A bureaucrat tries to find meaning in his life after he discovers he has terminal cancer.A bureaucrat tries to find meaning in his life after he discovers he has terminal cancer.A bureaucrat tries to find meaning in his life after he discovers he has terminal cancer.
- Nominated for 1 BAFTA Award
- 6 wins & 2 nominations total
- Director
- Writers
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaWhen Takashi Shimura rehearsed his singing of "Song of the Gondola," director Akira Kurosawa instructed him to "sing the song as if you are a stranger in a world where nobody believes you exist."
- GoofsWhen Kanji and the Novelist go to a busy, loud nightclub, the film has been reversed as evidenced by the backwards "Nippon Beer" banner in the background.
- ConnectionsFeatured in The Siskel & Ebert 500th Anniversary Special (1989)
- SoundtracksJ'ai Deux Amours
(uncredited)
Music by Vincent Scotto
Lyrics by Georges Koger and Henri Varna
Performed by Josephine Baker
[Played when entering the bar with the long-faced man]
Featured review
Simply Brilliant - Kurosawa's Greatest
Kanji Watanabi is a quiet, melancholy man who has spent all his life behind his office desk doing sweet eff-all. When he is diagnosed with stomach cancer he realizes that he has been petty much dead his whole life, and searches desperately for away to live again.
This is Akira Kurosawa's masterpiece, yes, even better than Rashomon and The Seven Samauri. It is a perfect true story of everybody's life- how we don't even realize we have it until we know it will be over in a short while. Watanabi's quest for self-discovery is one of the greatest from any motion picture ever made. The all-too-true paradox is one to end all paradoxes- that Watanabi is dead, and had been all his life, until he realized he was sick, which is when he began living for the first time. Takashi Shimura, the actor best known for his role as the wise, bald-headed Samauri in The Seven Samauri, and the professor out of the early Godzilla films, plays Watanabi perfectly- in my mind, it's one of the greatest film performances of all time.
Not everyone will love this movie. It was made a long time ago, the main character is an old fogey, it has subtitles, and it's pretty long. Many people today, especially young kids, would find it boring. Well, let 'em. There's no need to worry about them, they'll always have Pirates of the Carribbean, they'll always have The Matrix. Leave Ikiru and films like it to the true lovers of cinema.
This is Akira Kurosawa's masterpiece, yes, even better than Rashomon and The Seven Samauri. It is a perfect true story of everybody's life- how we don't even realize we have it until we know it will be over in a short while. Watanabi's quest for self-discovery is one of the greatest from any motion picture ever made. The all-too-true paradox is one to end all paradoxes- that Watanabi is dead, and had been all his life, until he realized he was sick, which is when he began living for the first time. Takashi Shimura, the actor best known for his role as the wise, bald-headed Samauri in The Seven Samauri, and the professor out of the early Godzilla films, plays Watanabi perfectly- in my mind, it's one of the greatest film performances of all time.
Not everyone will love this movie. It was made a long time ago, the main character is an old fogey, it has subtitles, and it's pretty long. Many people today, especially young kids, would find it boring. Well, let 'em. There's no need to worry about them, they'll always have Pirates of the Carribbean, they'll always have The Matrix. Leave Ikiru and films like it to the true lovers of cinema.
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- Brave Sir Robin
- Dec 28, 2004
Details
Box office
- Gross US & Canada
- $60,239
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $2,149
- Dec 29, 2002
- Gross worldwide
- $96,302
- Runtime2 hours 23 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.37 : 1
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