Red Beard is well meant and well made, no question about it. But it unfolds familiarly and, at 185 minutes, practically forever.
Red Beard(赤ひげ)
✭ ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭ Read critic reviews
Japan · 1965
3h 5m
Director Akira Kurosawa
Starring Toshirō Mifune, Yûzô Kayama, Tsutomu Yamazaki, Reiko Dan
Genre Drama
Add to Watchlist
Please login to add films to your watchlist.
Aspiring to be a personal physician to a wealthy family, Yasumoto is disappointed when his first post after medical school takes him to a small country clinic under the gruff doctor Red Beard. He introduces Yasumoto to the unglamorous side of the profession, ultimately assigning him to care for a prostitute rescued from a local brothel.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
ReelViews by James Berardinelli
As an elegy to a perfect fusion of directorial mastery and an actor’s indomitable screen presence, it’s hard to imagine something more memorable and affecting than Red Beard.
The New Yorker by Michael Sragow
In Kurosawa’s dynamic yet intimate wide-screen filmmaking, practicality and empathy merge with psychoanalysis and even bits of magic; the young doctor’s near-fatal close encounter with a female serial killer, and a virtuous man’s deathbed confession of a horrifying marital tragedy, are among the sequences building to a genuinely inspirational conclusion.
Chicago Sun-Times by Roger Ebert
I believe this film should be seen by every medical student. Like Kurosawa's masterpiece, "Ikiru" (1952), it fearlessly regards the meanings of life, and death.
Users who liked this film also liked
Dersu Uzala
(Дерсу Узала)
A military explorer meets and befriends a Goldi hunter in Russia’s unmapped forests. A deep and abiding bond evolves between the two men.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Soviet Union, Japan • 1975
- Director Akira Kurosawa
- Cast Yuriy Solomin, Maksim Munzuk, Mikhail Bychkov, B. Khorulev, Vladimir Kremena, Aleksandr Pyatkov
- Genre Action, Adventure, Drama
- Available on Criterion Channel, Amazon Video
Woyzeck
Desperate for money, Woyzeck volunteers for a medical trial: a diet of peas. While his lover pursues an affair, Woyzeck loses his mind.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- West Germany • 1979
- Director Werner Herzog
- Cast Klaus Kinski, Eva Mattes, Wolfgang Reichmann, Willy Semmelrogge, Josef Bierbichler, Paul Burian
- Genre Drama
- Available on Fandor Amazon Channel, Apple TV, Google Play Movies, Amazon Video, YouTube, Tubi TV, Shout! Factory TV, Kanopy, Plex, Plex Channel
High and Low
(天国と地獄)
A wealthy executive becomes the victim of an extortion plot after his chauffeur’s son is kidnapped.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1963
- Director Akira Kurosawa
- Cast Toshirō Mifune, Tatsuya Nakadai, Kyōko Kagawa, Tatsuya Mihashi, Isao Kimura, Kenjirō Ishiyama
- Genre Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller
- Available on Criterion Channel, Max Amazon Channel, Apple TV, Amazon Video
Rhapsody in August
(八月の狂詩曲)
Tears. Laughter. Innocence. It was a summer of remembering.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1991
- Director Akira Kurosawa
- Cast Sachiko Murase, Hidetaka Yoshioka, Tomoko Ôtakara, Mieko Suzuki, Mitsunori Isaki, Hisashi Igawa
- Genre Comedy, Drama
- Available on No streaming locations found.
I Live in Fear
(生きものの記録)
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1955
- Director Akira Kurosawa
- Cast Toshirō Mifune, Takashi Shimura, Minoru Chiaki, Masao Shimizu, Eiko Miyoshi, Kyoko Aoyama
- Genre Drama
- Available on Criterion Channel
Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors
(Тіні забутих предків)
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Soviet Union • 1965
- Director Sergei Parajanov
- Cast Ivan Mykolaichuk, Larysa Kadochnykova, Tatyana Bestayeva, Nikolay Grinko, Spartak Bagashvili, Leonid Yengibarov
- Genre Drama, Romance
- Available on Klassiki, Takflix
Stray Dog
(野良犬)
During a sweltering summer, a rookie detective searches Tokyo’s streets for his stolen Colt pistol.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1949
- Director Akira Kurosawa
- Cast Toshirō Mifune, Takashi Shimura, Keiko Awaji, Eiko Miyoshi, Noriko Sengoku, Noriko Honma
- Genre Crime, Drama, Thriller
- Available on fuboTV, Criterion Channel, Crackle, Tubi TV, Plex, Plex Channel
The Bad Sleep Well
(悪い奴ほどよく眠る)
A young executive hunts down his father's killer in this chilling corporate take on "Hamlet."
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1960
- Director Akira Kurosawa
- Cast Toshirō Mifune, Masayuki Mori, Kamatari Fujiwara, Takeshi Katō, Kyōko Kagawa, Tatsuya Mihashi
- Genre Crime, Drama, Thriller
- Available on Criterion Channel
Tokyo Drifter
(東京流れ者)
A former yakuza enforcer is looking forward to a normal life when his gang disbands, but soon finds himself an assassination target.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1966
- Director Seijun Suzuki
- Cast Tetsuya Watari, Chieko Matsubara, Tamio Kawachi, Hideaki Nitani, Eiji Gō, Tochiko Hamakawa
- Genre Action, Crime
- Available on Criterion Channel, Apple TV, Amazon Video
Floating Weeds
(浮草)
Members of a traveling theater troupe meddle in the personal life of the troupe's leader.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1959
- Director Yasujirō Ozu
- Cast Ganjiro Nakamura, Machiko Kyō, Hiroshi Kawaguchi, Ayako Wakao, Haruko Sugimura, Chishū Ryū
- Genre Drama
- Available on Criterion Channel, Max Amazon Channel, Apple TV, Google Play Movies, Fandango At Home, Amazon Video, YouTube, Kanopy, Plex, Plex Channel
Day of Anger
(I giorni dell'ira)
Lee Van Cleef has been dirty, "ugly" and downright mean... now watch him get violent.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Italy, West Germany • 1967
- Director Tonino Valerii
- Cast Lee Van Cleef, Giuliano Gemma, Yvonne Sanson, Walter Rilla, Christa Linder, Ennio Balbo
- Genre Western
- Available on Amazon Prime Video, Night Flight Plus, Amazon Prime Video with Ads, Amazon Video, Tubi TV, Plex, Plex Channel
Erotic Dream of the Red Chamber
(紅樓春上春)
- ✭ ✭
- Hong Kong • 1978
- Director Chin Hsin
- Cast Leslie Cheung, Cecilia Wong, Sam Hang-Nei
- Genre
- Available on No streaming locations found.
HiGH&LOW: The Red Rain
(HiGH&LOW THE RED RAIN)
- ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 2016
- Director Yudai Yamaguchi
- Cast Takahiro, Hiroomi Tosaka, Miyu Yoshimoto, Takanori Iwata, Nobuyuki Suzuki, Keita Machida
- Genre Mystery, Drama, Action
- Available on No streaming locations found.