Kumonosu-jo [Throne of Blood] (Kurosawa, 1957)

Macbeth is reimagined as a samurai in feudal Japan in director Akira Kurosawa's classic adaptation of the Shakespearean tragedy. Familiar with Orson Welles's more faithful adaptation, Kurosawa chose to place a more personal stamp on his version by translating the events and characters to historical Japan. The equivalent of the tragic Scottish lord is Taketoki Washizu (Toshiro Mifune), a valiant warrior whose life is transformed by an encounter with a ghostly female spirit. The spirit offers several predictions, finally stating that Washizu will rise to power over the current warlord. When these predictions begin coming true, he and his ambitious wife decide to ensure his ascendancy to power by murdering the current ruler. As with Macbeth, Washizu achieves his goal, but his guilt and the suspicions of others soon bring about his downfall. The shift to Japanese settings is seamless, creating a historically accurate and resonant work with a culturally distinct visual style. The supporting performances also recall Japanese tradition, particularly Isuzu Yamada's creepily unemotional take on Lady Macbeth, while Mifune proves consistently gripping in the sheer intensity of his performance. The intelligence of Kurosawa's alterations retains the drama's tragic impact, especially during the conclusion, in which Washizu makes a memorable final stand against an advancing army. Impressive in every regard, Throne of Blood seems secure in the pantheon of superior film adaptations of William Shakespeare.

General
Complete name : Throne of Blood.mkv
Format : Matroska
File size : 4.38 GiB
Duration : 1h 49mn
Overall bit rate : 5 717 Kbps
Movie name : Akira Kurosawa-Throne of Blood (1957)
Encoded date : UTC 2011-12-30 21:01:34
Writing application : mkvmerge v5.2.0 ('I can't explain') built on Dec 18 2011 18:12:03
Writing library : libebml v1.2.3 + libmatroska v1.3.0
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Duration : 1h 49mn
Bit rate : 5 156 Kbps
Nominal bit rate : 5 268 Kbps
Width : 960 pixels
Height : 720 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 4:3
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Stream size : 3.95 GiB (90%)
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Duration : 1h 49mn
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Channel(s) : 2 channels
Channel positions : L R
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Stream size : 351 MiB (8%)
Language : Japanese
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http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050613/

Language: Japanese
Subtitles: English (in mkv), Spanish and Portuguese (srt)

Posted originally at KG by EceAyhan, whom we thank