Permutations on the Theme of Murder: The Search for Solutions

Abstract

What does an analysis of the films that appear to be closest in narrative structure to Rashomon offer the media scholar? The issue of translation, particularly in the case of The Outrage, seems to be most at the forefront. It seems clear that the concerns of a particular director at a particular historical moment do not translate straightforwardly across time and cultures. The amount of material written on Rashomon makes the point that even the original creates problems of interpretation that are related to the fact that it is a Japanese film. By the time the story has been framed by a need-to-know discussion of the original short stories it is based on, the legends surrounding Rashô gate, notions of guilt in Buddhism, the supposed culture of Heian Japan, the postwar culture of Japan, and Kurosawa’s own worldview, the film itself gets buried under a weight of scholarly material. This, however, is not how film directors generally go about creating a remake.

“Just the facts”

—Ritt 1965¹