Great Directors: Akira Kurosawa Dersu Uzala 1975 Friday, April 25 - Thursday, May 1, 2008 Film Information Directed by Akira Kurosawa Language Russian with English subtitles Running Time 141 minutes Film Notes of 1970’s DODESUKADEN. Fortunately, Kurosawa had a Like several of Akira Kurosawa’s other films, relatively quick recovery and DERSU UZALA is an adaptation of sorts. turnaround. Not only did DERSU Whereas Shakespeare and Dostoevsky (among UZALA make for an award- others) served as the inspiration for earlier movies, winning return to the medium the memoirs of a Russian explorer formed the he had given so much to, but basis for what is otherwise a Kurosawa anomaly. it also served as a synthesis of DERSU UZALA is, for example, the only one of what Alexander Payne recently the director’s films made outside of Japan (the described as the quintessential Soviet Union), and the only one of them not in Kurosawa aesthetic: “His Japanese (Russian). It is also the only Akira movies combine great visual Kurosawa film to have won an Academy Award, storytelling with a humanist, taking the 1975 trophy for Best Foreign Language deeply compassionate view Film. of the world. He believed DERSU UZALA was Kurosawa’s first release artists should look at all of life in five years, which would not have been an with understanding, without abnormal stretch of time between movies for blinking.” the director, were it not for what occurred in that —Casey span. In 1971, Kurosawa attempted to commit suicide, having fallen into a depression caused at least partly by the commercial disappointment More Information Written by “When I start on a film I always have a number of Akira Kurosawa ideas about my project. Then one of them begins to germinate, to sprout, and it is this which I take Featuring and work with... My films come from my need to Maksim Munzuk say a particular thing at a particular time. The Yuri Solomin Svetlana Danilchenko beginning of any film for me is this need to express Dmitri Korshikov something. It is to make it nuture and grow that I Suimenkul Chokmorov write my script—it is directing it that makes my Vladimir Kremena tree blossom and bear fruit.” Aleksandr Pyatkov —Akira Kurosawa Cinematography by Fyodor Dobronravov Yuri Gantman Asakazu Nakai Original Music by Isaak Shvarts Country of Origin Soviet Union / Japan Awards Academy Award Winner: Best Foreign Film Also Recommended Ikiru 1952 (Dir. Kurosawa) Walkabout 1971 (Dir. Roeg) Kundun 1997 (Dir. Scorsese) At the Ruth Sokolof Theater · 14th & Webster, Omaha · 402.933.0259 · filmstreams.org .