Something Like an Autobiography (2 page)

I expected an aloof ogre. I was far too intimidated to bring a tape recorder, and only hoped my ignorance would not offend him. My journalist’s duties—to ask about those troublesome times of the last decade or so—were forgotten along with my composure. Too agitated to ask about anything so personal, I stumbled through the formalities and then finally hit upon the idea of asking Kurosawa about his impressions of Naruse Mikio, a director he assisted on one picture in 1938, and who is as little known in Japan today as he is in the United States. From anecdotes about Naruse we progressed to talk about Enomoto Ken’ichi, who starred in Kurosawa’s 1945
The Men Who Tread on the Tiger’s Tail
and who was one of the most popular comedians of the immediate prewar and wartime era. Most of the films in which he appeared, including many by Kurosawa’s mentor Yamamoto Kajirō, have been lost, so few people know about him today.

The shy gentleman wearing sunglasses who answered my questions soon became enthusiastically involved in reminiscing. These were people and experiences obviously dear to him, but nearly forgotten. He seemed pleased to recall them, even at the behest of an American film student/journalist whose Japanese—to this day—is far from perfect.

The next thing I knew, I was being asked to take part in conversations when he was preparing to begin his autobiography. Later I was summoned on numerous occasions around the world to translate for him, to act as what he jokingly calls his “Foreign Minister,” and have been flattered to do so.

I hope that in translating Kurosawa Akira’s account of his own life that I have conveyed the spirit and sensibilities of this unique personality in a fashion that is comprehensible to the Western reading public. I have only my experience as his interpreter to guide me (and I have no professional training as an interpreter), but the content of this volume is far more delicate and necessarily far more personal than interviews and press conferences.

I have over the last four or five years seen Mr. Kurosawa in situations where he appears meek, vulnerable and, on occasion, testy—but only when provoked. These are usually meetings with the press. I have also seen him in situations where he is totally in command and clearly in love with what he is doing—making movies. The image I retain of him in my mind’s eye directing the night battle scenes in
Kagemusha
is one of a man brimming with confidence, authority and potential. If some of the excitement I have experienced in the presence of this contradictory and inspiring personality emerges in the translation of this remarkable life, my hopes will have been fulfilled.

AUDIE BOCK

Berkeley, October 1981

IN THE PRE-WAR
era when itinerant home-remedy salesmen still wandered the country, they had a traditional patter for selling a potion that was supposed to be particularly effective in treating burns and cuts. A toad with four legs in front and six behind would be placed in a box with mirrors lining the four walls. The toad, amazed at its own appearance from every angle, would break into an oily sweat. This sweat would be collected and simmered for 3,721 days while being stirred with a willow branch. The result was the marvelous potion.

Writing about myself, I feel something like that toad in the box. I have to look at myself from many angles, over many years, whether I like what I see or not. I may not be a ten-legged toad, but what confronts me in the mirror does bring on something like the toad’s oily sweat.

Circumstances have conspired, without my noticing it, to make me reach seventy-one years of age this year. Looking back over all this time, what is there for me to say, except that a lot has happened? Many people have suggested that I write an autobiography, but I have never before felt favorably disposed toward the idea. This is partly because I believe that what pertains only to myself is not interesting enough to record and leave behind me. More important is my conviction that if I were to write anything at all, it would turn out to be nothing but talk about movies. In other words, take “myself,” subtract “movies” and the result is “zero.”

Not long ago I gave up trying to refuse, however. I think my capitulation derives from the fact that recently I read the autobiography of the French film director Jean Renoir. I once had the occasion to meet him, and even to be invited to dinner with him, over which we talked of many things. The impression I had of him from this encounter was that he was not at all the type of person to sit down and write his autobiography. So for me to hear that he had ventured to do so was like having an explosion go off under me.

In the foreword to that book Jean Renoir writes the following:

and further,

My own decision to write the present chapters, which in a slightly different form were first published in the Japanese magazine
Shŭkan Yomiuri
, was prompted by these words, and by the terrific impression Jean Renoir left on me when I met him—the feeling that I would like to grow old in the same way he did.

There is one more person I feel I would like to resemble as I grow old: the late American film director John Ford. I am also moved by my regret that Ford did not leave us his autobiography. Of course, compared to these two illustrious masters, Renoir and Ford, I am no more than a little chick. But if many people are saying they want to know what sort of person I am, it is probably my duty to write something for them. I have no confidence that what I write will be read with interest, and I must explain that I have chosen (for reasons I will discuss later) to bring my account to a close in 1950, the year in which I made
Rashōmon
. But I have undertaken this series with the feeling that I must not be afraid of shaming myself, and that I should try telling myself the things I am always telling my juniors.

In the course of writing this thing resembling an autobiography, I have on several occasions sat “knees to knees” with a number of people and talked frankly to refresh my memory. They are: Uekusa Keinosuke (novelist, scriptwriter, playwright, friend from grammar-school days); Honda Inoshiro (film director, friend from our assistant-director days); Muraki Yoshiro (art director, frequent member of my crew); Yanoguchi Fumio (sound recordist, a cherry tree of the same
bloom as I at P.C.L., the pre-war predecessor of the Toho Film Company); Sato Masaru (music director, pupil of the late composer Hayasaka Fumio, a frequent collaborator of mine); Fujita Susumu (actor, star of my maiden work,
Sugata Sanshir
ō); Kayama Yŭzō (actor, one of many I put through severe training); Kawakita Kashiko (vice president of Tōhō-Tōwa Films, a lady who has aided me greatly abroad and who knows much about me and the reputation of my work in foreign countries); Audie Bock (American scholar of Japanese cinema, a person who when it comes to my films knows more about me than I do about myself); Hashimoto Shinobu (film producer, scriptwriter, collaborator with me on the scripts of
Rashōmon, Ikiru
and
Seven Samurai
); Ide Masato (scriptwriter upon whom I have relied as collaborator for my recent films, my adversary in golf and shogi chess); Matsue Yōichi (producer, Tokyo University graduate, graduate of the Italian Cinecittà film school, a man whose activities are completely mysterious, very strange to me; my life abroad has on many occasions been shared with this handsome Frankenstein); Nogami Teruyo (my right hand, frequent member of my crew beginning as script girl on
Rashomon
, and in this endeavor as well, from start to finish, the person I make suffer). I would like to express my warmest thanks to all of these people.

AKIRA KUROSAWA

Tokyo, June 1981

I WAS IN
the washtub naked. The place was dimly lit, and I was soaking in hot water and rocking myself by holding on to the rims of the tub. At the lowest point the tub teetered between two sloping boards, the water making little splashing noises as it rocked. This must have been very interesting for me. I rocked the tub with all my strength. Suddenly it overturned. I have a very vivid memory of the strange feeling of shock and uncertainty at that moment, of the sensation of that wet and slippery space between the boards against my bare skin, and of looking up at something painfully bright overhead.

After reaching an age of awareness, I would occasionally recall this incident. But it seemed a trivial thing, so I said nothing about it until I became an adult. It must have been after I had passed twenty years of age that for some reason I mentioned to my mother that I remembered these sensations. For a moment she just stared at me in surprise; then she informed me that this could only have been something that occurred when we went to my father’s birthplace up north in Akita Prefecture to attend a memorial service for my grandfather. I had been one year old at the time.