decided to give them a spin. I really don't know what it was, but watching these two films back to back on a day like that really burnt into my mind the picture of Kurosawa as a director of "pleasant" and easy-to-watch films, in the good sense. I've thought this way of him ever since. So now anytime I have a free day of PJ'ing around, I'll always crave a Kurosawa movie. I love them.
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  • By j jordon
    March 02, 2010
    02:30 PM

    My first was Ran. Saw it in the theater with the whole family. Was 8, and had never read a subtitled movie, and to this day, I have no idea why my father took the whole family to see it. Afterwards it sat in the back of my head, as a wonderfull play of color, and a scene about breaking arrows. So it was with a nice surprise, that when I got older and into film, I got to see Ran again, and go, I saw this years ago. But it was better the second time around, being able to follow the story and enjoy the Shakespeare parralells.
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  • By JKim
    March 02, 2010
    02:31 PM

    Yojimbo was the first Kurosawa film I ever saw. It was during a Japanese film class I took during college (God, can it sound any more esoteric?). When the black and white images started up in class (on top of it being foreign AND subtitled???), part of me expected a snoozefest, but as soon as that fantastic music started up... I was hooked!
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  • By Dave
    March 02, 2010
    02:31 PM

    I rented "Rashomon" on VHS in High School. After it ended, I stopped the tape and regular cable TV came back on. It was Comedy Central and the "MST3K" gang was watching some old cornball movie. About 30 seconds after tuning in, one of them noted the foresty setting and made a joke along the lines of "Wait...we're suddenly in a Kurosawa movie now?" Total coincidence. Very strange. At the time I figured it was some kind of cross-textual sign, so "Rashomon" loomed larger in my mind than it normally would have. Years later, I bought "Rashomon" on Criterion DVD...but i still haven't watched it! Nowadays I would cite "7 Samurai" or "High and Low" as my personal favorites.
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  • By Alexander Bucsis
    March 02, 2010
    02:34 PM

    Rashomon was the first of Akira Kurosawa's films that I had the privilege of seeing in my formative years as a young cinephile. Not knowing entirely what I was in store for––or rather, what was in store for me––I fed the Criterion disc into the DVD player and began on that rainy afternoon what was to become a lifelong love affair with the great director's body of work. Several years later, while studying "In a Grove," the Ryūnosuke Akutagawa story from which Rashomon is largely derived, I revisited the picture to find it as captivating and alive a film as when I'd first fallen for it.
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  • By Brian F.
    March 02, 2010
    02:37 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I ever saw was Rashomon. It was my friends Criterion DVD and it was completely damaged and scratched up. The first 10 minutes were scratch free and I was able to watch the film without the DVD skipping or having any issueS. But after the first 10 minutes the movie would skip and freeze every couple of minutes. Yet, I was so entranced by the first 10 minutes of the film that I endured all of the issues inherent in the damaged DVD. It took about 3 1/2 hours for me to finally finish watching the film, usually having to replay the same shot 3-4 times before feeling satisfied in moving on to the next scene. However, the film was so glorious that it was very difficult for me to un-glue my eyes from the screen, regardless of the horribly mangled state of the DVD. It was probably one of the most unique and frustrating viewing experiences of my life. Nonetheless, the next day I bought Rashomon and Seven Samurai.
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  • By Dave Wilson
    March 02, 2010
    02:39 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was "Rashomon." This was in the late 80s. I was in high school in San Francisco and I lived about two blocks away from The Castro Theater, one of the country's best oldtime movie houses. They were doing a Kurosawa retrospective - "Throne of Blood" was actually the one I wanted to see, but it was a double feature with "Rashomon" opening. I was hooked. Mifune, the traveling shots through the forest, light and shadow, all that energy and raw emotion, the mystery of those conflicting viewpoints. I was hooked. I went back night after night and caught as much as I could. I went to film school later on, I was so hooked. My first short was about a college kid who thought he was a samurai. And it wasn't bad.
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  • By Adam
    March 02, 2010
    02:40 PM

    Throne of Blood was the first. High school. In the midst of a self-administered class on canonical film history (textbooks were mostly Pauline Kael collections, a little bit of Film Comment, and the then-recent 1993 Sight & Sound poll issue). I was desperate to see Rashomon but couldn't find it anywhere and Ran was only available (to me) Pan-and-Scan, which I knew was wrong. Local library had Throne of Blood and I took it home and watched it three times, if memory serves. I'd already decided (from crit, of course - no films anywhere to be seen yet) that I'd like Mizoguchi better, but oh, those camera moves in Throne of Blood...
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  • By Thomas Hochman
    March 02, 2010
    02:42 PM

    This is easy: Ran. I had already read my first Shakespeare. I had seen West Side Story and Zeffirelli's operatic Romeo & Juliet. To say nothing of how it changed my perception of Japan and opened my eyes to Kurosawa. Ran made film, art to me. Ran made Shakespeare beautiful, to me. Ran made Shakespeare literature. Even though it was sent in a time and a country I was only vaguely familiar with; Ran made Shakespeare relevant.
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  • By Stephen
    March 02, 2010
    02:43 PM

    My friend/dormmate got me into the Criterion Collection my freshman year in college. I did a blind buy of "Rashomon", popped into my dvd player, and have never looked back. He should get a commission from you guys for getting me me hooked.
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  • By Garrett Kelly
    March 02, 2010
    02:43 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Ikiru. It was about two and a half years ago, I was 20 at the time. I went to my local video store looking for any foreign films they might have, to my luck I found Ikiru. Kanji Watanabe's story is one that will always resonate with me and hopefully everyone else. With only a year to live, he has to find a way to come to terms with that fact. After trying many things, he settles on fighting to turn a dump into a children's playground. I will never forget the scene of him after the playground is finished as he is overwhelmed with a feeling of content. All of us, like Kanji, hope to do something that contributes to the happiness or well being of others, we want to live our life and have an impact. I haven't seen that premise told better in any other film than Ikiru.
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  • By Mark Hendrix
    March 02, 2010
    02:47 PM

    A few years ago, I randomly purchased the Kurosawa - 4 Samurai Classics collection on an impulse just because the box looked cool and it seemed a good way to explore a genre I hadn't previously given much thought or time. Though the name sounded vaguely familiar, I knew nothing about this Kurosawa fellow. I got home and watched Seven Samurai and was spellbound. The others in the set solidified a new love affair with both the director and the Criterion Collection in general.
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  • By Jaime Grijalba
    March 02, 2010
    02:48 PM

    My first film experience with Kurosawa was about six years ago, it was summer and it was a cloudy day. I was in my uncle´s house in the countryside, he was on vacations with his family and we went to take care of his house. Obviously, the work of taking care of the house was using all the things that he had: fridge, TV, computer, pool, etc; me and my family were like in paradise: we had a huge TV and enough food to live till they'd come back. That day, we had been seeing some TV shows on cable, sitting on the couch, bored with my brother and father, we had been doing this as it was very cold outside, we couldn't swim in the pool. I had seen that my uncle's DVD collection had many samurai movies, among them were Miyamoto Musashi 1 and 2, and also "Seven Samurai", directed by Akira Kurosawa. At that time I wasn't as big a film buff, but the name did ring a bell, I knew I had to see it, but the lenght scared me for some time, I told my dad that I wanted to see it, he had never seen it and also wanted to, but asked me with a seriosu face if I could stand more than 3 hours of movie, I looked away and made a life changing decission, I said that I would see it whole. After 207 minutes I had my mouth open, I was amazed, the time had passed flying, three hours were nothing, I was entertained, thrilled and full with emotions, a film buff was born. Outside there was a slight rain, living through it as we had seen a battle in the rain was really inspiring. I still thank my uncle, he was my eye opener.
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  • By Ron Foster
    March 02, 2010
    02:50 PM

    My first was Rashomon. I think I was about 17 and A friend had dragged me kicking and screaming to see it in some theater in Greenwich Village in NYC. I remember sitting in the theater waiting for the film to start, pissed off that my friend wanted to see this rather than some cool movie that was in color and in English. When the lights went down, it was the music at first that hooked me. That, coupled with the on screen storm gave a sense of dread and made me want to pay attention to the story and every shot, which I kept thinking was like some amazing photograph. I then came to realize how amazing the whole film was. It was an experience that I enjoyed in every Kurosawa film I would watch there after. My friend loves reminding me that it was he that turned me on to this great director, so for the thousandth time I thank him, and for the millionth time, I thank Kuroawa for making such great films.
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  • By David Reinke
    March 02, 2010
    02:50 PM

    At an actual theatre -- The Seven Samurai. Although it was the shorter version is was still a fantastic film. I subsequently saw the restored full length film and quickly realized just how much richer and fully realized Kurosawa's vision was. It is still on my list of the Top Ten Greatest Films. What a masterpiece.
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  • By James Mulligan
    March 02, 2010
    02:50 PM

    My first one was "Seven Samurai" in my first year of university. I remember sitting through the first half-hour and thinking what a dull beginning, and then finally everything started happening and the rest was really amazing. I'm also a big fan of Dostoevsky, and remembered thinking that Dostoevsky had a tendency to do the same: dull beginning setting up a long story, awesome rest of the book. When I found out Kurosawa directed a version of "The Idiot", I knew that would be a perfect match.
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  • By Tommy Acuff
    March 02, 2010
    02:50 PM

    As a part of a group raging Star Wars fans in high school, we'd read that we should watch The Hidden Fortress to note the similarities between it and Lucas' first Star Wars flick. We lived in a small southern town filled with a half dozen Mom & Pop video stores. One reluctantly agreed to order the movie, but only if we'd buy it. We each chipped in five bucks, and got the movie. Nice, brand new VHS copy (I'd put this around 1993, but it could have gone a year in either direction). We started watching it at our friend Bill's house, since he had a big screen TV down in their rec room.. Halfway through the movie, all but two of us had tapped out. Didn't know if it was the subtitles or the black & white. While the rest of our friends congregated in the other room to play the Star Wars RPG, Bill & I watched what was simply a tremendously fun flick. We couldn't even drag them back in for the final battle. And while Yojimbo and Sanjuro have since become my favorites, I'll still have a spot in my heart for Hidden Fortress.
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  • By Wesley Rumph
    March 02, 2010
    02:52 PM

    The first Kurosawa film was "Yojimbo". I was in high school at the time and in love with Wes Anderson movies. Being as both my copies of "Rushmore" and "Royal Tenenbaums" were Criterion, I decided to slowly work my way through the Criterion DVDs available at the local movie rental store. So, I rented "Yojimbo" and I was hooked from the first frame. Very, very few actors can create the kind of presence Toshiro Mifune created. I was so gleefully happy after watching the movie that I went out and rented "The Seven Samurai" later that even. Great day.
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  • By Justin Tomblin
    March 02, 2010
    02:52 PM

    My first Kurosawa experience was High and Low. I was mesmerized by the pacing of the film and how it reminded me of an old Jules Dassin type of noir thriller turned on its ear. This promptly made me seek out other classics like Seven Samurai and Ikiru. I would just like to thank Criterion for exposing myself and others to one of the great masters in all of cinema, both domestic and foreign.
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  • By Caroline
    March 02, 2010
    02:54 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Rashomon. During my sophomore year of high school, my history class was charged with watching a Kurosawa film and a Western film of a similar genre or plot, and analyzing the differences. Most students selected spaghetti westerns and their Kurosawa counterparts, so being the contrary teenager I was, I selected Rashomon and compared it to Murder on the Orient Express (1974). In order to watch it, I had to purcahse a used copy of Rashomon online because the library and Blockbuster didn't have copies - luckily I still have that beat up VHS today! At the time I wasn't quite the cinephile I am now, but I knew I had watched a work of genius.
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  • By Mario J. Machado
    March 02, 2010
    02:56 PM

    The first film that I saw, from Akira Kurosawa, was "Dersu Uzala" (1975) in 1984 when I was 16 years old. I was at an age where I wanted to expand my horizons, through film, and seeing a Japanese film that explores the friendship of two men in the forests of Soviet Russia opened my mind to the possibilities of what film can do. Seeing this film, as well as other films from foreign countries, taught me that the power of film is universal when dealing with the human condition.
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  • By Jen Shaffer
    March 02, 2010
    02:56 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was Seven Samurai. I was about 13 and in the midst of this huge Japanese movie kick. My brother came home from college for Christmas and he brought out his copy of Seven Samurai. Watching that movie with him began a beautiful tradition of watching a different Kurosawa film together every holiday. I began buying every Kurosawa film I could get my hands on and when I was old enough to earn real money, I spent all of it on any Criterion Collection dvd my local video store carried. That film opened me up to a whole new plethora of movies, not just by Kurosawa, that made me think and challenged me as a viewer, even in high school. I attribute my immense love of movies to that time when my brother and I watched Seven Samurai.
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  • By Anthony Perry
    March 02, 2010
    02:56 PM

    I live in a town that isn't known for it's culture, a midwest town in Illinois smack in the middle of the state. I was an avid fan of Siskel & Ebert's TV show because they helped to educate me on what I was missing cinematically. In 1980 a new multiplex cinema opened up, the first one to reach our town. It had six screens and the manager promised that one screen would always be reserved for "art house" films. The first and only "art house" film to play at this theatre was Kagemusha and it didn't even play for seven days. It only lasted the weekend before they pulled it, but I was there that Friday at the very first showing. I later bored my friends and family with what it felt like seeing this massive film unfold before me. Seeing those battles fought on a huge screen with those vibrant colors astounded me. I was 22 and I knew that I had finally found the kind of cinema that I wanted to submerse myself in. It remains the only Kurosawa I've had the pleasure of seeing on the big screen but it served it's purpose. I've been a fan ever since and I began checking out musty worn out VHS tapes from my local library (which I discovered had [and still has] an amazing array of foreign language films). I'm still in this town 30 years later but I've seen every Kurosawa film (save for two of them) and I own every one (with the exception of four). There still isn't a theatre in town that plays foreign language cinema, but that's okay. Thanks to Netflix, amazon and companies like yours, it's far easier now to see a wide array of foreign language cinema!
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  • By Ali Shojaee
    March 02, 2010
    02:57 PM

    My first kurosawa experience was Red Beard. Well it created a very romantic picture of Kurosawa in my mind when I saw this. Spceially I was touched by the scene which women shout at the well, and the death of the old man. It was one of the many things that turned me into an idealist!!
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  • By Brent Smith
    March 02, 2010
    02:58 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Rashomon. I was at university, taking a bunch of film studies courses. After having my status as a film buff questioned by a few fellow students, I decided to fill in the gaps in my film-watching experience, of which I was told Kurosawa was an unforgivable one. Rashomon was an early work, a universally acknowledged high point, and readily available to rent in my hometown. I haven't seen the film since that initial viewing (about seven years ago), but two things really stuck with me: Mifune's animalistic performance and the image of Rashomon Gate in the rain.
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  • By Paul
    March 02, 2010
    03:00 PM

    Seven Samurai. I was probably 12 when I saw it at tiny cinema in an office building (as far as I can remember) in Adelaide, South Australia. I just thought samurai were cool at the time, but it affected me deeply, being the first film to really turn me on to the possibilities of non-Hollywood cinema. It is still just as affecting today.
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  • By Mack Faamausili
    March 02, 2010
    03:04 PM

    The first Kurosawa movie I saw was "Dreams" shortly after it was released on VHS some years back. I remember seeing him on the Oscars accepting a lifetime achievement award from Martin Scorcese. The box looked interesting so I rented it. Honestly, I wasn't that impressed being something of short-attention spanned 20-something, but I was especially taken by the snow scene and of the business-man endlessly running down a volcano. The next Kurosawa movie I saw, "Seven Samurai", totally blew me away and I proceeded to watch all his movies after that, my favorite now being "High and Low". It also sowed the seed which is my fascination with early Japanese cinema. Awesome stuff!
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  • By Hassan
    March 02, 2010
    03:05 PM

    Hidden Fortress. I saw it a a revival theatre near where I was going to school. I went because I hear that George Lucas was heavily influenced by this movie and Star Wars was an homage to it. I loved it.
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  • By Waylan Choy
    March 02, 2010
    03:05 PM

    technically I saw glimpses of Seven Samurai, but the first full release I watched was YOJIMBO (Criterion Collection :]). I saw the many references that liken Yojimbo as the influence to the Western genre. In all, it was an intriguing story, made me want to know what was going to happen next. I paid particular attention to the set design and costumes, and especially the cinematography. As a photographer myself, this was very special. this guy almost paid for his selfishness! but in the end, made up for it. I'm glad he made it out alive.. though was there any doubt? of course, much respect for Criterion providing the DVD commentary package/notes and for opening the door to film history and classics. I feel as if I am gaining a legitimate education just from the archive. It's been a fun 6 months!
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  • By Ben Cossum
    March 02, 2010
    03:06 PM

    Seven Samurai was my first Kurosawa film. I was in middle school and I went through a samurai phase where I was totally obsessed with samurai cinema. I rented it from a blockbuster and watched it with my dad and distinctly remember being able to tell a huge difference between this movie and all the other samurai films I had seen up until then. It soon became one of my favorite movies and I watch it at least once ever couple of months and show it to anyone who hasn't had the pleasure of seeing it. It definitely made a huge impact on me as a child and influenced me to watch tons of other great pieces of cinema.
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  • By andrew
    March 02, 2010
    03:08 PM

    The first Kurosawa I ever saw was RAN. In highschool, I used to have the booklet catalogue (that came with my first Criterion) as my bathroom reader, so his name popped up a lot. I read and reread that catalogue to infinity. I was 17, when on a trip to Hong Kong, I picked up about a hundred cheap legal VCDs (about $7 for 3!), among them was RAN. One day I decided to finally watch my first Kurosawa...which is kinda cool cos I've since heard about how he would wait for the right cloud formations to be in the background, so no wonder it was so beautiful! The compositions with the hoards of troops. Everything was incredible. I remember when the evil wife finally got hers...I was utterly shocked at the horrific (yet beautiful) blood splatter on the wall. It was the first time I'd ever seen anything like that!!
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  • By Eugene Golbin
    March 02, 2010
    03:08 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was the Seven Samurai when I was seventeen years old. My parents were out of town and I was home alone and had nothing to do. Flipping through the channels, I noticed that Turner Classic Movies was playing a Kurosawa marathon (Seven Samurai, Throne of Blood, Yojimbo) with comments from Tom Cruise and Edward Zwick (to promote Last Samurai). I had heard of Seven Samurai before but could not imagine the wonderful night that I was in for. I watched every second of that marathon, enjoying numerous sodas and bags of popcorn. At the time, I was not yet a big cinemaphile but Seven Samurai quickly changed all that. I saw that it didn't matter how many explosions or special effects were thrown on screen; what truly mattered was the art of character development and storytelling. I watched the rest of the marathon and went to bed at sunrise.
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  • By Andrew Choe
    March 02, 2010
    03:10 PM

