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9.7/10
FilmFascination Rating
I am now familiar with Kurosawa’s work and am aware what he is capable of. He has this magic of giving depth to the movie by bringing out the true emotions from his actors. Ikiru, made by him, is a movie I consider as one of the finest ever made. Forget about nowadays, you won’t find such movies over decades.
High and Low starts with a meeting between Gondo and the executive directors of the National shoes company. A brilliant opening to set the tone of the film. The three directors are cold businessman who try to convince Gondo, a factory manager, to produce cheap shoes for profit. Instead of falling into greed, Gondo throws them out of the house.
Gondo, although a rich guy, is one of those who has risen from poverty. Now he is under the threat that he will be kicked out of the company if the directors convince the old man who it seems started the company. That is when he gets a call that his son has been kidnapped and is forced to pay in return. He has financial issues, but for his son he readily agrees to the absurd amount demanded by the kidnapper. But things take a turn when he understands that actually his Chauffer’s son got kidnapped by mistake. All this comes at a time where he needs his money the most. He is under debt, and if he loses this money, he is as good as dead.
I wouldn’t tell you what happened after that but all I want to say is that this is just half of the movie. Kurosowa engages you in a way that you would get into a pressure packed dilemma like Mr. Gondo even when you know that the right step should be to get the boy safe.
Just that part of the movie is so well devised, one could have made a short movie of only the first half and still it would have been such a good movie. When I saw that there is more than an hour left, I was so happy about it. It becomes easy to watch the movie when you get emotionally connected with what is happening in the first half. The steps taken by the characters are justified. Mr. Gondo’s denial of giving money is justified, and even Aoki, the chauffeur, begging for his boy’s life when he hears his voice is justified. All these details compel you to leave the morals aside for a while and think practically. I saw this video of analysis of Kurosawa’s blocking technique, and it is brilliant. I’ll share it with you below. Whoever is interested watch it after watching the movie. It will make you realise and understand when I was talking about how good the first part is.
Kingo Gundo is played by Toshiro Mifune. When I got to know that he was the same guy I had seen in the ‘Seven Samurai’, I could not believe it. You would have to see both the movies to understand how different the roles are. The change he shows in his character brings the quick shift in tone and perspective. I might be ignorant, but I haven’t read about him anywhere. He deserves so much appreciation.
Although crime and suspense movies might be detailed but certainly not at the level of this one. We really start from nothing with the officers and very slowly start getting somewhere. Every detail you get is very practically found out and one thing leads to another. Not like one of those movies that bring a fucking lead that comes out of completely nowhere. That is one of the things that make this movie special. You are there with the officers while finding everything. As difficult as it seems to find initially, the movie does everything rationally with facts we were told before.
Above everything, the movie is about, as the title suggests, the two classes. Sure, it shows the comfort and difficulties, but not in a biased way. It is meant to open the curtains that might be blinding your perspective to look at the other class. There is no denying that the society is unbalanced, but the movie tries to show both the sides. It isn’t justifying one of them, just showing how it is for the other. As Kurosawa likes, he leaves us with some lingering questions about humanity. His depth of understanding of humans gives this power to the movie that you had not expected to experience. He once wrote, explaining that his films seek to answer the question “Why can’t people be happier together?”.
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