Throne of Blood(蜘蛛巣城)
✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
Japan · 1957
1h 48m
Director Akira Kurosawa
Starring Toshirō Mifune, Isuzu Yamada, Akira Kubo, Takashi Shimura
Genre Drama, History
Add to Watchlist
Please login to add films to your watchlist.
Returning to their lord's castle, samurai warriors Washizu and Miki are waylaid by three ghostly women who predicts their futures. When the first part of their prophecy comes true, Washizu's scheming wife, Asaji, presses him to speed up the rest of the spirit's prophecy by murdering his lord and taking his place.
What are people saying?
Users who liked this film also liked
The Hidden Fortress
(隠し砦の三悪人)
Two peasants agree to escort a couple across enemy lines in exchange for gold, but the couple is harboring a secret.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1958
- Director Akira Kurosawa
- Cast Toshirō Mifune, Minoru Chiaki, Kamatari Fujiwara, Misa Uehara, Susumu Fujita, Takashi Shimura
- Genre Action, Adventure, Comedy, Drama
- Available on Criterion Channel, Max Amazon Channel, Apple TV, Amazon Video
Red Beard
(赤ひげ)
A look into the tumultuous relationship between an arrogant young doctor and a compassionate clinic director.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1965
- Director Akira Kurosawa
- Cast Toshirō Mifune, Yûzô Kayama, Tsutomu Yamazaki, Reiko Dan, Miyuki Kuwano, Kyōko Kagawa
- Genre Drama
- Available on Criterion Channel, Max Amazon Channel
Ikiru
(生きる)
Mr. Watanabe tries to find a meaningful human connection after he is diagnosed with terminal cancer.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1952
- Director Akira Kurosawa
- Cast Takashi Shimura, Haruo Tanaka, Nobuo Kaneko, Bokuzen Hidari, Miki Odagiri, Shinichi Himori
- Genre Drama
- Available on Criterion Channel, Max Amazon Channel, Apple TV, Google Play Movies, Fandango At Home, Amazon Video, YouTube, Kanopy
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
Kagemusha
(影武者)
A petty thief must impersonate a powerful warlord in order to lead his troops to battle.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan, United States • 1980
- Director Akira Kurosawa
- Cast Tatsuya Nakadai, Tsutomu Yamazaki, Jinpachi Nezu, Takashi Shimura, Kenichi Hagiwara
- Genre Action, Drama, History, War
- Available on Apple TV, Google Play Movies, Fandango At Home, Amazon Video, Microsoft Store, YouTube
The Mouse That Roared
They're Taking Over The Country In An Invasion Of Laughs!
- ✭ ✭ ✭
- United Kingdom • 1959
- Director Jack Arnold
- Cast Peter Sellers, Jean Seberg, William Hartnell, David Kossoff, Leo McKern, MacDonald Parke
- Genre Comedy
- Available on Apple TV, Google Play Movies, Fandango At Home, Amazon Video, Microsoft Store, YouTube
The Lower Depths
(どん底)
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1957
- Director Akira Kurosawa
- Cast Toshiro Mifune, Isuzu Yamada, Kyōko Kagawa, Ganjirô Nakamura I, Minoru Chiaki, Kamatari Fujiwara
- Genre Drama
- Available on Criterion Channel
Kwaidan
(怪談)
Bizarre, unearthly, terrifying— a nation's legend, an author's imagination, a director's creation manifest in the superlative— Kwaidan
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1964
- Director Masaki Kobayashi
- Cast Michiyo Aratama, Misako Watanabe, Rentarou Mikuni, Kenjiro Ishiyama, Ranko Akagi, Fumie Kitahara
- Genre Drama, Fantasy, Horror
- Available on Criterion Channel, Max Amazon Channel, Apple TV, Google Play Movies, Fandango At Home, Amazon Video, YouTube
The Human Condition I: No Greater Love
(人間の條件 第1部純愛篇/第2部激怒篇)
A Japanese pacifist and socialist struggles to accommodate the demands of his country during wartime.
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1959
- Director Masaki Kobayashi
- Cast Tatsuya Nakadai, Michiyo Aratama, Chikage Awashima, Ineko Arima, Sō Yamamura, Akira Ishihama
- Genre Drama, History, War
- Available on Criterion 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
Night Train
(Pociąg)
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- Poland • 1959
- Director Jerzy Kawalerowicz
- Cast Lucyna Winnicka, Leon Niemczyk, Teresa Szmigielówna, Zbigniew Cybulski, Helena Dąbrowska, Ignacy Machowski
- Genre Mystery, Thriller, Drama
- Available on No streaming locations found.
Kill!
(斬る)
- ✭ ✭ ✭
- Japan • 1968
- Director Kihachi Okamoto
- Cast Tatsuya Nakadai, Etsushi Takahashi, Yuriko Hoshi, Tadao Nakamaru, Akira Kubo, Shigeru Kôyama
- Genre Action, Comedy
- Available on Criterion Channel, Max Amazon Channel, Apple TV
All the Boys Are Called Patrick
(Charlotte et Véronique, ou Tous les garçons s'appellent Patrick)
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- France • 1959
- Director Jean-Luc Godard
- Cast Jean-Claude Brialy, Anne Collette, Nicole Berger
- Genre Comedy, Romance
- Available on Criterion Channel, OVID
Softie
(Petite nature)
- ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭
- France • 2022
- Director Samuel Theis
- Cast Aliocha Reinert, Antoine Reinartz, Izïa Higelin, Mélissa Olexa, Abdel Benchendikh, Jade Schwartz
- Genre Drama
- Available on No streaming locations found.
An incredible example of one way to do an adaptation that is simultaneously faithful to the Shakespeare (when fog rolls in and wipes everything off the screen—"life is but a shadow, a candle"), while simultaneously making the story its own. The death scene, also, is entirely appropriate to the film's (and the play's) ideas about fate. Death by arrow has a sense of inevitability to it—there's not much one can do to stop an arrow once it is in flight towards a person, whereas you can fight against or counter a sword. When the arrows finally do begin to fly, Washizu is trapped on either side by arrows, prevented from running from his fate, before the arrows finally strike him..