    Ikiru I watched it on a small computer monitor because our TV didn't work. I watched it in my room around 3:00 in the morning because that's all I did when I was 17: watch movies late at night and early in the morning. I had nothing else to do. What else could I do? Movies helped me escape to a world that was so wonderful, a world that was so much more beautiful than the reality I was living back then. Ikiru came as a shock to me. How was it that I kept seeing myself--a 17 year old--in Watanabe, an old bureaucrat dying of cancer? It's disturbing to think how Watanabe was almost a mirror image of my own. Would I become Watanabe when I grow old, having missed out a life of fulfillment? I'm 19 now. I'm much happier at where I'm at in my life, and I'm sure (though this might sound odd or weird or cheesy) Ikiru has in some way made my life much more fulfilling. And every time I see Watanabe out on the swing set singing to the snow, I can't help but feel so happy. I love the snow, and the times I spent on the swing were some of the happiest moments of my life. Thank you Kurosawa for this masterpiece. Happy early 100th birthday!
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  • By W. Chang
    March 02, 2010
    03:11 PM

    First Kurosawa film I ever saw was RAN back when I was in high school. Back then I wasn't much into foreign films (or film at all, really), but I was very into classical literature, so when my mom told me this epic, Japanese film based on KING LEAR was about to start - I forget which channel it was, probably IFC - I parked myself in front of the TV and sat in awe for the next few hours. And it definitely wasn't the last Kurosawa film, that's for sure.
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  • By Hughmax
    March 02, 2010
    03:12 PM

    "High and Low" was the first Kurosawa movie I consciuosly watched in its entirety. It was in 1993, my wife was on the verge of going inot labor with our first child, and I had gone to the movie store to rent some movies to watch while we were waiting to go to the hospital for the delivery. The masterful demonstration of the tension in the manufacturer's decision making process was then, and still is today, mesmerizing. Kurosawa is clearly one of the best story structurers and tellers cinema will ever know.
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  • By Luke Petach
    March 02, 2010
    03:12 PM

    When I think of Kurosawa the picture that flows vividly to my head is the eerie haunting theme at the beginning of "Throne of Blood" when Spiders Web Castle is being introduced. This is because this is the first Kurosawa film I ever saw. It was recommended to me my Junior year of high school by my English teacher. We had just finished studying Macbeth in class and I was craving a deeper more vivid understanding of the story. My teacher told me that the first time she really learned to love Shakespeare was when she saw Throne of Blood in college. I had heard of Kurosawa before, but had never checked out any of his films and at the time I was going through a Bergman obsession phase so the idea of another foreign auteur seemed irresistible to me. I immediately went and got my hands on a copy of "Throne of Blood," and after watching that movie I became so inspired that I decided that I was going to purse a career in film.
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  • By Kevin Longrie
    March 02, 2010
    03:15 PM

    Working at a small town blockbuster and being the budding cinephile that I was, I quickly made my way through every art/independent/foreign film we had in stock. (Free rentlals!) I remember the day I picked up Seven Samurai, what was to be my first, but definitely not last Kurosawa film (I even ended up taking a class on the guy at university.) I watched it with my dad over the course of two nights (we had not looked at the runtime before we started it late one night) and, after that, it IMMEDIATELY went onto my "Kevin recommends" shelf. I also bought the Criterion copy of it (the original one-disc DVD) the next day. Seven Samurai was not only my gateway into Kurosawa, but Japanese film as a whole. Long story short: phenomenal and highly influential.
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  • By Patrick Halloran
    March 02, 2010
    03:15 PM

    My first Kurosawa was Ikiru. I was just starting to get in to cinema seriously, so I was hitting all the big directors. When Kurosawa came up I knew I should watch Seven Samurai or Yojimbo, but what I happened to have available at the time courtesy of a very, very great independent movie rental store, was Ikiru. So I took it home, knowing nothing much about it, and watched it. I was utterly decimated by its beauty and pain. I watched it with one other friend, and both she and I had tears streaming down our faces. One of the best blind-rents I ever made.
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  • By D-Man
    March 02, 2010
    03:15 PM

    I first saw Seven Samurai as a small child (probably when I was around 10 or so) because my father loved Kurosawa. I would act out scenes with my favorite character (Kyuzo) and always felt like crying when seeing him and Kikuchio die at the end. I watched it so many times that in my middle school year book under the "favorite movies" section, Seven Samurai was written down amongst the likes of Mr. Deeds and 3 Ninjas. Years later when I began studying film in college, Seven Samurai is the only film that still hasn't dropped off of the list and the only film thy still moves me the same way it did 12 years ago.
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  • By Koji Yamamoto
    March 02, 2010
    03:15 PM

    "Dreams" I was only 10. I saw it on TV. I didn't watch it from the beginning but when I turned on the TV, they were showing the Tunnel episode. The haunting images of the tunnel and ghost soldiers were so captivating that I still remember how shocking it was when I first saw it. It is a very dark and heavy topic, but even as a 10 year-old boy, I was blown away by the artistic vision of Kurosawa. And I had never heard of any story that's as deep and moving as the story in the episode of The Tunnel. The Tunnel still remains as one of the greatest stories I've heard in my life. Right now, I'm pursuing my career as a film director and Kurosawa has been one of the biggest influences since the day I was blown away by "Dreams".
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  • By Robert Hedrick
    March 02, 2010
    03:16 PM

    The first film by Kurosawa that I saw was "Yojimbo." I was in my sophomore year of high school and was really getting into film when my dad informed me about the greatness of Kurosawa. I checked out the video from the library and encouraged (okay, forced) my brother into watching it with me. It completely blew both of us away and started me on my way with the great Japanese film master. I sure haven't looked back, having seen more that 20 of his films up to this point, and hopefully (with the help of Criterion) many more. :)
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  • By Nate
    March 02, 2010
    03:17 PM

    My first Kurosawa experience was only a few days ago. It was Yojimbo, and it was one of the greatest films i have ever watched. Ever since then i have been looking for all of the Kurosawa criterion movies.
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  • By Maxim Van Scoy
    March 02, 2010
    03:17 PM

    About 5 or 6 years ago, I borrowed Seven Samurai from the local library. I was pretty excited to watch it, as I'd heard so many great things about it. Well I was only left with disappointment after the DVD started skipping like crazy after about ten minutes. Some time later, while perusing the movie selection in a store, I came across The Hidden Fortress. I bought it, brought it home and basked in it's glory. Since that time I began watching as many of Kurosawa's films as could. But Seven Samurai always seemed to allude me. Those first ten minutes burning in my mind. It wasn't until the 3 disc set was released that I found my opportunity. So despite seeing many other films before it, I still consider Seven Samurai to be my first experience with Kurosawa.
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  • By MATT!
    March 02, 2010
    03:19 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I've ever seen was Kagemusha on blu-ray. I've obviously heard about all of his films before but had never seen any of them. When Kagemusha came out, I decided that I was going to start there. Buying a 3 hour samurai epic on blu-ray without even seeing it made my friends think I was crazy but holy cow it was phenomenal. I was blown away by every piece of this film and have quickly added him to my list of favorite film makers!
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  • By Tony P
    March 02, 2010
    03:20 PM

    When I was 13, I was still riding a six-year Star Wars high. I had fallen in love with them when I saw the re-release in 1997, and was devouring anything to do with them. I happened to read an interview with Lucas about how The Hidden Fortress had been the biggest influence on the first movie, and so I immediately checked it out from the library. It blew my 13-year-old mind. I was immediately taken with the originality of the story: a wonderful tale of conflict with warriors and princesses, told from the point of view of people who don't give a damn about any of it. To this day it's one of my favorites, possibly because it's the funniest film he made. I may "appreciate" stuff like Rashomon more, but The Hidden Fortress is my personal favorite.
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  • By Rob Martindale
    March 02, 2010
    03:23 PM

    The first film by Kurosawa I saw was Rashomon. I actually bought the Criterion laserdisc on a whim, having never seen his films, but, being a huge film fan, knowing the influence he has had on directors like Lucas and Coppola. Also, being a huge Academy Awards fan, I knew this was an early film to win best foreign language film before such a category even existed. Needless to say, this film brought me into the world of Kurosawa and I have never looked back. Rashomon has and will stay in my top 5 films of all time.
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  • By geoffrey spurgin
    March 02, 2010
    03:23 PM

    Hidden Fortress was the first Kurosawa movie I saw maybe 5 years ago. Having been a life long Star Wars fan, I ran home hoping it might paint Phantom Menace in a better light. Or at the very least, have another movie to add to the collection of related movies (right next to Battle for Endor). My opinion? R2D2 > Tahei > Matakishi > C-3PO
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  • By JOSH LOCKLAIR
    March 02, 2010
    03:24 PM

    The first Kurosawa I saw was in high school, and it was THE SEVEN SAMURAI, on VHS. I saw it before I ever saw THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN, and loved the historical perspective of a piece of Japanese feudal history, and was attracted by how close it was to the westerns I saw as a child. I proceeded to watch RASHOMON and KAGEMUSHA, and became intrigued by Mr. Kurosawa's ability to tell a strong visual story. Shot composition, editing and acting always compliment his films. They are excellent examples of how a filmmaker should prepare to shoot a film, because every element serves the story.
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  • By Heather Kamp
    March 02, 2010
    03:27 PM

    The first Kurosawa movie I saw was Hidden Fortress, and I was about 5 (or about 24 years ago). My father had very little time when he was in graduate school then so he'd spend the time outside of that watching movies with me that he loved. It was on the tv and we watched it together. It was the first movie I saw that wasn't in english or french, but I don't remember being bothered by that. While it may not be my favorite still (that's currently held by Yojimbo) it was definitely one of the steps that led me to having a love of film.
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  • By Peter DeMars
    March 02, 2010
    03:27 PM

    I thought I was hip until I saw Ran. Wet behind the ears, Scorsese, Coppola, et al made me fall in love with movies, but Kurosawa was my Renaissance. I miss the excitement of discovering movies like Ran, Seven Samurai, Ikiru...
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  • By Jesse Lee Oswald
    March 02, 2010
    03:28 PM

    Yume. (Dreams) My sister owns a DVD copy. Normally, we can't agree on anything to watch except Miyazaki. I had never seen a Japanese film before (non-anime) and it was a new experience. I must be honest and avoid "sugar-coating". I thought the movie was decent. I have seen 26 other movies by the master since then and for the most part, each one one them (except Rhapsody) were more meaningful to me. Had I not seen Dreams however, I would have never had the curiosity to rent The Seven Samurai or Rashomon.
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  • By Al Topich
    March 02, 2010
    03:28 PM

    Back in high school I was really in to cheesy Samurai flicks, Sonny Chiba and whatnot, but I hadn't tried any of Kurosawa at that point. Well earlier in 2002 I had discovered a movie called Usual Suspects and liked it to a point, or enough so to where I did research on the interwebz about the flick. A lot of bloggers on IMDB started to describe the major story structure to that of Rashomon. So i thought to myself, "Samurai... Stylistic... I should dig it." Then i went to the nearest video store and blind bought it on criterion, blind buying is a common practice by me. I went home, fired up the dvd player in my room, fixed a bowl of Rocky Road ice cream, turned the lights down low. Within the first five minutes, I was amazed at the down poor of rain coming down on our storytellers. And half way through, I knew this was nothing like Usual Suspects, but something far greater. By the end of the movie my face had melted. I was like the Nazi's in Indiana Jones. From there on I went to Seven Samurai and Yojimbo and then the next Kurosawa, enjoying him even more. But I will never forget my time with Rashomon.
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  • By Greg
    March 02, 2010
    03:29 PM

    I can't remember what age I was, I think it was my early teens, but the first Kurosawa movie I saw was Ran in a theatre in northeast Seattle with my father. It was an absolutely mind-blowing experience. The imagery, the sounds, the directing, the acting ... I was vaguely familiar with King Lear (and knew nothing of the somewhat similar Japanese story). Having only been a fan of bland, generic Hollywood movies up until that point, I saw finally what true film-making was about.
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  • By Warren Pollard
    March 02, 2010
    03:30 PM

    My first Kurosawa was The Seven Samurai. I was about 13 or 14 years old, and my only exposure at that point to (reasonably) quality cinema was the IMDB top 250, as it is to many inexperienced filmgoers. Seven Samurai, I believe, was the only foreign language film in the top 10, and my young self decided to give it a shot.This was a big step for me; it was the first foreign language film I ever saw, and definitely one of the first black-and-white films I willingly watched. I downloaded it illegally, and watched it one night in my basement. I had a bad monitor and a horrible video card, and my computer chair wasn't very comfortable. The visual quality of the video file was also quite poor, and it took me a while to figure out how the subtitle files worked. As you can tell my viewing setup was pretty damn bad. Despite my discomfort and poor image quality, I was highly impressed. Seven Samurai holds a place in my heart as the first time I really delved into movies that were anything other than new, "famous", colored and in English. It opened a world of possibilities to this young cinephile.
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  • By Gustavo H. Razera
    March 02, 2010
    03:32 PM

    RAN. I watched it last year, in my house, in a home theater, on a Criterion DVD of course Its as grand and profound as a Shakespearean tragedy, which, by the way, it *is*. Though deliberately paced, it's mesmerising, and Lady Kaede is one of all-time great female villains (although villain isn't the proper word here).
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  • By Matt
    March 02, 2010
    03:32 PM

    Rashomon. I was 18. It was a Criterion disc of course. I planted myself on the couch and waited to be blown away. I wasn't. There were some great moments: the sun glaring through branches overhead, the channeling of the samurai's ghost, Kanazawa's stolid expression after witnessing his wife's rape, but there wasn't a connection. I didn't feel that rush of emotional and intellectual stimulation I had come to expect from great art. The film may benefit from repeated viewings, and I intend to watch it again, but one of Kurosawa's ideas has been indelible: the human inability to accept any absolute truth.
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  • By Tron
    March 02, 2010
    03:35 PM

    The first one I saw was One Wonderful Sunday, just over a year ago. I had wanted to watch Seven Samurai and a few others for years but had never gotten around to it. Finally, I decided to watch a Kurosawa and started with that one, I'm not sure why. However, I was immediately entranced with Kurosawa's style and his writing. I watched it alone, on my couch and in pitch black. I know it's not one of his "masterpieces" but I knew that this was the work of a cinematic genius. My approach to films has changed dramatically since I was introduced to Kurosawa, and One Wonderful Sunday still holds a special place in my heart.
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  • By Patrick O'Leary
    March 02, 2010
    03:36 PM

    I rented the video of THE SEVEN SAMURAI--or should I say "the videos"? It came in two cassettes. I popped it in and was blown away by the battles --arrows, swords and horses and mud. Long movie, I thought, if it came in two volumes. And then it ended. Or rather a title came onscreen that read: THE END. The end? Didn't they mean the end of part one? Then I realized I had watched the second half of the movie FIRST. So I pop in Part One. Watch it from the begining. And I'm amazed. It's great. Even out of order. Even starting in the middle. If that isn't greatness, I don't know what is.
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  • By David R
    March 02, 2010
    03:37 PM

    My parents' first date together was a little known film called Seven Samurai. I remember my mom telling me about how my dad's idea of a romantic date was a three hour long, black and white samurai movie. She loved it, or at least feigned interest enough to go out with my dad again, and lo and behold they got married, I was born, and I was about thirteen when I discovered an old VHS copy of Seven Samurai in the house. This was before I'd even heard of the Criterion label. "What's this?" I asked. I was at the point in my life where I became hugely interested in Japanese culture. I had been into Super Mario Bros., Speed Racer, and Astro Boy since I was a young boy, and that began to evolve in a interest of many aspects of Japanese culture. My mother told me the story of their date, and how she bought that tape in the early nineties as a reminder, though they hadn't watched it since. Hearing great things about Kurosawa, and the film Seven Samurai, I immediately spooled it up in our VHS player. I was instantly drawn in to the plight of the farmers, and their desire to fight back. I was floored by the intricate characterization, the weaving stories of each of the characters, and the epic battles that took place. As soon as the first tape finished, I rushed to the VCR to put the second one in. Three hours is a long time for a thirteen year old to sit in one place for a black and white subtitled movie, but I was enthralled. That movie single-handedly brought an interest in film to me that went deeper than just Star Wars and action movies. It is the reason I discovered the Criterion Collection, as I went to find more of his movies. It is the reason that I value the power of film more than I ever have. If I could, I would personally thank Kurosawa for having such a powerful effect on my life.
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  • By Chris M
    March 02, 2010
    03:38 PM

    My very first Kurosawa experience was the Criterion 2003 DVD release of "Shichinin no Samurai" (Seven Samurai). I graduated college in 2004 with a major in film criticism, and somehow none of my classes managed to discuss any Kurosawa films to any detail (a pretty sad fact, in hindsight). I continued doing my own studies into genres I was less familiar with until... well, I guess I haven't stopped doing that. It seemed from what people around me were saying that "Shichinin no Samurai" was the most well-known Kurosawa film. So I rented it (through Netflix, I believe) in July or August of 2004 (I was 24 years old), and had one of the greatest film experiences of my life. I have watched more samurai films than I can count by now, but not a single one managed to capture the artistic vision of this particular Kurosawa film. I was taken back by how much I cared about the characters by the end of the film. A character study "Shichinin no Samurai" is, and nothing less. Asakazu Nakai's cinematography, and the score by Fumio Hayasaka each functioned as characters all their own. Suspension of disbelief was no issue watching it for the first time. How many genres were part of "Samurai" blew me away. It was drama, comedy, romance, tragedy, action, adventure... on and on, one could go. This film stands as one of the most complex and effective narratives in the history of cinema. I am so glad it was my first Kurosawa experience, as it stands even today as my favorite of all his films. Thank you for the opportunity to talk about this experience, I look forward to reading as many of the others as I have time to.
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  • By Aaron Dawson
    March 02, 2010
    03:39 PM

