Altman, Robert. "Introduction to 羅生門 (1950) (Rashomon)" Criterion. 2002.

  «Rashomon» is the most interesting, for me, of Kurosawa’s Films. That and the «Throne of Blood». Those two stand out the most. «Throne of Blood» was more accessible because most non-Japanese Audiences at least knew the basic Story of «MacBeth». This was more creative because I don’t think we’d seen anything quite like this.

  The main Thing here is that when one sees a Film you see the Character on the Screen. It’s not like Reading or you imagine certain Things. You see very specific Thing, you see a Tree, you see a Sword. So you take that, one takes that as Truth. But in this Film, you take it as Truth, then you find out it is not necessarily the True and you see this various Versions of the Episode that has taken place that these People are talking about and you and you’re never told which is True and which isn’t True, which leads you to the proper Conclusion that it is all True and none of it is True. So it becomes a Poem and it cracks these visual Things that we have in our Mind that if we see it, it must be a Fact. In other [Medium], Reading or Radio where you don’t have these specific Visuals your Mind is making it up. So what my Mind makes up, what your Mind makes up, or what your Mind [the Audience] makes up, is never the same.

  The Trial or the Testimony Scenes that keep going back, you see the two figures behind the Person giving the Testimony. We never see the Interrogator. So this Person is speaking to the Audience as if the Audience were the Interrogator. If I, the Audience, were saying, What happened? I saw, this other guy told me something else. You get a different Version. There’s one Fact that takes place in all of them, and that’s the Death of this one Man. It’s a Poem and it’s dramatic and it works. It certainly changed my Perception about what is possible in Film and what is desirable. You just have to be able to let the Audience come to that Conclusion and say, Oh, that isn’t what happened, and everybody you would talk about, [have them] sit down, make the Person see the Film, ask him Questions, you would not get the same Answers from anybody, which is the Art of Art. That’s what Art is. It penetrates your Intellect, your Mind, and your Experience and History have to react on this new Information. You’re reacting from your own persona on it and that’s what give it Power, I think.

  The Camerawork was fantastic. You were always under these leaves so it wasn’t clear. The look of the Film tends to diffuse it. It’s like Painting and you paint impressionistically. Had he shot that whole Film under the open Sky, it would be quite a different Film. But putting into that dapple, you never knew where you were or where you weren’t. And the Thing that stays most in my Mind are the Shots of the Sun through the Trees and that Movement, constant Movement.

  It is said that Kurosawa was the first Person who had pointed his Camera at the Sun. [Mnemotechnique] I was shooting Television. When I saw that I went out and worked the very next day and absolutely emulated one of those Shots. I don’t remember what the Piece was even but I remember someone had me in a swing and I kept swinging with the Camera, I’d swing, I’d swing up and see all that Stuff through that, I was fascinated with that and I’ve done that ever since.

  The Rain, I love the Rain. Rain is the real emotional trigger that works in any Film. I love Weather: the Rain; extreme Heat; the Wind; anything that’s excessive because it gives you another blanket, so to speak, it gives you another layer that the Audience can relate sensually. To me, every Element in that Film was part of that Film, part of the Poem.

  The Actingstyle of Mifune /mifooni/ and the Japanese Actors are quite different from the English-speaking, European styles of Acting. It served me. The Woman particularly I thought was good. The Mifune Character I might have felt a little exagerrated but that’s the Music of that Culture. Japanese Person will never see the Film the same as the non-Japanese Person. The Japanese Culture knows that History of Samurai like we do the American Western. Every Culture has [its] own what you grow up as Children, so we miss a lot of that in this Film because we just don’t have the Background but the best Thing about it was for non-Japanese Audiences was there was not a lot of Dialogue. It was a visual Film. The Titles are [enough] to keep you up with it. It’s the visual Stimulation that hits the Audience. That’s the Reason for Film, otherwise we should just turn the light off and call the Radio. So it’s a great Film, it certainly had its Influence and continues to have an Influence on me.