• The final film from Kurosawa- 83 years old when he made the film– one of the cinema’s greatest artists
  • It is about a retired professor—he’s a simple man, a good man, sentimental (the cat stuff is a bit much)—like the old man in Dodes’ka-den he sort of welcomes burglars into his home- that sort of wisdom
  • Hilarious little vignette about a horse staring him down while he buys horse meat from the butcher
  • Lots of drinking and storytelling- a few acts turn into almost musical theater
  • the group of his former students in a line like the funeral in Ikiru
  • at 34 minutes the there’s a nice frame- he’s facing the camera, framed by the sliding wood doors and two students facing him. Another one of them looking at the moon framed by the door
  • the ending is superb as well- he has a memory/dream of himself as child and the camera floats into the watercolor clouds as he drifts away—really fitting
  • Recommend but not in the top 10 of 1993