    I first saw Rashomon in a high school World Literature class, the teacher was a huge Kurosawa fan (having lived in Japan for a number of years, this wasn't surprising.) I hadn't seen or even heard of Kurosawa before hand but was intrigued by the ambiguity of the story and went out and bought your collection of Kurosawa Samurai films shortly thereafter along with Ran.
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  • By Andrew T
    March 02, 2010
    03:42 PM

    I began my second semester in college without any real knowledge of International Film and decided to better acquaint myself with it. That coupled with a infatuation with Japanese Anime left over from high school started me looking at what I thought to be "Old Japanese Movies." Between classes while bored one day I typed that into the media search engine at my college and it came back with mostly Kurosawa titles. I settled for the shortest movie on the list, "Rashomon" and thought it would be cool since it had samurai. What then occurred when I put that ratty old VHS in the library VCR and put on the headphones was just an awakening, not just of Kurosawa but of Film, in my mind. I was blown away by the different stories, especially Takashi Shimura's story in which both of the men are cowards, barely touching swords before scurrying away. Blew. My. Mind. I skipped my next class just to watch it again. I remember being completely shocked by the ending and the rain falling on the temple at the end just pounding away in my ears. Cinematic Nirvana. Since then I have strived to see all of his movies. A local cinema will be showing Rashomon this 23rd and I cannot be more thrilled. To this day still my favorite film of his and he is my favorite director. Thank you for doing his films justice Criterion. Thank you.
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  • By Charles Deckert
    March 02, 2010
    03:43 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was 1954's "Seven Samurai", which I had only watched because I read that it was a favorite of one of my favorite filmmakers Jim Jarmusch, for reasons I hadn't known why (and still don't, to be honest) except for and obvious influence in his "Ghost Dog: Way of the Samurai". This experience was recent, for I don't come around much Kurosawa or any Japanese cinema where I'm at (at least not by local means), and the impression left upon me had to be of silent awe, within which I came to understand, in my own way, what beauty and what grace this man Kurosawa, no longer with us, managed to set up and capture in his films, especially in this 3 hour plus epic which has been imitated and granted homage to countless times. I was finally honored to see the source of such inspiration, of which one can only admire and never copy.
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  • By Michael Demopoulos
    March 02, 2010
    03:45 PM

    Red Beard. I was in an digital sound design course at depaul, one of the few good classes I had in my time there, with a fantastic professor (Stuart Grais). We saw the clip from Red Beard where the dying man was telling his story and it was at the point where he encountered his otherwise thought to be dead wife. It was silent, and then a blast of wind made the nearby chimes scream, brilliant! I forgot about it for a long time and then went nuts trying to remember which film it was. And since it's a very small and disjointed part of the overall story I could never figure it out until I actually looked up my old Professor's info and emailed him and yeh yeh yeh.
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  • By Pat Carroll
    March 02, 2010
    03:45 PM

    When sentenced to solitude by starlit night I seldom seek consolation in cinema. Yet when suffering from incessant insomnia, I turned to Seven Samurai for solace last September. As a lad at the sensitive age of seventeen I had seen my first glimpse into the world of Kurosawa and it changed my own world. I was forced to view this masterpiece with Sennheiser headphones, and a Sony T.V. stuffed in my closet at midnight while the world slept, but nothing could ruin the experience. Now I watch Bergman, and Fellini, at arthouse theaters, or simply alone, in a closet, at the dead of night, when I can really see myself as Toshiro Mifune or Marcello Mastroianni and I can see what made Kurosawa so great.
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  • By Kyle Meyers
    March 02, 2010
    03:48 PM

    We were visiting my wife's parents on Chebeague Island off of Maine in January or February many years ago. They were house-sitting a beautiful old home named "Ashley". In the summer, thousands of people make this island their home, but in the dead of winter, there were no more than 300 residents...isolated, cold, and quiet. Even though the general store and restaurant were closed for winter, the "town hall" and library remained open to the public. While browsing the VHS tapes one afternoon, a conversation was struck up between myself and a librarian. I knew very little about foreign film at that time, but I knew just enough to pretend I knew much about Akira Kurosawa and that "Seven Samurai" is indeed a "great" film, even though I had never seen it, or any other Kurosawa film. :-) Fortunately, this impressed the librarian enough to invite me to the community film night, since "Rashomon" was next in the series of selected films. So I show up to this thing awkward, vulnerable, and green in light of this community of mostly retired professors and liberated thinkers. I began thinking, "What the fuck did I get myself into? Are they going to ask me what I think about the film? Why did I pretend to know about Akira Kurosawa?" But I was also anticipating the initial experience of watching this film, yet not really knowing what to expect. One of the initial feelings I remember was boredom (Boooooo - I know), because I had never seen anything with the style of a silent film, and except for Kazan's "On The Waterfront" and Capra's "It's a Wonderful Life", I hadn't really even enjoyed many "classics", unless they were faster paced like Hitchcock's films. So this 90 minute film felt like three hours. Discussion ensued, but I didn't listen. I didn't speak their language. However, it seemed symbolic of the film itself, as I walked away in a fog, trying to put the pieces together. Surrounded by snow, pines, and darkness...sucking in the cold air...considering the apparently awful nature of man...on an island that seemed to isolate us from that very nature...wondering what the fuck it could mean...and wondering what direction I was walking...and why. Film was never the same after that. Neither was I.
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  • By Ryan Estabrooks
    March 02, 2010
    03:49 PM

    The first Kurosawa film for me was "Seven Samurai". I rented it from the video store I worked at and watched at the house one night and was surprised at how much I would come to love it. I had never really seen any samurai movies before that and was amazed at how easily it kept my interest for over 3 hours. I was hooked from then on
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  • By Alex
    March 02, 2010
    03:50 PM

    Seven Samurai. I watched it as part of a Criterion Collection month-long marathon I did in February. It was a film I had been wanting to see for a long time. How could I not? Even the title sounds epic.
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  • By Woody Jones
    March 02, 2010
    03:51 PM

    As an avid film watcher, I had heard Kurosawa's name for years before I actually saw one of his pictures. I was a senior in college and living with this horrible roommate. One night he brought home a copy of Seven Samurai that he had rented from a local video store. We put it on and he thought it was boring and soon left the room. I was completely mesmerized and sat through the whole film. It was a nice touch that it also happened to be raining that night. It added to the ambiance quite nicely Later in graduate school I took a whole class devoted to the master and discovered even more wonderful films like Red Beard, The Bad Sleep Well, and Dersu Uzala. I kicked that roommate to the curb years ago, but the one good thing he ever did for me was to introduce me to Kurosawa. For that I have to begrudgingly thank him.
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  • By Tony Martinez
    March 02, 2010
    03:52 PM

    The indelible images of Rashōmon haunt me to this day, nearly six years after my first exposure to this masterpiece. It was during a thunderstorm here in Florida, in a darkened room when my wife and I sat with a bowl of popcorn and immersed ourselves in this finely crafted but visceral experience, astounded at the level of cinematic storytelling, and wondering why we hadn't considered it much, much sooner.
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  • By Gordon Miller
    March 02, 2010
    03:54 PM

    First film I saw was Ran at the former theater known as the Balboa Theater in Newport Beach, CA back in late '80s when it first came through. The Balboa showed a wonderful mix of classic movies and art films in its day. My buddy and I were blown away by the scale and colors. I remember thinking they must have hired every person in Japan for those army sequences
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  • By Carlo Coen
    March 02, 2010
    03:55 PM

    My first Kurosawa was Rashomon, dubbed into Italian. I was very young (probably ten or eleven) and it was my father who guided me through the film. He, my mother and I were sitting in the drawing room of out apartment in Rome and Rashomon was on TV. The screen was small, but all the lights had been switched off, because in those years (early 60s) TV was a sort of a small movie theatre in the drawing room, and everybody had to keep silent. Today TV is on throughout the day, all the lights are on and people keep on doing anything else, watching flashes and hearing noises in the background. It has become a piece of furniture. I was watching Rashomon with my utmost attention, trying at the same time lo listen to my father's comment, and -although difficult to understand vis-a-vis the "usual" films I was accustomed to- I remember I was fascinated by the idea of how the same story can be told from different points of view. I was thinking of how lies are conceived, of how difficult it is to tell what is lie and what is truth. At that age I could not realise the harmonious relationship between images and story-line. My father, nevertheless, was insisting on the beauty of the faces expressed by Mifune, on his body movements, "look, it's like in a pantomime, it means he's acting while telling his version..." I remember that very clearly, but I wanted to think as deeply as I could of how the different versions of the incident could ALL be believable. I watched Rashomon and my second Kurosawa film, The Seven Samurai, several times later in theatres, and I might mix up some impressions, but watching a film at home on an old TV set with one's father enthusiasm behind is an experience that my son cannot have, because his very concept of TV does not have anymore the aura of magic it had in 1962, and I feel a bit sad about that...
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  • By Christopher Smith
    March 02, 2010
    03:55 PM

    One night, after watching dumb and dumber twice in a row, once forward and then once completely in rewind, my brother walked into the room, told me I was insane, slapped me back to my senses and promptly slid a library copy of Rashomon into the VCR. When I saw the opening shots of monochromatic architecture and heavy rain I yelled, "No way." But by the time it got to the freaky eyebrowless medium I was in love. With the movie. Not really the medium. (Maybe a little bit.) I still don't know which story told the real absolute truth but I know it definitely wasn't the one about the two man-children on a trans-american road trip.
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  • By Brett Rogstad
    March 02, 2010
    03:56 PM

    Seven Samurai - I was probably 19 years old and rented it from a local video store. I sat on my bed while watching it and was so enthralled. I remember being moved to tears by the ending and the following day I went out and bought my own copy. I've probably bought it several times since that first viewing. Kurosawa was a huge influence on me towards getting into film making.
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  • By Juana
    March 02, 2010
    03:57 PM

    My first was Seven Samurai, when i was in my teens in the early seventies. It became an obsession to see all of Kurosawa's films, and thanks to a local art theater and later the Detroit Film Theater, over the next several years I caught up with many more. It was so much more difficult before the age of home video. I think i saw Rashomon next, then Yojimbo and Sanjuro, and then High and Low, The Bad Sleep Well, and Ikiru a bit later. Anyway, I'm grateful i got to see Seven Samurai before Star wars came out, or even before seeing The Magnificent Seven or any of the other movies descended from it. Many of them are wonderful and fun, but Seven Samurai is the kind of classic that seems to contain everything within its story and characters.
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  • By Christopher Smith
    March 02, 2010
    03:58 PM

    One night, after watching dumb and dumber twice in a row, once forward and then once completely in rewind, my brother walked into the room, told me I was insane, slapped me back to my senses and promptly slid a library copy of Rashomon into the VCR. When I saw the opening shots of monochromatic architecture and heavy rain I yelled, "No way." But by the time it got to the freaky eyebrowless medium I was in love. With the movie. Not really the medium. (Maybe a little bit.) I still don't know which story told the real absolute truth but I know it definitely wasn't the one about the two man-children on a trans-american road trip.
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  • By Jon Hillman
    March 02, 2010
    03:58 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was the magnificent Seven Samurai. I bought it back when the first release was still in print, but put off watching it for a long time. One night, about a year later, I had nothing better to do, so I put it in. Three hours later I literally hit myself. I was appalled that I had put off watching this masterpiece for so long. I watched it again that same night, even though I knew I would only get about two hours of sleep before I had to go to work, and I've watched at least once a month ever since.
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  • By Scott Perry
    March 02, 2010
    03:58 PM

    Seven Samurai was my introduction to the legendary filmmaker. I was eighteen and a smart ass. My favorite movie was Pulp Fiction and I lived in an isolated suburban town. I'd quite lines in video class assuming being an expert in Tarantino gave me higher knowledge in film. My instructor told me I didn't know cinema until I saw a Kurosawa film. I was confident I could prove him wrong. I borrowed Seven Samurai from a friend on DVD. The box sat on top of my television for months. He kept bugging me until I decided to return it during class the next day. I stayed up late and didn't finish Seven Samurai until the early morning. It was the most mind-blowing experience. I couldn't believe I avoided this film for so long. The next day, I barely kept my eyes open, but it was worth suffering. My video instructor was right.
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  • By Christopher Smith
    March 02, 2010
    03:59 PM

    One night, after watching dumb and dumber twice in a row, once forward and then once completely in rewind, my brother walked into the room, told me I was insane, slapped me back to my senses and promptly slid a library copy of Rashomon into the VCR. When I saw the opening shots of monochromatic architecture and heavy rain I yelled, "No way." But by the time it got to the freaky eyebrowless medium I was in love. With the movie. Not really the medium. (Maybe a little bit.) I still don't know which story told the real absolute truth but I know it definitely wasn't the one about the two man-children on a trans-american road trip.
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  • By Andrew D Rice
    March 02, 2010
    03:59 PM

    The tale of the legendary Seven Samurai - When I decided to expand my palate for film beyond the rash of movies my peers found entertaining, I wanted to go beyond hollywood. I had seen many classics from the golden era, so a black and white did not matter to me, and no CGI certainly did not matter to me at all. I wanted to start with the BIG ONE, "Seven Samurai." I was 16 years old, a mere boy in a beardless youth, and I kissed them both goodbye. I was unable to watch with anyone as it would have seemed boring and dull to those around me. The experience was very different, I observed every nuance working together as a symphony of Dialogue , acting, filming, and emotion. I thought "finally, this is the kind of film I want to watch." I wanted to expand foreign films, so I chose Seven Samurai to start. It was my introduction to these art pieces, and my introduction to Akira Kurosawa. Shortly after Rashoman, Hidden Fortress, Throne of Blood, and Yojimbo all in beautiful presentation of Criterion dvd.
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  • By Theo
    March 02, 2010
    04:00 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was The Seven Samurai, back in the early 00s. I was fifteen years old and completely absorbed by movies. It was the time when I first developed a critical thought, rather than just watching them. Fascinated by Japanese history and philosophy -and also playing a lot of Shogun: Total War!- I learned about Akira Kurosawa from Microsoft Cinemania. an interactive movie encyclopedia that was released in 1997. I still remember the enthusiastic reviews by Roger Ebert, featured in the guide. I decided to get hold of a Kurosawa movie, but non of his films were available in Greece, in neither DVD or VHS. I looked on the internet and discovered a little website called Amazon, where you could order almost everything you could think of and have it send over to your doorstep. Two weeks later, on a hot summer night, I took an unforgetable voyage to the medieval land of the rising sun. A voyage I gladly resume every time I have the chance to!
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  • By Matthew Greenberg
    March 02, 2010
    04:01 PM

    My first was Rashomon in the summer of 2008. I was attending a teen arts camp and studying film for a future profession as a director. I was not big on foreign film at the time but when my teacher sprung this mysterious film onto us, I became hooked. Sure, the story seemed familiar due to countless knockoffs I had seen throughout my childhood moviegoing experiences. But this was the original, the most innovative and the best presented. I was hooked from the Criterion logo to the final black screen. That summer later proved to be one of the best and most productive of my life and I must say that Rashomon started it off on a very high note.
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  • By Mark
    March 02, 2010
    04:02 PM

    My first Kurosawa was The Hidden Fortress, on a borrowed VHS copy which had been taped off of PBS when I was 12 or 13. Growing up, Star Wars had been basically the most important thing in my childhood. I'd read interviews with George Lucas about how big an influence Kurosawa had been on him, HF in particular, so I thought I'd see where the most important movie in my life had come from. 15 years later, I've gladly traded Jedis for samurais.
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  • By Chad Wolfe
    March 02, 2010
    04:02 PM

    7 Samurai was my first. After watching it I didn't know if I wanted to make love to a woman or fight some dude.
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  • By Martin Keller
    March 02, 2010
    04:03 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I watched was Ran. For my Shakespeare class in college we were required to watch a film based on Shakespeare. So I went to take out Throne of Blood from the library, only to find out that some jerk had taken it out and not brought it back. So Ran it was. On this day, many years later, I definitely understand why that movie was never returned.
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  • By Russell Carmon
    March 02, 2010
    04:05 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Seven Samurai. I was working at Best Buy and when the 3 Disc special edition came out, i figured I should pick it up and give it a shot. I was developing a burgeoning interest in cinema and film criticism, so Kurosawa's name as a master director was well-known to me, but I had no idea the journey that await me. After settling in for what I thought would be a grueling 3 hours, I was shocked when I had to switch discs at the halfway point since it seemed like no time had passed at all. By the closing scene, I was a full on Kurosawa fan and instantly restarted it. After watching it again for a third time the next day, I decide to permanently show my love and had the battle flag tattooed on my arm.
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  • By Richard Greig
    March 02, 2010
    04:09 PM

    Ikiru-Late 60's-During a winter blizzard in Greenwich Village-Walking to the late show at the Bleeker St. Cinema-Newly wed, just twenty two-Returning to the apartment walking in the middle of the street, 20 inches of snow-Seeing Watanabe's eyes as he sings in the dancehall-snow on our shoulders like on his as he sings and swings-Last week she was in the green chair next to mine as we watched Ikiru again-a sublime affirmation of life.
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  • By Jason Knapp
    March 02, 2010
    04:10 PM

    I was taking a college course called "Shakespeare on Film" and everything we'd seen had come from European filmmakers: Olivier, Kozintsev, Hall. Then I saw Throne of Blood (Kumonosu-jô) and nothing was quite the same. Sure, the basic elements of the story were there. But the whole movie felt like a dream: characters slipped easily from stylized, almost dance-like movements into natural exchanges. The mist that hung over the woods outside the castle, the ghost-like gestures of Lady Washizu felt strange and wonderful. This drama about avarice and ambition -- a story I thought I knew -- had become a very ritualized ghost tale. And by taking me away from familiar ground and placing it and me in a new context, it brought me closer to the play than I'd ever been before. I declared a Film major not long afterwards.
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  • By Niklas larsson
    March 02, 2010
    04:10 PM

    I saw Ran when i was 17, it had just been released as à rental Vhs and the first thing that struck me was the beauty, that this probably was the most beautiful film i had ever seen
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  • By Jim Shegas
    March 02, 2010
    04:11 PM

    IKIRU at The Little Tokyo Theater in downtoen Los Angeles...it no longer exists, but the memory remains. This film completely overwhelmed me and changed my expectations of what I expect and demand of a film. Written with sensitivity to the human condition, poetic in its imagery...afterwards the attendees all wrote a message to Mr. Kurosawa in a book. I hope he got to read it! I have since seen every one of his films, going to some lengths to find the really obscure ones.
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  • By Juan Barraza
    March 02, 2010
    04:11 PM

