Synopsis
Kanji Watanabe is a middle-aged man who has worked in the same monotonous bureaucratic position for decades. Learning he has cancer, he starts to look for the meaning of his life.
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Cast
- Takashi ShimuraKanji Watanabe
- Haruo TanakaSakai
- Nobuo KanekoMitsuo, son of Kanji
- Bokuzen HidariOhara
- Miki OdagiriToyo
- Shinichi HimoriKimura
- Minoru ChiakiNoguchi
- Minosuke YamadaSubordinate Clerk Saito
- Kamatari FujiwaraSub-Section Chief Ono
- Makoto KoboriKiichi Watanabe, Kanji's Brother
Recommendations
- 100
Chicago Sun-Times
Over the years I have seen "Ikiru" every five years or so, and each time it has moved me, and made me think. - 100
ReelViews
A thoughtful, existential meditation about the meaning of life and what constitutes a life well-lived, