High and Low

Watched this Kurosawa movie the other night. Ummmm....very disappointing. It started out as this great kidnapping movie--great beginning plot twist; it reminded me of a play that had been made into a movie. Think Sorry, Wrong Number or Wait Until Dark. But about halfway through it develops into a very slow-moving police procedural, and eventually into some sort of class-based morality lesson. I would have liked all three ideas, had they been fully-fleshed out. It seems to me that if Kurosawa would have made three movies instead of one, they each would have been better than the mishmash of High and Low. One thing about it is very nice, though. Toshiro Mifune's performance is the best I've ever seen him give--nicely understated compared to his crack-addict-on-speed act he does in The Seven Samurai and Rashomon, for example.

Rats. I've never been disappointed by a Kurosawa movie. I guess they can't all be winners.