    Seven Samurai. I was in high school and vividly remember browsing the DVD collection at a Borders bookstore looking for a movie to purchase. DVD’s were in their infancy and consisted of merely 2 or 3 shelves so I remember seeing a few “seven” movies like The Seventh Seal, The Seventh SIgn, and eventually Seven Samurai. I picked up the original Criterion Seven Samurai DVD and became enamored by the cover but the 39.99 price tag eluded me. Thereafter, whenever I would be at any store that sold movies, I would search for it to see if it was cheaper and just to gaze at the cover. When my next birthday arrived, I received a gift card to Amazon.com and naturally ordered the movie and loved it. I was already a fan of independent film including some foreign ones but Seven Samurai began my love affair with Criterion DVD’s and my impulse to buy a film simply based on its beautiful and creative art design.
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  • By Amir Hother Yishay
    March 02, 2010
    04:11 PM

    The Kurosawa film I saw was Rashomon, in my room, on a website called something like free movies and documentaries, something like that. It's a good site- I saw M, Monty Python's Holy Grail, and some Charlie Chaplin shorts on it. They've also got tv shows like Borat and Flying Circus, but ANYWAY. I thought it was a really awesome movie- I loved the acting, the story, the cinematography, and most of all the concept. I loved how well the movie kind of captured the idea of what "the truth" is. Interesting stuff.
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  • By Dan Sessoms
    March 02, 2010
    04:12 PM

    Rashomon in film school in 1996. It was an eye opening experience. The complexities of the structure, the ideas, the humanity, all perfectly executed. Not to mention the force of Mifune's performance. I immediately started seeing as many of AK's films as possible. Ran, Yojimbo, Seven Samurai were next.
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  • By YiFeng You
    March 02, 2010
    04:13 PM

    when: Seven Samurai (Spine#2) on DVD around year 2000-ish. it was one of the very first DVDs i had purchased. as far as i recall, i had to buy it twice. the very first one didn't have bonus or something like that... and the second one did. i also own the 3disc edition now many years later. where: at home on DVD. how: back before terms like HTPC and streaming is common, i had already been using that concept. haven't owned an actual "TV TV" since late 90s. always been media centers ever since. it was a smaller 20" CRT, but the picture quality is amazing and i had a 5.1 setup already from the computer to AV Receiver. Criterion DVDs always max out my picture and sound quality =). experience: nothing short of a revelation. it instantly skyrocketed to my #1 fav. film of all time from any director from any time from any country. i've not seen anything before or since that have equaled or rivaled the artistry that is present in the seven samurai =). it didn't take long before i've gone back to the film several times over the years and everytime i see it, i still get NEW information about it, because it is so long and so densely packed. the acting, the light and shadow, the rain, the emotion of mifune carrying the child on the river, the fx, the samurai duels, the last battle, and so on. it's just cinematic perfection.
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  • By Toni Jauhiainen
    March 02, 2010
    04:17 PM

    I had heard the name 'Kurosawa' before I started collecting DVDs and watching films more than before. And when I later started to explore Japanese cinema I found out that he was one of the most important directors of the country. First Kurosawa experience for me was Rashomon - I think it was about six months ago, maybe less. I bought one of those cheap Kurosawa collection DVD-sets they sell here in Finland just to see if he's as good director as everybody says. Then one evening I watched the film and that I'll never forget. I mean, that film just blew me off. It made me more interested in Japanese cinema and Japan in general(later I started studying the language too).
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  • By Gordon
    March 02, 2010
    04:17 PM

    I woke up. I was hungover to the point of debilitation. My friend Dave was sleeping in the kitchen when I woke him up. I said, "We need to go to class, man." In his stupor he agreed, and we began to walk. We made it as far as the library before deciding that we were not fit to be in public and that our classmates would probably learn more if we skipped. The debate didn't last long. We would do it for the greater good. Before going back to our dorm, we stopped off at the library to rent a movie. I had been meaning to see Kurosawa for awhile, but had never got around to it. We chose Stray Dog. Happy ending.
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  • By Micah Champagne
    March 02, 2010
    04:17 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Seven Samurai. I was 18 and I sat in on a friends film class and they showed it. It blew me away, and I have never really seen film the same way. There are things I never really though of in watching movies before watching this, like cinematography. But this really opened my eyes to the beauty and artistry of film.
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  • By Dan Coffey
    March 02, 2010
    04:18 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw (and the only one to date, believe it or not) was Ikiru. I had already seen a few Ozu films and Ikiru just made me more interested in Ozu. So, obviously, I need to be schooled on the whole samurai aesthetic.
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  • By Trey Smith
    March 02, 2010
    04:23 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was Seven Samurai. I watched it one rainy Friday evening, the lights off and my door shut for the optimal viewing experience. I was blown away. Though before seeing the film I had heard of Kurosawa's masterful touch, I had no idea how fantastic his films would be. Seven Samurai is such a long film, but watching it time flies by as if it were only an hour or so long. That is the sign of a great film that is worth watching, when the running time is not an issue, no matter how long it may be. Kurosawa changed the way I look at cinema and influenced me in ways no other directors have. I respect him and his work, for he always has something to say...and its always worth hearing. It all started with his greatest samurai epic.
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  • By Thomas
    March 02, 2010
    04:24 PM

    My first Kurosawa film came toward the very beginning of my obsession with movies, which would have made me 12 or 13 years old. Although prior to this I had seen a number of take-offs on his work, things like; Magnificent Seven, Star Wars, and (ugh) Last Man Standing, none of these imitations could compare to my first encounter with the real thing. It was Seven Samurai, and I had rented it from Blockbuster (although, I later realized that my older brother already owned a copy of the original Criterion disc---the one with the restoration demo---, which I eventually stole from him.) I decided to put aside a full afternoon to watch it, as it seemed obvious to me, even at such a young age, that something as heralded as Seven Samurai deserved to be treated as more than an ordinary film, and thus must be viewed in one uninterrupted sitting (or maybe I was just using this as an excuse to avoid doing chores, I don't remember.) After being thoroughly enthralled by the entire film--most particularly by Mifune's performance and the fact that I wasn't doing yard work--I decided that Seven Samurai was a masterpiece, that Toshiro Mifune was the coolest man in the world, that Akira Kurosawa was a genius, and that I had to track down every film the man directed. Almost a decade later, Kurosawa still stands as my favorite director, Mifune as my favorite actor, and though I've loved every AK movie I've seen, Seven Samurai still stands as my favorite film.
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  • By Evan Mather
    March 02, 2010
    04:30 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was "Dreams" - although I fell asleep in the middle of it - or did I?
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  • By Ken H.
    March 02, 2010
    04:30 PM

    Yojimbo was my first. I saw it on my 21st actually. I was kind of sick and stayed in, was flipping through the channels when I stumbled across a listing for it on IFC. Tuned in a minute or two before it kicked off and fell in love with immediately. To make it even better, after Yojimbo they ran Seven Samurai! Turned out to be a rather nice birthday after all!
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  • By Andy Johnson
    March 02, 2010
    04:32 PM

    Hidden Fortress. About three years ago a friend of mine who is a big Kurosawa fan and Criterion collector loaned me that and Seven Samurai. I knew Seven Samurai's reputation but watched Hidden Fortress first. Maybe in part because I'd been informed the inspiration for the droids in Star Wars had been inspired by the characters in this film. My freind described it as telling the story from the veiwpoint of the lowest characters. Intreged, I watched Fortress and absolutly loved it. The characters were well written and enormously well acted. Their personas have stuck with me sence and I have became a devoted Kurosawa fan since, seeking and viewing all of his movies I can.
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  • By Ben
    March 02, 2010
    04:34 PM

    The first Kurosawa I saw was Rashomon about a year ago. It was easily one of several experiences that changed the way I looked at cinematic history; Breathless and Bicycle Thieves are among the others. I slowly began to watch other Kurosawas, and actually studied Rashomon in a film class I took later that year. Now a year later I still have only seen one film that I rate higher than Rashomon: Ikiru. Kurosawa also now ranks in my top 3 directors, as almost all of his films that I have seen are masterpieces that stand head and shoulders above the rest.
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  • By Jeff Heinzl
    March 02, 2010
    04:37 PM

    Yojimbo. My father might have joked that the name had a distinctly South Carolina flavor (Yo! Jim-bo!) if it weren't for the samurai swords and the black and white blood. And the fact that I was laughing already.
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  • By John P
    March 02, 2010
    04:38 PM

    I saw Seven Samurai in a college class at Georgia State University back in the late 80's. I'd heard of Kurosawa, but hadn't seen any of his films up until that point. Never even saw the Magnificent Seven either, so was glad to have seen Seven Samurai first. It's still an amazing film, no matter how many times I've watched it over the years.
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  • By Lucas Kollauf
    March 02, 2010
    04:40 PM

    It was Seven Samurai about 3 years ago. I had heard about it and seen it referenced in a lot of places so I decided to rent it from Netflix. I put it on in my room. I never thought it could keep my attention as much as it did, because of the length. Boy was I wrong. It is now my favorite movie and Kurosawa is one of my top directors.
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  • By Arlene
    March 02, 2010
    04:40 PM

    I first saw Seven Samurai as a little one. I think I was 10. I had just stumbled upon i ton the TV and was just so memorized by how and what was going on.
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  • By Bartosz Sieczka
    March 02, 2010
    04:40 PM

    It was April 2005. I was 17 years old back then. I've bought a copy of Shichinin no Samurai which was added to an issue of a woman magazine that I thrashed right away. It was quite a rarity at that time, because it was probably the very first vhs/dvd issue of this movie in my home country, Poland. The great thing in being young is ones' great enthusiasm that makes small things seem epic. That's propably why I invited a pack of my best friends to take part in my personal 'premiere' of Seven Samurai. The video quality turned out to be really bad and the publisher mocked us even more by releasing this movie with polish subtitles put in a huge black box overlaying english hardcoded subtitles. But, neither the 'horror' quality nor the late time, could overwhelm the incredible impression the movie made on us, at that time. The sense of honor and a specific politeness of Japanese people combined with harsh reality amused me at glance and kept on amusing me while watching other Kurosawa works. Even though I've seen many other Kurosawa films since than, I never had a chance to see this specific one again. Soon, on 8th of March I'm going to see it after almost 5 years. This time on a silver screen in the local cinema celebrating the anniversary. I can't wait to see or, should i rather say 'experience' this movie again as a whole different person.
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  • By Mark N
    March 02, 2010
    04:40 PM

    I think it was RAN back in the mid-eighties. I was living the East Village life with friends who were obsessed with Fellini. I think we imagined ourselves to be support cast from La Dolce Vida and 8 1/2, so we spent every weekend at Film Forum or Cinema Village, smoking and spending the rest of the night sipping espresso at late night cafés in the Village. After seeing RAN, I became a Kurosawa disciple, though I'd still rather live in a Fellini film.
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  • By Pouya G.
    March 02, 2010
    04:41 PM

    To be honest, my first Kurosawa film was his last, "Dreams." I was in high school and playing hookey as my friends and I had gotten the film from Netflix at the time. We drove to the nearby forest preserve (it was May) and busted out our portable DVD player. We ended up watching the whole thing outside in the trees, we found a branch to balance the DVD player, it was brilliant. Really great experience and I'm glad that film was my first Kurosawa, very organic and other world-y.
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  • By Jon Sheffer
    March 02, 2010
    04:43 PM

    The first Kurosawa movie I saw was Seven Samurai. I was 22 years old, and I was looking for classic films to watch. I stumbled upon this epic masterpiece, and was instantly hooked. Those 207 minutes flew by, and after it was over I knew I had to see more of this work. To this day, Akira Kurosawa is my favorite director.
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  • By Jessica Schneider
    March 02, 2010
    04:43 PM

    Ikiru. I was working a crappy job for a State Health Dep't and much of the bureaucratic mess that affects the character in that film I could identify with since nothing ever got done.
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  • By Henry Colin
    March 02, 2010
    04:44 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was of course: THE SEVEN SAMURAI! I started the movie and I was in complete awe of how grand it all felt. I found myself unable to look away, except when it came time to change over to disc 2. I finished it and instanty watched it a seocnd time. I was then thrown into a Kurosawa obsession. A direcotrial obsession for me only happens when I see the best of the best, and this was one of them.
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  • By Jay Kranz
    March 02, 2010
    04:47 PM

    Seven Samurai. I was just starting to get into serious cinema, so obviously I was looking into the criterion collection. only tricky thing was I had no money so ebay was my way to look for deals. unfortunately in this case I ordered it from a crooked seller and got a bootleg! It looked like garbage but still the film shone through as something special, so when the criterion reissue came I was first in line.
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  • By Ted McCoy
    March 02, 2010
    04:49 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was RASHOMON. My best friend of 20 years had gone off to film school and was back in town for the Christmas holidays, and we would stay up until 5 a.m. watching great movies. It was a great education-by-proxy for me, and RASHOMON was eye-opening.
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  • By Greg West
    March 02, 2010
    04:49 PM

    My Kurosawa film was Seven Samurai. It has quite the acclaim so I coughed up 40 bucks for the Criterion DVD copy and watched it on a big HDTV in all it's glory! This was only last year and I've since been watching way more classics and some other films by Kurosawa as well.
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  • By Brett Graybill
    March 02, 2010
    04:50 PM

    My first Kurosawa experience was with Yojimbo. While working at a multiplex theater in PA I discussed foreign cinema with one of my coworkers. Eventually he mentioned this Kurosawa guy who I had never thought much of, and said "You've never seen Yojimbo?!?" Two days later I was a fan and bought the "Kurosawa Four Samurai Classics set." This was only last summer. I am twenty year old college student who spends his hard earned cash on criterion blu rays and lives on PB&J.
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  • By Joshua Vrysen
    March 02, 2010
    04:50 PM

    Dreams - Had an amazing English teacher in high school - 10th grade - wasn't Japanese herself but was heavy into Japanese culture - ran an afterschool Japanese club - started every class with "Konnichiwa" - and at the end of the year, on one of those days where the exams are mostly all done, but you still have to go to classes - she showed us 4 of the chapters from Dreams - Sunshine Through the Rain, The Blizzard, Crows, and The Weeping Demon. life changing.
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  • By Roman Petrov
    March 02, 2010
    05:02 PM

    Surprisingly enough, I saw my first Akira Kurosawa film only about one year ago. I'm a Cinema and Digital Arts major at Point Park University in Pittsburgh, PA and I had the great fortune of experiencing "Seven Samurai" on an enormous screen, with a rear projector, hopefully the way such an epic was intended to be seen. The film was part of my History of International Cinema class that I was taking for the semester. In general, one does not simply watch a Kurosawa film, but rather, one EXPERIENCES a Kurosawa film. "Seven Samurai" was such a force of nature (for who else can capture nature better Kurosawa himself?) that my understanding of what cinema was capable of had fundamentally and permanently changed. The editorial techniques, the compositions, the wonderful characters, the score and much more were all part of this experience. Since then, I have seen ten other Kurosawa films, and I have yet to be disappointed.
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  • By Jason Cryer
    March 02, 2010
    05:02 PM

    "Yojimbo" was my first Kurosawa film - My high school film teacher, a huge Kurosawa fan, dedicated an entire section of class to the Sensei. Although the projection was poor and we had to watch the film over three days, I knew I'd been shown something special. Over the next few weeks, we were also shown "Sanjuro," "Ikiru," and "Ran". Needless to say, it was an enjoyable class.
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  • By Reuben
    March 02, 2010
    05:03 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Yojimbo, which I caught on a whim. It was fantastic.
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  • By james parsons
    March 02, 2010
    05:07 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Ran. I don't remember now exactly when I watched it, but it was sometime around 1990. At the time I really had no idea who Akira Kurosawa was, as I had not yet begun to pay much attention to the names of the directors of the films that I enjoyed. Of course, I was aware of names like Spielberg, Scorcese, Lucas and even David Lynch (though I was only aware of Lynch as the director of Dune!) Now the reason I remember seeing it sometime around 1990 is that that was the period when I first starting become aware of and interested in film as an art form. That year I saw Wild at Heart, Cyrano de Bergerac (with Gerard Depardieu), and Henry and June in a spectacular theater in Dallas, Tx. and was just so affected by these films that for the first time I started paying attention to who the director was. Consequently, I started talking to other people about 'directors' and a friend recommended that I needed to check out Akira Kurosawa and Satyajit Ray. Ran was among many of the films by great directors that I watched in the next year or so, along with Pather Panchali, The Seventh Seal and Wild Strawberries, Blue Velvet, The 400 Blows, The Maltese Falcon and Night of the Iguana, Dr. Strangelove and A Clockwork Orange, and many others. But now I was watching films with a developing awareness of the creative force behind these great works of art. While all these movies made great impressions on me, Ran stands out for being my gateway film to the work of Kurosawa. Again and again as I made my way through the profoundly beautiful world of cinema I returned again and again to Kurosawa. First with Yojimbo and The Seven Samurai, and then Throne of Blood, Ikiru, and High and Low, and on through Red Beard, Dersu Uzala, The Hidden Fortress and Rashomon, and finally, most recently to Drunken Angel, Stray Dog, No Regrets for My Youth and The Bad Sleep Well. While one cannot say that any particular director is the greatest filmmaker of all time, because there are so many great artists that have made, and continue to make, films; If absolutely forced to name one as the greatest there's about a 99% chance that I would choose Kurosawa because he has made so many films that are just absolute breathtaking masterpieces. I have been moved so deeply in so many ways by these films that I believe I can claim that having seen them has, in a very real way, affected who I am; and I would not like to imagine a world in which Akira Kurosawa had not been a filmmaker!
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  • By Julio P.
    March 02, 2010
    05:13 PM

    My first Kurosawa and, incidentally, my first Mifune film was "Stray Dog". At the time, I was on a heavy Seijun Suzuki kick and, having exhausted the available film supply, I yearned for more Japanese films featuring guns and the men that yearn for them. So to the library I went, checking out "Stray Dog" from the local library, its cover featuring a prominent gun beckoning me. I settled on the couch and began the film. I was expecting a high-paced action film. "'Tokyo Drifter' this is not," I thought. About fifteen minutes in, I sensed a meditative calm enveloping me. Despite the tenseness and dread Mifune was experiencing on-screen. My attention became transfixed by Kurosawa's direction, almost seamless in how it followed Mifune's character around. Each encounter with a wayward resident of the city served not as a reststop for my attention but as a reinforcement, coupling it with Mifune's journey, leaving me in awe past the final scene of the film. This journey through post-war Japan still lingers in my thoughts. And my thoughts return not to wondering what became of Mifune and his gun but rather the inhabitants he comes upon in his taut journey. Seemingly inconsequential, it is them that most left an indelible impression upon me. "Stray Dog" is as much their story as it is of Tifune or his gun.
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  • By DB
    March 02, 2010
    05:14 PM

    Rashomon, 1993, London. My then girlfriend and I were on a study abroad program and wandering the city. We came across a midnight showing of Saturday Night Fever at the Prince Albert Theater. A little homesick for NYC we went inside. The theater was run by a group of college kids and everyone was drinking and having a good time. The second reel was loaded backwards and suddenly everything was upside-down. The management (college kids) came into the theater and offered us all free popcorn while they fixed the problem. Everyone was happy and drinking and now eating the free popcorn. A few choice words came from the rear of the theater and the "management" came back to tell us the print got badly damaged but asked would we like to see tomorrow night's midnight movie instead. The audience agreed. Rashomon. Not one audience member left. We were a little less boisterous, some still drinking, all transfixed to the screen. No one asked for their money back.
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  • By Joseph F Basco
    March 02, 2010
    05:16 PM

    I went on a Criterion Collection binge this past summer thanks to the public library. My first film was also my first glimpse into Kurosawa's work, Yojimbo. The flim fascinated me with its humorous take on westerns. It was so cool to see Mifune as a clever, John Wayne esque hero.
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  • By Rick Martin
    March 02, 2010
    05:20 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was at the tender age of 14 or so - it was the Criterion double VHS release of "The 7 Samurai". Even though I now own almost all the Kurosawa films on DVD, I still have this double VHS on my shelf - it was signed by an actor named Nakajima Haruo who not only played a bandit in the film but also played Godzilla from the original film until "The Terror of Mecha Godzilla". Nakajima had many amazing stories that he shared with me about his time working with Kurosawa and Mifune. It was while we were at a bar hanging out that he told me that Mifune had just died in hospice. We drank a toast to the great actor. I shall treasure that old VHS tape always.
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  • By Christopher D. Jacobson
    March 02, 2010
    05:21 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I ever saw was Ikiru, which I bought about five years ago. I bought the DVD sort of on a whim; a friend had suggested I check it out, so I did. I'll admit, the Criterion cover got me all the more interested. I figured with such a grand cover, I'd be in for a real classy art film—and I was! At the time, I wasn't too familiar with pre-'70s films. (A lot sure can happen in five years in the life of a film aficionado.) It was an experience that I enjoyed through and through: the excellent black and white photography, the many film scratches and other defects dating the film, and just a good-hearted tale—something that is frequently missing from today's cinema. It truly is a product of the 1950s, and that's partially what makes it so beautiful. I've since seen maybe about a third of Kurosawa's directorial output (thanks to my town's library having quite a number of them available), and each and every film has been a marvelous experience. He quickly became one of my favorite directors, and one day I'll get around to seeing all of his films.
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  • By Wesley White
    March 02, 2010
    05:23 PM

    Ran was the first Kurosawa film I ever saw. I'm a fan of Shakespear, and someone at school had mentioned to me that this Japanese director had made a samurai movie based on King Lear. I didn't go in expecting a lot, but what I found was one of the most engaging movies I had ever seen. Ever since then I've been a huge fan.
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  • By Sara Holsten
    March 02, 2010
    05:23 PM

    The first Kurosawa film that I saw consciously was "Dreams." I rented it and a couple of other Kurosawa films from a small independent video rental near my campus and watched the film on my room mate's incredibly tiny television in our dorm room. While I recognize that "Dreams" is not Kurosawa's best film, even on the tiny screen on my room mate's TV, the images were incredible and invoked in me an incredible emotional response and general enthusiasm for Kurosawa's films, and for Japanese film in general (at the time, I was studying Japanese literature and culture). I went on that night to watch "Ikiru" and "Rashomon."
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  • By Bart Cortright
    March 02, 2010
    05:29 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Seven Samurai in film class back in high school. I remember thinking: "Wow Pixar's A Bug's Life completely ripped off the narrative of this film and moved it to bugs...." This lead to my hatred of rip offs.
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  • By Clint Hughes
    March 02, 2010
    05:30 PM

    Seven Samurai! I went through a very heavy western period in college and my roommate at the time came home while I was watching the Magnificent Seven. He asked me if I had ever seen the original... one thing led to another... and a few hours later we were drinking Sapporo and watching this DVD by some company called Criterion. Thus my introduction to both Kurosawa and the Criterion Collection - thanks Errin!
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  • By SI
    March 02, 2010
    05:31 PM

    Sanshiro Sugata in my college Japanese Cinema class. I also saw Seven Samurai in that class and was hooked from then on. Now I've seen most of his body of work, and closing in fast on the remaining ones!
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  • By Jim Rankin
    March 02, 2010
    05:34 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was Ikiru. I was in my mid 30's just starting to get into foreign films. I know the overwhelming consensus is Toshiro Mifune is Kurosawa's main leading man, but I believe the best performance was given by Takashi Shimura in this film. Simply heartbreaking and timeless. One of the rare films that watched at different stages in your life, carries a completely different meaning.
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  • By Brian Ikeda
    March 02, 2010
    05:35 PM

    I was probably 10 or 12 when my dad took me to a Japanese film festival that was screening Yojimbo. My dad is Japanese and was always trying to teach me about the culture, but we lived in Nashville, so there weren't many opportunities! I remember how surreal the whole experience seemed at the time. I had never seen or heard anything like that before in my life. I was truly peering through a window into another world- the setting, the language, the costumes, the culture! I left that night with a whole new world to explore in my imagination and with a new dimension to my father that I didn't know existed.
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  • By Dustin Meadows
    March 02, 2010
    05:41 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I ever saw was Seven Samurai. I remember watching part of the final battle in a history of film class in college and I was immediately compelled to check it out after realizing the parallels and influence it had on Pixar's A Bug's Life, one of my favorite films growing up. Unfortunately, part of the ending was ruined for me as upon my first viewing I knew that Kikuchiyo wasn't going to survive the battle against the bandits from the clip I'd seen in class. Nevertheless, it reminds my second favorite Kurosawa film after Yojimbo.
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  • By Ryan Browder
    March 02, 2010
    05:45 PM

    I remember first hunting down Rashomon after recalling a comment by Werner Herzog. He claimed if he could make one perfect movie he would have made Rashomon! I knew I had to see this film immediately and was really touched by how Kurosawa was able to capture such "humanism." You can only guess how excited I was to recently catch the restored 35mm print at the UVA film festival!
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  • By Nicole Lacy
    March 02, 2010
    05:51 PM

    I was roughly fourteen when I caught a bit of "Dreams" (I believe that the part that comes to mind is from "The Blizzard") -- my memory is usually very fuzzy and I only recall this because I was with my grandfather, and it is one of the last memories that I have of him (he would pass away about a year later). I remember feeling a profound connection with my grandfather as we watched it, and now I always think of him when the film is mentioned. From what I understand, Kurosawa was one of my grandfather's favorite filmmakers, and I sometimes watch his films with the idea that I can gain insight into some of the more concealed aspects of my grandfather's personality by viewing them.
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  • By CHAD VONHINKEN
    March 02, 2010
    05:53 PM

    Almost 8 years ago to the day, RASHOMON was my first Kurosawa film. I got the Criterion DVD the week (maybe even the day) it came out, and the day I bought it I watched it twice when I got home from work - once without commentary, and again with. I was making my way through "films I've always heard of & read about, but never seen" - and Rashomon was up there on my list.
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  • By Jef Burnham
    March 02, 2010
    06:04 PM

    "Kagemusha-" My love affair with film began when I was 14. It was my preferred artform and I obsessively absorbed every film I could get my hands on. Luckily for me, a local video store had not only a wide selection of movies on VHS (we're talking late 90s here), but a "5 Movies for $5 for 5 Days" deal, which was perfect for me on my teenage budget. I plowed through gangster films, which is what you do when you're 1, and everything by Kubrick, but I soon felt that I needed to branch out. So I finally decided to rent from their Foreign section. My decision to rent from this part of the store was in fact spurred by a Kurosawa film. They only had "Kagemusha" and "Dreams," but "Kagemusha" caught my eye. I had never seen a samurai movie, or, for that matter, any Japanese film at all. It was a wholly new cinema to experience, and it would prove to be one of the most challenging films I had seen. Having grown up on American war movies, I was very much put off by the tone of the picture. It was a war movie, sure, but it was so much more than death and carnage from one end to the other. The politics of it were beyond my comprehension and the idea of the double admittedly confused the 14-year-old me; but it was wonderful. I had never felt so at odds with a film, and frankly, I loved it. To be so thoroughly challenged was not something I had experienced with any American film I had encountered and I wanted more of it. So I watched it again the next day, and when I returned to the video store, my 5 rentals were all from the Foreign section. And that feeling of being challenged by pictures like "Kagemusha" is precisely why I am the rabid cinephile I have become.
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  • By Jake Fredel
    March 02, 2010
    06:27 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was Seven Samurai when I was 12. I had become interested in film, and saw this film, having previously seen The Magnificent Seven, on the new Criterion DVD set. I was amazed by the battle scenes, and the scope of it all. For me, I felt I had experienced a range of emotions and a much different style then I'd seen before, even though I didn't understand all of the plot. That was my first Criterion disc also, and the start of a long journey in film viewing.
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  • By Hasan Nadir Derin
    March 02, 2010
    06:31 PM

    I think it should be the Seven Samurai. I was very little and i saw it on tv. It definetly felt so long at that age but i also aware that i saw something magical.
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  • By Phillip Pettit
    March 02, 2010
    06:31 PM

    "Kagemusha" was my first experience with the Japanese film director. Luckily, I was able to experience it on Blu-ray and enjoy the film the way Kurosawa intended. Unfortunately for me, I am about to turn 21 and have, other than Kagemusha, no experience with Kurosawa. I plan to catch each of the films that films that air on the TCM marathon. I think "Kagemusha" has truly made me a believer in Samurai/Feudal Japanese film. Though I hear his more modern films would interest me more, I feel that I have a new appreciation for the samurai genre. Hopefully with the new Blu-ray editions of Yojimbo and Sanjuro I can further my appreciation for Kurosawa's work.
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  • By Daniel Sohinki
    March 02, 2010
    06:35 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Ikiru. A friend of mine in film school recommended Kurosawa's films to me, and, somewhat naively, I ordered a set of 10 Kurosawa films on DVD for 30 dollars on e-Bay. Before this, I never really had an interest in foreign film or old film, and I certainly had no experience shopping for such films on e-Bay. Needless to say, the films were all bootlegs with horrendous subtitles (out of sync, incomplete sentences etc.) Ikiru's subtitle issues made the film borderline incomprehensible, but it allowed me to focus on other aspects of the film: the music, the beautiful black and white cinematography, and of course, Takashi Shimura's incredible performance. The image of Watanabe swinging on the swing and singing his song brought me to tears, and I saw it as a testament to the quality of the film itself that it could have such an impact on me while I understood virtually none of the dialogue. A truly brilliant film that opened my eyes to the brilliance of Kurosawa's work, and pushed me to explore a more diverse group of films. Incidentally, it was my search for a better version of Ikiru that brought me to Criterion in the first place.
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  • By Pete Bublitz
    March 02, 2010
    06:36 PM

    My first glimpse of Kurosawa so vivid that I remember what I was doing and my reaction, without knowing much about Kurosawa nor what the movie was at the time, was the witch's intro in Throne of Blood. I was probably 13-14 at the time. I recall flipping through the channels one night when I clicked past a public access channel, figuring they wouldn't show anything aside from the usual TV address projects done by junior high kids. But then it hit me, "Oh, were those samurai?" I clicked back quickly, and there was the scene. When that moment (which I won't spoil) occurred, I switched away from it, freaked out to the point that I tried looking for something on another channel to get my mind off it.
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  • By Jonathan McLellan
    March 02, 2010
    06:38 PM

    My first Kurosawa was "Rashomon," (the Criterion Collection's DVD) rented from Hollywood Video. I popped it into my Playstation 2 and began watching the masterpiece as I sat on the carpet of my room. I was probably 15 or 16 so I was very naive about international cinema and really the history of cinema. I remember after I watched it the first time I watched it again the next day with the commentary. I watched the Altman introduction and the rest of the special features and was enthralled by it. I hadn't seen anything like that; shooting into the sun, the different perspectives and of course the great duo of Kurosawa and Mifune, one of the great duos of cinematic history. I was introduced to the Japanese master.
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  • By joseph Bridges
    March 02, 2010
    06:38 PM

    Seven Samurai. After years of hearing about the greatest movie ever made. I bought Seven Samurai without really knowing who and what and where. WOW! What a movie!!!
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  • By Mike
    March 02, 2010
    06:41 PM

    Yojimbo. It was the first one I caught on IFC's Samurai Saturdays.
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  • By Bret Bynum
    March 02, 2010
    06:42 PM

    I have have actually never seen a Kurosawa film before which is why I need this the most. I've never been able to get a hold of a movie of his and I don't think I will for a long time! I know he's one of the greatest of all time and that's why I need to get familiar with his work because I know how influential he was to film and I really want that influence on myself! I would be forever grateful for the experience!
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  • By Jesse
    March 02, 2010
    06:43 PM

    It all started with "The Magnificent Seven". When I was younger, it was inconceivable that there could be a greater version than Yul Brynner, Eli Wallach, Steve McQueen, James Coburn and Charles Bronson's American masterpiece. It was the Western version of a super-group. Then, an older friend I love and respect did a rendition of Toshiro Mifune's speech condemning the samurai, and defending the villagers. It might have been in a log cabin and he might have donned shin guards and hockey gloves as he spoke to replicate the armor... but I had chills. I watched "Seven Samurai" the next day. And that was the beginning of my relationship with Kurosawa.
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  • By ALBERT BAIER
    March 02, 2010
    06:44 PM

    Seven Samurai was my first Akira Kurosawa film. I saw this shortly after I saw the Magnificent Seven which I loved. Feeling guilty I knew I had to watch the original. Magnificent Seven was fun and it had a lot of flare. Seven Samurai was the real deal with Kurosawa's detail and precision in character and story making it more than fun but also PERFECT movie. The villager's life and suffering was more clear through the actors, the group of samurai looked more rugged than the gunslingers and there was more detail in the defense tactics. Seiji Miyaguchi played my favourite character being the stoic bad ass. I could never forget Toshiru Mifune and Takashi Shimura contrasting each other as the loud, arrogant warrior and the humble yet assertive leader. I can go on and on but these were what stuck out the most in my first viewing.
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  • By Patrick Hogan
    March 02, 2010
    06:45 PM

    I'll never forget the first time I saw Seven Samurai. The scene from the film which always sticks with me is the one in which Toshiro Mifunes's character is holding the crying baby in his arms. Now by this point we know that his background and papers are sketchy but don't really know where he came from or how he was raised. With one sentence everything becomes clear when someone asks him why he is so distraught. Mifune replies: This was me! It becomes clear Mifune's character's beginning started like that of the crying baby he held in his arms. This scene its simplicity and truthfulness never fails to move me.
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  • By Tom
    March 02, 2010
    06:52 PM

    My first Kurosawa was The Seven Samurai. I had been heavily drinking when I saw it late one night on TCM. I picked up the DVD soon after and happily I enjoyed it more when I was sober!
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  • By s. a.
    March 02, 2010
    06:53 PM

    Ran back in 2001 for a Shakespeare in Film class. For some reason, I think we had to rent it and watch it at home. So I got a VHS of it and sat down to watch it. I loved the beginning with the three sons against the mountain scenery. I was amazed at how it held my attention. I never thought a samurai movie could do that.
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  • By Ian Wirth
    March 02, 2010
    06:55 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Ran. I was 12, and my father, a great fan of Shakespeare and a film professor at NEIU, had dug up from his VHS box the film Ran, telling me that if I liked King Lear so much, I would definitely enjoy this. We had made tacos (I even remember the meal), and we sat down, turning the lights off and popping in the VHS, Then we entered Kurosawa's world. The moment it started up, with that oh so still shot of the three horsemen (Is it a still photo? Wait for it... No!), the silence broken by a single movement, I was entranced. Everyone mentions the amazing mid-film battle sequence, but they forget how truly fantastic the entire film is. Real art. I had always liked film, acting, and writing, but after seeing Ran film rose to the top of my three passions. I wanted to be a filmmaker because of Ran. Immediately I devoured his films, Seven Samurai next, then Yojimbo and Sanjuro in quick succession. I can remember the exact order I watched his films in. 7 years later, and Ran is still my favorite film, and Kurosawa the only idol of mine still untarnished.
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  • By Mike H
    March 02, 2010
    06:55 PM

    "Throne of Blood" was my first encounter with Kurosawa, and it was enthralling. His reimagining of Lear brought new meaning to the concept of "adaptation". I've been enchanted by Seven Samurai, Rashomon, Ran, and Yojimbo since, and look forward to delving into more of his classics in the future.
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  • By Trevor
    March 02, 2010
    06:56 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was Rashomon. I was 15 and I just recieved it from Netflix. The day I recieved it, I was home sick, so i plopped my sick self on my living room couch, popped it in, and loved it. Kurosawa is the best medicine!
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  • By Jeff
    March 02, 2010
    06:57 PM

    I posted on a message board looking for intellectually stimulating films. Over and over, people suggested Kurosawa. So, I decided to buy Seven Samurai and Ran. I had a mini movie marathon the day they arrived and I`ve been hooked ever since.
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  • By Rick
    March 02, 2010
    07:02 PM

    The first Kurosawa movie I saw was "The Hidden Fortress," at the Detroit Institute of Arts, a little over seven years ago. They were presenting a mini-festival of Kurosawa films, a different one every Monday night. I'm not sure why I decided to go. For one thing, Detroit is 90 miles from where I worked, so getting there by showtime meant leaving work early and driving a long way in order to do battle with another city's rush hour traffic. For another thing, my expectations weren't exactly inspiring. I'd heard the name "Kurosawa" on sitcoms and such as a shibboleth of pretension. I knew that "Rashomon" had something to do with varied perspectives. And that's it. I guess I figured it's Art, it's medicine, I won't understand it, but a dose or two is probably good for me. Imagine my delighted surprise, then, sitting alone in the crowded dark, at just how pleasureable, how rollicking, how much sheer fun the movie was. I was there every Monday after that, slowly learning to appreciate many different registers of pleasure and fun and Art. And I got pretty good at Detroit rush hour driving besides!
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  • By Charlie
    March 02, 2010
    07:06 PM

    Seven Samurai. A childhood fascination with Kendo turned me towards the samurai films of Kurosawa when I was 8 years old. Standing in my parents room with a yardstick-sword I played along to the whole second half of the movie. Awe of Kyūzō's deft handling has remained to this day.
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  • By Alex
    March 02, 2010
    07:07 PM

    The first one I saw was "Ikiru." I think it was about two years ago. I had rented the DVD from my public library, and watched it on my computer in my bedroom.
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  • By Zach Savage
    March 02, 2010
    07:09 PM

    Seven Samurai. I had bought it on VHS back in the 90s as part of a grand effort to impress a girl with my art-house knowledge. I haven't spoken to her in about a decade, but my Kurosawa fanboyism is going stronger than ever.
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  • By Sondra Warren
    March 02, 2010
    07:17 PM

    I first saw Rashomon in college (a little more than 30 years ago) and was lucky enough to see the actual film (of course this was before even VHS was readily available). I became an extreme life long film buff in college due to taking classes in film history and criticism and seeing films by Kurosawa, Bergman, Kubrick, Truffaut, Fellini, etc. I was mostly intrigued by the theme of Rashomon and it was not only my introduction to Kurosawa, but to Japanese Cinema and culture in general. I didn't see any Ozu films until much later. I visited Japan a few years ago for work and the people I talked to were very pleasantly surprised by my knowledge and appreciation of classic and contemporary Japanese films and Anime. Usually they know more about Hollywood films than visiting Americans know about Japanese films. Rashomon is my favorite Kurosawa film to this day (with Seven Samurai a close second).
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  • By Andrew Henderson
    March 02, 2010
    07:17 PM

    SEVEN SAMURAI. When I was younger there was this movie at a local video store that always got my attention but for some reason I never got around to renting. For years, when ever my parents took to that store I'd always walk by this tape and look at the box but I still never rented it. When I got a little older I started to think the man on the cover was actor Takashi Shimura, being a huge Godzilla fan I was familiar with some of his work. When I realized that is WAS Shimura on the cover I just had to rent this movie, just to see him in something without giant monsters destroying Tokyo in it. I was around 13 or 14 years old. My Dad and I watched it in one sitting, despite being a little intimidated by the over 3 1/2 hour length of the film which covered two VHS tapes (most video stores still didn't carry a lot of DVDs back then). When the film opened with the TOHO logo at the beginning and I started reconized some of the actors from other Godzilla movies I've seen, it gave me a feeling of both nostalgia and excitement. Seeing these actors in a very surious movie without rubber monster in sight was like seeing peers at a class reunion. I fell in love with Seven Samurai before the first tape ended. It is such a beautiful and powerful movie that to try to describe it in words is simply pointless. Seven Samurai is one of those films that you don't watch, you experience it.
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  • By Alex Ross
    March 02, 2010
    07:17 PM

    Kagemusha was my first Kurosawa experience. At the time of his death Channel 4, here in the UK, ran a season of his movies and I was fortunate enough to be 16, alone and looking for a new world. I was already a huge film-buff (or so i thought) and did my best to introduce innovative cinema to my close friends, lending out fading copies of Lost Highway, A Clockwork Orange and Jacob's Ladder to my classmates. I remember being outnumbered when the Alien vs Aliens debate arose. I remember watching 2001 with my Grandad on a Sunday afternoon when I was much younger and being struck by awe...I loved cinema and I tried to share it with everyone I knew. I also remember watching Kagemusha for the first time and sensing at the time that my perception of cinema would change forever. I didn't talk to any of my friends about it, I didn't try and force it upon anyone...it was personal. It was the new world I was looking for and I had discovered it myself (with a little help from channel 4). A few years later at University, when I was studying Film, one of my new flatmates was looking through my DVD collection and he stopped at Kagemusha - instantly declaring that he hadn't watched it since that very same night Channel 4 aired it around the time of Mr Kurosawas death back when we were both 16. That night a new and very dear friendship was formed and I was able to share, for the first time, a new world of cinema.
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  • By David Scales
    March 02, 2010
    07:20 PM

    "Yojimbo" TNT used to air foreign films on Sundays at 9PM with Roddy McDowall hosting introducing the films. I think this was about 22 years ago while I was still in middle school. I had already seen "A Fistful of Dollars" because my dad had introduced me to the Leone Dollars Trillogy prior to this. To be honest I didn't know that "Fistful" was a remake until I did further reading on both films. Still love both although "Yojimbo" is much more hilarious and outlandish than "Fistful." Favorite moment is Mifune's taunting of Uschi-Tora's gang before he starts flashing his blade and also love the moment when the dying Nakadai calls Mifune "Samurai Trash."
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  • By Stefan Flickinger
    March 02, 2010
    07:22 PM

    The first Kurosawa movie I ever saw was Hidden Fortress. I think I was seventeen at the time, and really into samurais and mostly had only seen cartoons and Zatoichi when it came to samurai media. I don't remember where I heard it, but I had seen or heard somewhere that Kurosawa's Hidden Fortress was a heavy influence on George Lucas and Star Wars. Star Wars was my favorite movie of all time so I immediately sought out The Hidden Fortress. I was blown away, the acting was outstanding, the cinematography and Kurosawa's use of rain was outstanding. I remember wanting to cry when the evil general was so moved by the Princess that he joined her cause. It opened my door to a whole window of film, and really made me start viewing films as not just entertainment, but art as well.
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  • By Brent Phillips
    March 02, 2010
    07:26 PM

    It was Dersu Uzala. I came across it channel surfing probably about 30-40 minutes into the film and I could not take my eyes off of it. It was the first foreign film I had ever seen and I had no idea who Akira Kurosawa was. Needless to say, the following months became an all out obsession to see anything and everything by my now favorite director. That was around 15 years ago and I have absolutely loved every second of it.
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  • By David G Pfister
    March 02, 2010
    07:35 PM

    I remember it was in 1992. I rented The Hidden Fortress to watch with Atsuko, a girl from Japan I was dating. I thought she would be impressed that I watched Japanese movies. She wasn't very impressed but I was. I started renting Kurosawa films almost evry weekend!
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  • By Jordan Wilson
    March 02, 2010
    07:38 PM

    The first Kurosawa movie I saw was Throne of Blood. I think I was about 16. It was on IFC one morning before my family was about to go on vacation. The atmosphere of it really mesmerized me. The ending where a terrified Washizu is hit with wave after wave of arrows is still one of my favorite scenes of all time. Not long after that, I saw the DVD in a store, and I believe that was my first Criterion purchase. Now that I think about it, I guess I have Throne of Blood to blame for all of the money I've lost to these things over the years...
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  • By Chris Perez
    March 02, 2010
    07:38 PM

    Like many high schools and colleges here in the Philippines, English teachers like to pop in a VCD copy of Akira Kurosawa's DREAMS (if Dead Poet Society was taken by another class) . And like many students, I thought it was a hard watch: long scenes and a culture logic removed from our own, removed from me. I slept on most parts and entirely on 'THE BLIZZARD' but my take away was, it was visually stunning, something unparalleled to my mind that time. His name stuck at the back of my mind until years later, in college, [around late last year] my screenwriting teacher popped in a movie that would ultimately resurface his name in front of my mind and for the rest of November would read nothing and watch nothing but about him and by him: RASHOMON. I imagine that VCD at our small high school library already worn down, scratched and skipping.
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  • By David G Pfister
    March 02, 2010
    07:39 PM

    Did you get my post?
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  • By John Severa
    March 02, 2010
    07:41 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was actually Ikiru. I saw this on DVD at home a couple years ago and was really moved by it. It's subdued style and honest searching about nothing less than the meaning of life was something that you don't really see often, not in many movies from the '50s.
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  • By David G Pfister
    March 02, 2010
    07:47 PM

    I remember it was 1992. I rented The Hidden Fortress to watch with Atsuko, a girl from Japan that I was dating. I thought it would impress her that I watched Japanese films. She wasn't very impressed but I was. I started renting Kurosawa films almost every weekend!
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  • By RAY FREEDMAN
    March 02, 2010
    07:48 PM

    SEVEN SAMURAI. I was 14 and experienced it with my father. We own a copy of it and it is my father's favorite film. I was mesmerized and the amazing photography and acting lit the room up. The sound was all the way up and afterwards, our neighbors got mad at us because we disturbed their dinner. After that, I now prefer SWORD over GUN.
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  • By Samuel Anderson
    March 02, 2010
    07:49 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was The Hidden Fortress. I remember reading an interview with George Lucas on how much an influence The Hidden Fortress had on with writing of Star Wars. From the princess, to how the film is shown from the perspective of the least important characters. This was about 1989, and I remember finding a VHS copy in the video store and watched it that night. From then on I was hooked.
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  • By Ben Middleton
    March 02, 2010
    07:51 PM

    It was either Seven Samurai or Yojimbo, and it was on IFC. It was about 7 years ago and I was just discovering my love for film. I could now say I was watching movies because it was my hobby and it was art, I wasn't just being a lazy couch potato anymore. They were also probably the first black and white movies I seriously watched, and ended up loving.
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  • By Angela Yeager
    March 02, 2010
    07:52 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was in college and it was Rashomon, which still remains a favorite. I was completely blown away by the photography (those tree shots!), Mifune's performance, and the brilliant screenplay. It was one of those lightbulb moments where I realized how many films had ripped off or taken pieces from this magnificent film, and I vowed to see more classics in film history so I wouldn't be ignorant any longer.
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  • By Harrison Bender
    March 02, 2010
    07:58 PM

    I watched Seven Samurai for the first time when I was fifteen. It was a beautiful, sunny Sunday, and all I wanted to see was this movie that I had read so much about over several years. I didn't leave my bed for ANYTHING for the next three hours. I was mesmerized by Mifune as Kikuchiyo, and I remember exactly how I felt when I saw Kikuchiyo react to the bandits setting fire to the village--detached, but awed and deeply empathetic. I saw it again with Michael Jeck's commentary immediately afterward. That's six hours of Kurosawa in one sitting. Not that it was difficult. Just sayin'.
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  • By Sean Carter
    March 02, 2010
    08:00 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was A Bug's Life, about a decade ago now. An animation, appealing to not only the children but the child in all of us. I was struck by its moving, potent story, its strong sense of character, portrayal of right and wrong, good and evil and most of all, the beauty of its spirit. A decent number of years later I saw my second, The Magnificent Seven. My correlation to A Bug's Life was almost instantaneous, again not just in its outstanding depiction of selfless courage, or the starkly contrasting morality of its characters, but the everlasting spirit of the picture. When for the first time I finally saw a true Akira Kurosawa film I realized why the relation between the pictures was so evident. The film was Seven Samurai, and my understanding of cinema was changed forever. No, the first two pictures were not his films in any literal sense, and viewing his sweeping masterpiece affirmed that. But at least I now understood why those films struck the same chord three times in a row. I could finally name the spirit: Akira Kurosawa living on through not only decades of cinema, but across countries and genres as well.
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  • By Matt McDaniel
    March 02, 2010
    08:29 PM

    A young boy, 15, 16 years old. His father taking off his coat in the kitchen. A clear acrylic box on the counter - there is a dark shape inside. Born just after Beta, must be VHS. The boy was not informed in advance, this is ominous. What is it? The Magnificent Seven. Why couldn’t I pick? This was one of my favorite movies when I was your age. This is a western? Yep. Great, just great. And it was. McQueen, Coburn - suddenly household names, Cinephile Ascendant. Several years later: has read an essay related to film criticism, also taller. Ready to dig deeper/feels guilty for having watched so many crappy movies, makes a list (Sight & Sound unaware or uncaring of plagiarism). 1) Seven Samurai "Oh, that was a remake." "My God, it’s full of stars." The lights come back on, the transformation is complete. Cinephile Excelsior. Dreams become realities, I begin wearing shirts that fit, I make terrible short films with cheap cameras and people I can trust not to laugh too hard, looking for flashes of that clarity of vision in Seven Samurai. More time passes: I wear a suit and enjoy the experience, I undergo ritualistic existential crises, I compose daily laments on the incompatibility of my life as a student and Criterion’s pricing scheme, however fair. I am a resounding success as a human being trying to be a human being. All of these things, all the parts of my life that have grown up and out after watching Seven Samurai – can I draw a huge mass of lines running from them back to Seven Samurai? No, but to say that they aren’t related is wrong, it’s just that there’s more to it than a simple cause-effect. I watched Seven Samurai at the first major plot point in my life, when I was deciding who I wanted to be, and it drove home just how little I knew: about film, about people, about the big questions. It gave me a taste of what was out there, and I decided I didn’t want to miss out. Now that is by no means a particularly unique history for this film, the comments that are already up make it clear that I’m not crazy, that I actually just told the oldest story in the book. But dammit, that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.
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  • By Chris Harper
    March 02, 2010
    08:30 PM

    I was 16 and a friend of mine lent me his VHS Janus copy of the Seven Samurai. I found the sub titles for that copy were incredibly hard to read but that wasn't enough to deter me. I was amazed by what I saw, a perfect blend of art and entertainment. It was truly an eye opening film for me and I can honestly say that that one film is the reason why I am pursuing a career in film making today.
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  • By Anthony
    March 02, 2010
    08:35 PM

    What was the first Kurosawa film you saw? Describe the experience briefly—when/where/how? First one I saw was Seven Samurai and it frickin rocked. I remember the closing sequence with the graves of the fallen samurai cutting to the faces of those left alive. WOW! I could watch that movie over and over and never get bored and always pick up new tidbits especially with the commentary track! thanks criterion for restoring a classic of the cinema!
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  • By will morris
    March 02, 2010
    08:43 PM

    My first Kurosawa was the tour de force that is Rashomon. I was a budding film connoisseur, which means since I started seeking out "films," I had heard nothing but great things about Kurosawa. I was lucky enough to catch Rashomon on IFC during my high school years. I was blown away by the multiple POV story that Kurosawa weaves and totally taken aback by the ultimately hopeful ending in such a dark film. Kurosawa was able to lead the viewer down an incredibly dark path for the majority of the film and then end on a very high note without being too sentimental or cheesy. I was hooked from then on.
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  • By Jes
    March 02, 2010
    08:48 PM

    I've been reading all the movies listed in Ty Burr's The Best Old Movies for Families, but I hesitated renting THE SEVEN SAMURAI as samurai never interested me and I worried that the movie would be too violent. But I was surprised at how great this movie is; the story, the characters, and especially the style immediately won me over, and I'm proud to say that this is one of my favorite of all movies.
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  • By Kevin Pihlaja
    March 02, 2010
    08:50 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Seven Samurai. I enjoyed Edward Zwick's The Last Samurai in 2003 and wanted to see more Samurai films and kept reading great things about Seven Samurai. Needless to say I was blown away by it and it opened up the genius of Kurosawa to me. This also opened up my eyes to the world of foreign films, which made me a fan of the Criterion Collection.
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  • By Nick
    March 02, 2010
    08:55 PM

    Seven Samurai. I was about 15 when it came on tcm, I hadn't been up to much all day and decided "ah what the hell I'll watch some samurai movie." To my great surprise the movie was more than just a hack and slash (not that most samurai movies are, but then again I was 15). Sitting in my upstairs rec room with a slight rain outside only complimenting the final battle scene, I fell in love.
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  • By Brandon
    March 02, 2010
    08:56 PM

    Throne of Blood. I saw the film with French subtitles on a tv channel while flipping late one night. I was in high school and starting to fall in love with film. The film enthralled me. I did not know it was Kurosawa but I was pulled in by the style, and soon magically discovered the film was Macbeth with a Japanese twist. The next day I searched high and low on the fledgling Internet for what the film was and discovered it was Kurosawa and the name. Then I discovered that every week the channel would show a Kurosawa film in that same time slot. I was a Kurosawa fan forever.
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  • By Larissa
    March 02, 2010
    08:57 PM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Dreams. I caught it by accident on television when I was 14 or 15. It made a huge impression on me: it was the first time I realized that a film could be as meaningful and nuanced as a novel or a play. I now own a copy of the film and go back to it at least once a year. I adore its intersection of mythology, the dream world and its 'green' statement. Kurosawa was green before it was fashionable to be green. And the rich palette of colors, which reach its peak with the Van Gogh segment, are luscious and surreal. The film is a feast for the eyes and mind.
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  • By Zach Green
    March 02, 2010
    09:04 PM

    Another Seven Samurai convert, here. Caught it on TV late one night after being ditched by my date at a high school dance.
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  • By Shawn Adams
    March 02, 2010
    09:08 PM

    RAN. My experience with this Kurosawa epic can only be described as shooting up visual crack. I am now an ocular fiend.
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  • By Geoffrey Stebbins
    March 02, 2010
    09:15 PM

    I can not remember exactly when it was that I saw "Dreams." Sometime between when I was 13-15. I had been meaning to dive in to Kurosawa films for some time and this was the first one that caught my eye at the local blockbuster. I took it over to my friend's house and we watched it. I was enraptured by the Fox Wedding segment. I don't think I had ever seen a forest look so beautiful on film. The film got better from there. I did konk out during the Blizzard segment though. I recognize that people - other people - consider Dreams a weak film. But it's still my favorite film of all time, maybe only for introducing me to my favorite director. Or maybe I'm a nature loving hippie. The Ishiro Honda chapter, "Mount Fuji in Red" has always filled me with a kind of dread. Still creeps me out. I've watched every film of his I could get my hands on, and I've seen "Throne of Blood" and "Ran" in theaters. The best though, was finally seeing a crappy print of "Dreams" at the Aero in LA a few years back. I still fell asleep during the Blizzard.
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  • By paul jacobs
    March 02, 2010
    09:40 PM

    When I was thirteen, my mom came home with a VHS of "Akira Kurosawa's Dreams", not exactly his most loved film. By that time, I had already settled on being an artist, and my mom rented the movie with the idea that it would appeal to my love of surrealism and colour. I watched the movie first once, and then a second time, in the same night of the video rental. I carefully noted all the colors, and after, for months, thought of that film while painting. I have seen many Kurosawa films since then, and I can acknowledge the power, grace, workmanship, and drama of "Rashomon", "Seven Samurai", and "Throne of Blood". I even went to Japan to live in part because of my great love of Kurosawa and Japanese cinema. But "Dreams", despite its flaws, still holds a special place in my memory as an artist trying to place his art on film.
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  • By Gene O'Brien
    March 02, 2010
    09:57 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was The Seven Samurai. I wanted to see what the big deal was about this film. I had heard that it was the inspiration for The Magnificent Seven and growing up in a household with a father who was a Western fanatic, I had to see it. All I can say is Wow! It was less 'Hollywood' and more 'real' than the film it inspired. This wasn't a bunch of Hollywood actors trying to steal scenes from each other. This was a work of art. I didn't see actors 'acting'. I saw 'reality' and it started me down the road to Kurosawa.
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  • By Bradley Gills
    March 02, 2010
    10:01 PM

    Oddly enough, my first Kurosawa film was my first foreign language film. I don't recall what channel it was shown on, but I came across it just as it was beginning. I was in my early 20s and loved movies, but had a pretty basic sense of cinema and never really gave older films much thought, let alone Japanese films! So imagine my surprise when Rashomon came on one Sunday afternoon when I had a bad cold and was just flipping channels. Frankly, were it not for the dextromethorphan and Vicks I probably would have never stopped! But in my clouded semi-conscious state something about it was irresistible and I was sucked into the story within minutes. Then it all changed and I was a bit confused until I realized what was going on. Then I was impressed. I remember distinctly one part where the camera aimed from the ground straight up through the trees into the sun...it was such a simple shot, but struck me as so unique and cool. That moment was the first time I ever considered "firsts" in movies: was the guy who made this the first to do that? was he the first to make a movie about rape? It all seemed so mature and differed drastically from the Leave it to Beaver image I had of old films. In short, it opened my eyes to a world I did not know existed. I watched enthralled by how "mature" it was...were they making movies like this everywhere in the 50s? i always thought the Japanese were stoic and emotionless...how could something like this even exist a few years after World War II? So many questions... Unfortunately this was long before the days of DVDs and I lived in a small town with no options at all to see foreign films in theaters, while VHS rentals were sparse. But the next weekend I was able to track down a vhs of Seven Samurai and the rest is history. Rashomon still holds a special place in my heart for having been the film that introduced me to cinema as art, and I still can't watch it without picturing that sickly Sunday afternoon on the couch.
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  • By Kristopher Snyder
    March 02, 2010
    10:14 PM

    My first Kurosawa experience was Yojimbo. I was fifteen and I had just purchased the Four Samurai Classics box. After carefully reading the cover copy (synopsis) of each box I selected Yojimbo, because not only was it fun to say, but also because it had a sequel. (I didn't select Seven Samurai since I had seen The Magnificent Seven a few years earlier and I figured there would be few surprises).
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  • By Glen
    March 02, 2010
    10:22 PM

    I don't recall my first; I was a film major and took a Japanese cinema course where I was fortunate to have experienced seeing Seven Samurai and High and Low. I would like to twist the question a bit and mention the first Kurosawa film my daughter saw. Last year, her high school English class was studying Macbeth, so I thought she might be interested in Kurosawa's adaptation in Throne of Blood. Luckily she was willing to give the movie a try (and of course I didn't tell her the source). We watched the movie together, and when we reached the banquet scene where the ghost of Miki (the Banquo character) appears, she finally said, "This is like Macbeth." To which I replied, "I was wondering when you were going to notice." She beamed like she had been let in on the ultimate secret, and ended up honestly enjoying the film.
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  • By Leakhena
    March 02, 2010
    10:34 PM

    "Akira Kurosawa's Dreams". It was 1995 and I was in the 10th grade with alot of teenage angst . I would borrow movies from the Columbus Metropolitan Library. I was skimming through the VHS tapes and came across "Dreams". I was drawn to the imagery of the rainbow on the cover. I had never heard of Kurosawa before so when I read the synopsis of the movie, I was intrigued that Martin Scorese was playing Van Gogh. Being a big a lover of the arts, I decided to borrow the movie that would change my life. I can still remember the feeling of watching that movie for the first time. I was home alone. My mom was a single parent working late that night. The opening scene with the vivid colors captivated me. Each story effecting me more and more. By the last scene with the old man in the village and the celebration of death, I realized there was so much more to live for and how much I wanted to change the world to make it as utopic as Kurosawa's Dreams.
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  • By Ben Friday
    March 02, 2010
    10:35 PM

    I remember my first experience with Kurosawa was watching Rashomon as a sophomore in college in 2005. I was going to school at Palm Beach Atlantic University, a small private school in West Palm Beach, FL, and studying film. It was hurricane season in south Florida and we were experiencing a lot of rain in the area, they had cancelled classes for the day and recommended an evacuation due to an oncoming tropical storm, but it wasn't mandatory to leave campus. I made it down to the West Palm Beach Public Library before they closed for the storm and picked up Rashomon on an old VHS tape. We had just read about Kurosawa in one of our film history textbooks, and I figured I'd pass the bad weather and ride out the storm watching one of his films and see what all the fuss was about. I had the TV turned up pretty loud and my suite-mate next door heard the opening scene of the film when the rain was coming down hard and ran into my room thinking the tropical storm had become a full fledged hurricane! He ended up staying to watch the film with me, and we made it all the way through the first half with no problems. Then the power cut out, and we were left to discuss what we thought the outcome of the film was. We argued back and forth all night and couldn't come to an agreement until the power came back on a few hours later and we stayed up late into the wee hours of the morning to finish the film. Needless to say, both of our predictions were wrong, haha, but it was still a film experience we will never forget as we rode out the rough weather in style with the great Kurosawa himself. The very next week, I began to collect all of his films on the Criterion Collection and ended up writing at least two major papers on his films before graduating. Thanks Criterion for your commitment to excellence, and for making great films by great directors like Kurosawa more readily available to avid fans of international cinema.
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  • By Erik Villasenor
    March 02, 2010
    10:51 PM

    Dodes’ka-den was the first Kurasawa film I saw. I bought it on sale at an electronics store. I watched it 2 days later at 9 AM. The story was as deeply enchanting as the colors. I knew I had to see more so I immediatly rented Yojimbo and 7 samurai. I'm hooked on Kurasawa for life now.
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  • By Luke Moses
    March 02, 2010
    10:53 PM

    I saw my first three Kurosawa films all in a row one day my senior year of high school, which was two years ago. I already knew that I would be heading to a different city for college, and my hometown has an amazing independent video rental store with tons of Criterion films. One of my favorite things to do back then (and even now when I return home on breaks) was to pick some director I had wanted to introduce myself to and watch several of their films. So I rented Rashomon, Yojimbo, and Seven Samurai and enjoyed the triple feature sitting on my couch in my pajama pants. I was extremely impressed (duh) and obtained the Seven Samurai Criterion dvd as quickly as I possibly could, which meant I waited until Christmas and got my parents to buy it for me because I didn't have a job. So thank you Criterion, video store, and parents for helping me view and own a crucial component to any film dork's collection. I eagerly await spring break (SB10 wooo) when I can once again spend entire days sitting in pajama pants and basking in the ethereal glow of Kurosawa's films.
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  • By Anthony Holly
    March 02, 2010
    10:54 PM

    My first Kurosawa film was Seven Samurai on DVD. I was just getting into art house, foreign, and independent films and had recently learned about the Criterion Collection. I had 3 or 4 other Criterion movies and was instantly hooked. I looked up information constantly about the collection and determined that my next purchase would be this 207 minute black and white samurai movie that I had never heard of just a few months prior. The day I got it, I quickly popped it into my DVD player and I watched it alone while relaxing on an old beat up 19" tv. Soon after, my collection has grown to almost 300 Criterion titles and my tv has improved to a much nicer 56" HDTV. I have to say that my appreciation and understanding of film has changed greatly, and for the better, thanks to the Criterion Collection. Keep up the good work! (And please send me that free DVD.....I don't have that one yet.)
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  • By Kanoa Pillen
    March 02, 2010
    10:59 PM

    Seven Samurai. It was a masterpiece of great proportions and I was forever moved by it. I watched it on a normal dvd and I promptly bought Seven Samurai on Criterion which was way better
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  • By Matt Kovar
    March 02, 2010
    11:43 PM

    The Kurosawa film that I remember seeing first was "Yomjmbo." Having, at the time, recently seen Sergio Leone's "Fistful of Dollars" I became excited to see the film it was inspired by. I got ahold of a copy of "Yojimbo" and put it on. I remember being sucked in from the credits. With the shots against his back and the beautiful surrounding country underscored by that great music. I'd never really watched much Japanese cinema prior to that, and before the credits were over I has wondered why that was. When Kurosawa's name popped up on the credits I instantly recognized it, but I could not remember from where or which film. I think I'd heard of him at some time or other, but for whatever the reason I had never checked out his work. "Yomjimbo" hooked me.
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  • By Matt Kovar
    March 02, 2010
    11:43 PM

    The Kurosawa film that I remember seeing first was "Yomjmbo." Having, at the time, recently seen Sergio Leone's "Fistful of Dollars" I became excited to see the film it was inspired by. I got ahold of a copy of "Yojimbo" and put it on. I remember being sucked in from the credits. With the shots against his back and the beautiful surrounding country underscored by that great music. I'd never really watched much Japanese cinema prior to that, and before the credits were over I has wondered why that was. When Kurosawa's name popped up on the credits I instantly recognized it, but I could not remember from where or which film. I think I'd heard of him at some time or other, but for whatever the reason I had never checked out his work. "Yomjimbo" hooked me.
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  • By EmilyK
    March 03, 2010
    12:12 AM

    I watches Kurosawa films growing up without ever realizing it. I know I watched Yojimbo, Seven Samurai, and Dreams, because later on, when I was actively looking for his films, I recognized them. My first 'let's go watch a Kurosawa film' experience was my first year in college. My roommate was taking a Japanese history class and her professor had assigned Kagamusha. This was the first Kurosawa film I saw on a big (well bigger than my tv) screen with an audience. I was crying at the end and desparately wanting to rewatch the film. I started looking for more of his films, only to realize that they had been introduced to me by my mother and grandmother (along with great Westerns and a surprising amount of Herzog and Bergman) all my life. At the end of college, I met my husband. One of the things that feuled our early conversations was a shared love of Kurosawa.
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  • By Goomba80
    March 03, 2010
    12:15 AM

    The first Kurosawa movie I saw was the Hidden Fortress, I bought a VHS copy from a local Borders back in the day. Always having been a fan of Star Wars, I decided to buy it without knowing anything about it even though it was like $40 and this was when I was probably a senior in high school. After seeing it I decided I needed more Kurosawa and exposure to global cinema and thanks to DVD and criterion, I've been able to amass about 800 DVDs, a good portion of which are criterion, samurai, and Kurosawa films.
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  • By Gabriela Pinelo
    March 03, 2010
    12:20 AM

    My older brother and I enrolled in the same Japanese 1 class at Tokay High School when our family moved to a house for the first time in our lives; it was his third year and my first year. Our Japanese teacher, which I later learned, is a HUGE Kurosawa fan and truly appreciates the art of his films. At Fridays he shows movies and he told the class that the first and his most favorite movie he shows to the level one students is Seven Samurai. It wasn't a SUPER revelation to me at first (I was 14); the big issue for me was the youngest samurai and the farmer's daughter: if they knew they couldn't stay together, why did they put themselves through all that emotional angiush?! It was sad when Kikuchiyo died and my favorite was Gorobei (I love archers!); why did he die first?! Atfer I first saw it I thought, "Wow, that was a good movie." As with most things in my life, I gradually learned that the guy who made Seven Samurai is Akira Kurosawa and he made other movies we saw in Japanese class and he more than deserves people's respect as a film artist and total innovater/visionary. Thanks Mr. Sitkin for the movies (especially Ikiru) even if you think you're the only person who appreciates them, the Japanese, the cherry blossom festival, and one of the top two greatest compliments of my life: my brother Edward and I are both intellectuals.
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  • By Javier Bravo
    March 03, 2010
    12:22 AM

    My obsession with Kurosawa began with the Masterwork’s edition of Ran I ordered from ColumbiaHouse. I viewed this film from the comfort of my own bedroom in the spring of 04. This Japanese take on Shakespeare’s Lear made a particularly vivid impression on me because of two factors; Nakadai and color. The richness of color throughout the film is pure bliss and it is almost orgasmic to see the clarity of vision that Kurasawa had to exploit color to its fullest capacity. The armies, the banners, the blood, and the flames…for the love of God the FLAMES…are among the most poignant visual images one conjures up when recalling this film. Even the sheer otherworldliness of Tatsuya Nakadai is eerily satisfying. His lemur-like gaze is unadulterated and without constraint in spite of all that makeup. Hell, even the boar hunt at the inception of the film is remarkable and I wouldn’t be surprised if Miyazaki didn’t borrow a bit of this flare for his opening scene in Mononoke. In short, happy Birthday Kurosawa! Your films are lessons on life!
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  • By Joe Harjo
    March 03, 2010
    12:22 AM

    ROSHOMON, I saw this movie sort of by mistake, I remember it was Saturday night and I went to the video store to rent a movie for the night. After much deliberation I decided 'Leonard Part 6' was the movie for me. But, when I got home I realized the case had the wrong VHS tape in it. ROSHOMON! WHAT THE....?!?!?! With no ride back to the video store I had no choice but to give it a try. 20 or so years later I still have never seen Leonard Part 6, but am a huge Kurosawa and Criterion fan and have seen most of his films! Funny how one of the greatest films ever made gets mixed up with a film that is on most 'Worst Movie Ever' lists.
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  • By Brandon Goco
    March 03, 2010
    12:24 AM

    Rashomon at Age 17: I was watching TCM, when Robert Osborne came on to introduce the next film. He spoke of Rashomon and how it was Kurosawa's first real international success. At that time, I've only seen one other Japanese film, The Tokyo Story. I loved the film and expected something in that direction with Rashomon. What I discovered was how much more beautiful and exhilarating Kurosawa's film was. At that point, I knew I have become a Kurosawa fan. I eventually went on to watch almost all of the films he made after Rashomon! A big surprise came when I found nearly every Kurosawa film I've watched a real treat. But Rashomon will always be a life-changing film for me.
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  • By Reno
    March 03, 2010
    12:31 AM

    My first encounter with Kurosawa was in college. I came across a used VHS of Dreams at a flea market. Finding the worn VHS was like coming across a strange book in an old junk shop. The image of that child standing in a field of flowers looking into a mysterious future under the arc of a rainbow was such a haunting and enticing image. I had heard of Kurosawa from my father but had never dedicated time to see any of his films. The film was a revelation; his color palette, the mixing of the mythic, the poetic and the natural, and the general melancholy of drifting through time and timelessness moved me deeply. I remember when the film was done I didn't quite understand what just happened but hell if I didn't get it. Those were the kind of movies I wanted from then on. Kurosawa was the kind of thoughtful director I wanted to watch from then on.
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  • By Tyler Mays
    March 03, 2010
    12:37 AM

    I watched Turner Classic Movies one day and Rashomon came on. I had just gotten cable hooked up that afternoon and turned the television on to see someone introducing the film, and I was hooked. I've been crazy for Kurosawa ever since.
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  • By Rene Baker
    March 03, 2010
    12:38 AM

    I was about 14 or 15, couple of years ago, one of my friends was a huge fan of everything that came out of Japan. He introduced me to mangas and stuff. One day, reading posts on the net, I learned about Yojimbo and Rashomon. Then I realized that my friend had them on dvd, and i asked him if I could borrow them. I watched them at home that night, the night during which I discovered international cinema and classics. Lights out, loud sound, on the sofa. Yojimbo and Rashomon were then my intro into the world of great movies, because of them I'm in film studies now. Thanks Akira!!
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  • By Keith
    March 03, 2010
    12:41 AM

    It was SEVEN SAMURAI when it was on Criterion laserdisc in the comfort of my home. I can't remember exactly when but it was around the time the laserdisc was released. I fondly remember the Criterion laserdiscs and I actually still have some (but with no working player...) but not SEVEN SAMURAI.
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  • By toshi fujiwara
    March 03, 2010
    12:45 AM

    i don't remember very clearly as i was yet a kid of 8 or 9, growing up in paris. it must have been on an wednesday afternoon and it must have been either "Seven Samurai" or "High and Low," don't remember which was first. at that time "Seven Samurai" was pretty damaged, not restored, but liked it very much. however i even enjoyed more "High and Low," which to me is still the best of Kurosawa. then at the age of 10 "Kagemusha" was released, frankly not a film for a 10 years old. then back to tokyo and i must have been in junior high when "Ran" was released--very intriguing for an adolescent, actually. then i thin it was when i was 20 or 21 that "Seven Samurai" was restored to its complete length and rereleased. looking back i think i had the rare experience of watching "High and Low" from the point of view of the two kids, sort of sneaking into an adult drama, only half comprehending what was exactly going on but still could grasp the ugliness of the adults' power games. i somewhat still watch that film in that way, a naive child's glimpse of the corruption and decadence of the adults' world of this country.
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  • By a d fearn
    March 03, 2010
    01:23 AM

    THRONE OF BLOOD A young student of theatre and avid reader of Shakespeare, I was introduced to this "alternative" retelling of Macbeth. It was consequently my first Kurosawa purchase (on VHS). I have never looked back. The years have rolled by and that first purchase has seen a lot of service, borrowed by many of MY students!
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  • By Greg
    March 03, 2010
    01:43 AM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was DREAMS. I was a freshman in high school and was taking an introduction to theatre class. Our teacher, Mr. Timko, was an utter genius--one of those people who somehow knows everything about everything...especially those things you'd think he'd know nothing about. We'd been studying different forms of Japanese theatre--Noh, Kabuki, and Bunraku--and we'd previously examined the ancient Greek form as well. Mr. Timko had a real passion for film, and he'd often show us clips from his extensive collection to help illustrate a parallel in the world of the theatre. I remember vividly sitting in a circle with my other classmates on the stage of our darkened theatre as Mr. Timko rolled in a VCR cart and began playing the fourth dream, "The Tunnel." I was spellbound by the character's long, steady walk through the dimly lit passage and the echoes of the Orphic myths we'd read earlier in the year. It was a culminating moment--one in which I felt that the forces behind art were working in concert with one another rather than being disparate. Watching that film (Mr. Timko ultimately showed us six of the eight dreams) was a crystallizing moment. I remember also feeling something special when Mr. Beech, another theatre faculty member, quietly sat down behind us students and listened intently to Mr. Timko lead a discussion about the final dream, "The Village of the Watermills." To see another teacher voluntarily sitting alongside us in this class spoke volumes about both Mr. Timko and the great Kurosawa film we were all enjoying. At the end of that school year--which was before the advent of DVDs and widespread use of the Internet--Mr. Timko gave me a copy of the film on VHS as a gift. We will still occasionally talk about that film and that class today--roughly fifteen years later.
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  • By Carman
    March 03, 2010
    01:46 AM

    I saw Rashomon at San Francisco's wonderful Castro Theater a little while back and randomly sat in front of a friend of mine that I only saw once in a while. Afterwards, we all walked outside, completely floored by the experience of having seen such an incredible film together but each had our own separate plans and went our separate ways like the woodcutter and priest, having been uplifted just a bit by the movie.
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  • By Jaime
    March 03, 2010
    01:52 AM

    My first film from Kurosawa was Rashomon. I saw it with my mother. It was a DVD with a good quality, not Criterion quality, but good. The feeling was a strange one. At the time I wasn't very familiar with Japanese films and I felt a little lost, not by the complexity of the film itself but by the need of trying to find an answer and that evolved into more questions, into reflections in my life and it was like a week or so that everything I did was something to do with Rashomon. it is like one of those experiences of youth when something deeply touches you and you go wandering about it for a while. Since that day I have a great admiration for Kurosawa. Oh, by the way, my mother said the movie was "nice" and went to sleep. Next day she was asking me to buy another classic movie... but not a Japanese movie. PD: I'm from Perú and I know I'm not going to win, but I couldn't resist the "nice" question. Thanks for bringing back some memories.
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  • By Drew Duncan
    March 03, 2010
    02:15 AM

    I saw Sanjuro first when I was nine. I remember wondering what artery they could possibly have claimed to hit in order to explain that much blood coming out of one guy. Awesome.
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  • By Patrick Bull
    March 03, 2010
    03:21 AM

    SEVEN SAMURAI was my first Kurosawa film. On Criterion's reissued DVD. I watched in my bedroom on a small TV with booming speakers. The light of my bedroom windows faded in sequence with the daytime of the film, so that I watched the brilliant nighttime drama -- and then the final, rain-soaked showdown -- in complete darkness. Despite the constraints, I have never forgotten this filmic experience.
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  • By Keith DuCharme
    March 03, 2010
    03:41 AM

    Yojimbo was my first. They were showing it first on a double bill with "Dreams" at the Student Union back when I was a freshman at Iowa State. Normally, the hard wooden chairs in the cramped meeting room meant watching a movie would make me sore for hours afterward. If that happened then, I forgot about it.
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  • By Radames E. Fernandez
    March 03, 2010
    04:30 AM

    The first Kurosawa film that I saw was Dreams. I walked into a Blockbuster and saw this DVD cover with the title Dreams. Lying down on my bed and pressing play on my dvd remote I entered the wonderfully brilliant world of Akira Kurosawa; a blind rental that to this day has yet to be topped. After watching this I felt ashamed of all the crappy films I’ve seen. After watching Dreams I went back to rent whatever Kurosawa films they had in stock at the time. Ran, Rashomon, Yojimbo, and Sanjuro. I became a zombie that week and re-watched Dreams as I finally drifted on to my own. I have no regrets.
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  • By Martin Paul Farinha
    March 03, 2010
    05:20 AM

    Dreams, I was working in a video rental store and the day Dreams was released i put it on in the store and have been hooked ever since. Before this I was strictly mainstream, but after seeing Dreams i searched out more Kurosawa and that led me to Criterion and from there a new world of alternate and world cinema has been a part of my life. Thank you Criterion, it's been a great ride!
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  • By Henry Biedenkapp
    March 03, 2010
    06:56 AM

    Seven Samarai was my first Kurosawa, probably on PBS or VHS, I was getting self educated in the world of foreign films during the early 80's while in college. I remember it being amazing and loving that "Japanese" feel in the subtitles, which is something that I believe is missing from the Criterion subtitles. Awhile later I saw Ran in the theater and was blown away again, the colors and that Shakespearean connection made the film unique, of course now I've got 21 Kurosawa Criterion DVD's along with a few others DVD from other distributors. Looking forward to the 5 new Kurosawa Criterion DVD being released from AK "100" box separately, including Madadayo, which I have from another DVD distributor. Keep ' em coming Criterion, you're doing a great job.
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  • By Bram Ruiter
    March 03, 2010
    08:35 AM

    It was august 2006 and I was sixteen years old. I got interested in film through a friend from school, who was a few years older, and he was an absolute addict to Asian cinema. Between his glorifications of obscure kung fu films and melodramatic television serials he named Ikiru being his favorite Kurosawa. Having never heard of Kurosawa nor Ikiru I asked what it was about. The story of an old man that had died and his friends and family recapturing his life sparked my interest and imagination. As soon as I got home I started up my download program and found a torrent that would introduce me to a new world. Bear with me for one moment: I was sixteen years old, I lived with my parents in this terribly small town far away from the big cities, had no job and thus no money to buy the film and the video rental stores never heard of Kurosawa either. Of course I do now own Ikiru on DVD. Looking back at that time feels somewhat magical. I had just seen Casablanca, being one of my first 'old films' to see, and was about to experience something even more drastic. To be honest: for me Ikiru lasted a lifetime. The thing was, I didn't know what I loved so much about it. It was long and tiresome, but nothing I had ever seen before. But now, four years later, I understand what I had happened: It became the first film that I experienced more like a memory than a narrative film. Ikiru became a part of my life. I have never dared to watch it again, because memories are sometimes best to be left what they are, but writing this now makes me want to watch Kurosawa's entire filmography. And I would start with one of his most wonderful stories and one of my favorite film-memories: Ikiru.
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  • By R.E. Owen
    March 03, 2010
    09:12 AM

    A week spent in Japan when I was twenty made me want to explore this facinating country even more. Movies offer a local perspective regardless of genre. Seven Samurai was the first one and I was totally enraptured with the scope of the story as well as the individuals characters.
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  • By Amanda
    March 03, 2010
    09:48 AM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Seven Samurai and I was completely hooked from then on. It showed at a local art theatre in Austin, I was 16, and in love with film (still am).
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  • By Arvid
    March 03, 2010
    09:48 AM

    My first Kurosawa-experience was really strange. It was at the Cinemateque in my town, one of the biggest cinemas we have, 700+ seats. It was a Kurosawa retrospective and the movie was Ran. It was a good print so everything started well but about two thirds of the film it stops and the machinist comes down and appologizes that they've showed the last two reels in the wrong order (that explains the broken chronology, i'd been confused by) so they started the movie up again with the reels in the right order. But twenty minutes later it stops again. Turns out the lamp in one if the projectors was broken. So now they have to run it on one projector and stop and reload between every reel. It became a long screening, but the movie was great!
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  • By paul
    March 03, 2010
    10:16 AM

    The first Kurosawa movie I ever saw was the Seven Samourais. I did not know what to expect because I had never heard of Kurosawa or his legacy. There was something about it that made get goosebumps. It was a very medetational (I know that word does not exist) experience. Lost of people might not agree, but I like to compare this movie to Solaris (1972). Theres something about Kurosawa's movies that is magical, something that makes people have such a deep passion in film. After watching the movie, I started to cry, I was so moved emotionnaly. Thats when I feel in love with Kurosawa as a director.
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  • By Justin Morgan
    March 03, 2010
    10:42 AM

    Yojimbo. Four years ago. At my local library. Just wanted to kill time and have been wanting to watch it for a while, being a Man with No Name fanatic. Words can't describe how much that film has changed my perspectve on filmmaking.
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  • By Jeff Downs
    March 03, 2010
    11:01 AM

    The first Kurosawa movie I saw was, unfortunately, not a good experience. It was SEVEN SAMURAI and it was in the 1980's when the restored version was being released. I went to a revival house and the film kept breaking. It made a 3 1/2 hour movie about 4 1/2 hours. Leaving the theatre there was a line of angry people waiting to get into the theatre and boy di I feel sorry for them.
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  • By Andrew Ilnyckyj
    March 03, 2010
    11:09 AM

    The first Kurosawa film I saw was Rashomon. I saw it when I was 16 in a film class in my high school. At the time it was just "that Japanese movie" to me. But it stuck with me! It taught me how to reinvent the linear narrative, It inspired me to learn more about Kurosawa (which i promptly and thoroughly did), and it is the movie that inspired me to pursue Film as a direction for my education and the rest of my life!
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  • By Kevin
    March 03, 2010
    11:09 AM

    Several years ago before we had kids, my wife and I were at our public library wanting to expand our cinematic horizons. We'd heard of Kurosawa by that time, and after looking through the videotape selections, settled on Rashomon. I was employed full time and in grad school part time pursuing a history degree. We both loved the movie, but what struck me most was how the story and its presentation so paralled the scholarly process of historical research. You have these accounts that agree on certain facts of an event. But then the accounts diverge, or one provides info not in the the others, or one or more directly contradict each other. Then you have to consider the person behind each account, their station, their motives, the quality of the info they report. And this is what is asked of the viewer in Rashomon. I was (and still am) deeply impressed, and this experience encouraged me to view more Kurosawa, which has led me down enriching viewing (and re-viewing) paths I might not have taken. (When the Criterion dvd was announced, it was one of a handful of times that I've acutally pre-ordered a title--Throne of Blood was another such instance.)
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  • By Sean Naito
    March 03, 2010
    11:28 AM

    My first Kurosawa experience was Yojimbo about 6 years ago. I was 18 and still fresh off of watching 'Kill Bill vol. 1' which in fact turned me on to the world of cinema and inspired me to look deeper. As I was scratching the surface then I had always known a little about Kurosawa and especially of 'Seven Samurai' but I decided to dip my fingers in a much shorter and what I thought would be a more entertaining film so I randomly picked Yojimbo from a local Hollywood video. I was impressed to say the least and shortly found out that Leone had based his 'Fistful of dollars' on it which further catapulted my obsession into film. Kurosawa,a definite gateway filmmaker. :)
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  • By J. Kyle
    March 03, 2010
    11:35 AM

    At every point in a young film-buff's life, the discovery of well-regarded films of non-American productions occurs, triggering a desire to seek out more and more highly regarded arthouse fare not well known by many of his or her peers. For me, the film responsible for starting my interest in 'Criterion Collection' titles was Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai. For my 17th birthday, I had made no lavish plans for celebration; no party with any friends. Instead, I decided to rent a film I have heard much about and was curious to see. As I was watching the film in my room, I knew I was watching a cinematic cornerstone. The influence Kurosawa's film has on almost every action film following is entirely evident. As many critics point out, the concept of a group of hired hands banding together to fight an enemy stems from this film. The two things most striking about Seven Samurai to me was how well the action scenes were composed, and how engaging each character was. Seven entirely distinct characters is a lot to keep track of and devote attention to, but Kurosawa managed to do it seamlessly. Plus, his use of rain to accentuate the emotional strength of his scenes would not have been as effectively used until Blade Runner, released nearly thirty years later. When the film ended, a desire to seek out other Kurosawa films emerged, as well as a desire to discover the works of other auteurs. Since watching Seven Samurai, I have discovered many excellent films. Though had I not watched it when I did, I am unsure if my relentless pursuit of great cinema would have been as strong.
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  • By Billy
    March 03, 2010
    11:38 AM

    I was at a movie store, holding Breathless and Seven Samurai in each hand, trying to decide which to buy. I asked a guy working there who told me Seven Samurai "didn't blow me away." I asked him about Breathless, and he said, "I think it's french." I thanked him for his help and bought both. Good decision. I watched Seven Samurai that night with my roommates and they were all asleep before the first disc was over, but I was on the edge of my seat the whole time. Kurasawa and Mifune had blown me away. (Breathless was also my first Godard experience, and oh man. I wouldn't have a girlfriend if it weren't for that movie.)
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  • By R. Yu
    March 03, 2010
    11:46 AM

    YOJIMBO I was in middle school when I was told by my older high school friend to watch Yojimbo after he heard that I really liked Sergio Leone's Fistful of Dollars. I went to the college library where I found an old VHS copy of it. At the time I wasn't very well versed in film, but even then I could see that it was the perfect pairing of samurai jideki and spaghetti western.
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  • By Brandon
    March 03, 2010
    11:47 AM

    I watched Rashomon alone in my home, without any prior knowledge of what it was about. I kind of expected an action movie with a little substance. Needless to say, I was blown away by the depth and insightfulness of the film. Hooked since then, but making my way through his collection slowly. Loved Ran, Seven Samurai, Yojimbo, looking forward to seeing more.
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  • By Frank
    March 03, 2010
    12:36 PM

    High and Low. When: Freshman year of college. Where: Introduction to Film class. How: I'm color blind. So black and white is pretty safe territory for me. I usually enjoy b&w films a bit more for this reasons. While watching High and Low I was completely immersed in the story, loving all of the twists and turns. Then, unexpectedly, pink smoke. I only knew it was pink because the next day in class someone asked "How did he make the smoke pink?" I felt a bit betrayed, but, in the end, fell in love with Kurosawa's cinema.
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  • By Tim Sheridan
    March 03, 2010
    12:47 PM

    My father had a VHS tape of Rashoman back in the 80s. I had read the short story in high school and I was curious. I was totally blown away by every aspect of the film, which reinvented the story. I it was an early experience in what potential film had as an art form. Even on a smaller TV, the visual impact, narrative invention, and great acting blew me away. I was hooked.
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  • By Sanjiv
    March 03, 2010
    12:52 PM

    My first Kurosawa was the Seven Samurai. I first saw it when I was 8 years old. I got a VHS from the local library, mainly because I was fascinated by samurai at the time (I just thought it was cool, the idea of guys who carry around swords on their belts) and because the packaging made it sound like an action-packed flick. I watched it over three days, and I absolutely loved it. Obviously, I had never really seen a movie like it at the time. I remember trying to show in to a bunch of friends later, but they were considerably less impressed with it. Nevertheless, in the 20 years since, I think I've seen Seven Samurai another 60 or 70 times, in all different venues and formats. It's still my favorite film and a constant source of inspiration for me.
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  • By REMY PIGNATIELLO
    March 03, 2010
    01:19 PM

    I think it was Yojimbo, very lately (only 2 years ago), thanks to your reissue. I find it really cool, plus, I had seen again Leone's Western just before, so it was a lot of fun catching the references between one another. But Mifune really stunned. I mean, he's just so cool in the movie, being the guy in the middle who's just having fun of the clans. He's awesome, really. and Kurosawa just catch this awesomeness very simply, yet very greatly. I still think Yojimbo is a very simple film, very easy to enjoy, and immediatly fun. Probably one of the Kurosawa I prefer because of this fun.
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  • By John
    March 03, 2010
    01:32 PM

    Hidden Fortress. About 5 years ago I watched an interview with George Lucas and he listed that film as one of his inspirations for Star Wars, so when I saw Hidden Fortress was coming on IFC I knew I had to watch it. over the years I found and watched all but 3 of Kurosawa's films. Criterion's Seven Samurai was the first one I bought, and currently own 3 dvd editions of it.
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  • By German Gonzalez
    March 03, 2010
    01:55 PM

    Seven samurai, I remember I saw very late in the night in a public channel, I got impressed the fight scenes, serenity of the samurai. How Kurosawa took from the Western films and vice versa. Great shadows creating a dark atmosphere that was much better than colors. Always serious characters showing us (western) the philosophy of the Bushido. Great Movie!
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  • By Matt
    March 03, 2010
    03:50 PM

    Yojimbo-I was a freshman in High school and I traded a bootleg VHS copy with a friend. Amazingly, I traded for some Troma schlock! Since then I've seen nearly all of Kurosawa's work--and I don't even recall what the name of the film I traded it for was! Can't wait for the Yojimbo/Sanjuro Blu Ray!
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  • By Michael Austin
    March 03, 2010
    04:59 PM

    The first I ever saw was Throne of Blood at the Film Forum in New York City. I had a friend convince me to go with him to their Samurai Film Festival. I'd never seen a samurai film, especially not a Kurosawa film. After I saw that I came back to every Kurosawa showing they had left during their festival: The Hidden Fortress, Yojimbo, Sanjuro, Ran. I caught most of the non-Kurosawa films as well. I was blown away by Kurosawa's films and the actors in them. After that I discovered my love of both Kurosawa and Japanese cinema. I also discovered what it was like to live off of Ramen and PB and J for that month since tickets were $10 bucks a pop and I must have seen at least 12 different movies. Totally worth it.
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  • By dan kinem
    March 03, 2010
    05:32 PM

    the very first kurosawa movie i ever saw, strangely enough was kagemusha. it was in 7th grade, i had been wanting to see some kurosawa since the beginning of that year, particularly seven samurai, but noticed this was playing on tv. it was probably fox movies or ifc or something. the visuals and scope of the movie struck me and stayed with me to this day. i have since seen many kurosawa films, but don't want to revisit this one quite yet, i am still letting it sit in my head. it was one of the first foreign films i saw, too.
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  • By Christopher R
    March 03, 2010
    05:44 PM

    Dreams - A friend showed me the film. It was late at night and I was tired and didn't know what to expect. I fell asleep. But since then, I have become "awake" to Kurosawa films and have now seen them all. (And love Dreams!)
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  • By Julie
    March 03, 2010
    05:45 PM

    Scandal - VHS My boyfriend was a huge Kurosawa fan and sent me a few of his films on VHS. I watched it on a semi-working in China, where I was at the time...
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  • By Lee Michael Geller
    March 03, 2010
    06:26 PM

    STRAY DOG. Borrowed the VHS from the Phoenix Public Library. Absolutely loved it and then began hitting up the local video store for whatever titles they could get; Seven Samurai, Yojimbo, Ran, etc. Saw Dreams in the theaters. I could stay up all night watching Kurosawa.
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  • By Colin Morgan
    March 06, 2010
    07:02 PM

    My first (and at the moment, only, though that will change soon) Kurosawa is High and Low. And, oh my God, the film might have have been almost 2 1/2 hours, but it felt more like five minutes went by after I was done watching it. That's how absorbed I ws in the film, and I've only experienced that with very few films.
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  • By food coma panda
    March 11, 2010
    02:13 PM

    Yojimbo. Sixteen years old. Going on forty, though. My parents' living room. PBS. A Saturday afternoon. With my fourteen-year-old brother. Then, Throne of Blood. Rashomon. Dodes-ka-den. Ran. Seven Samurai. And everything else.
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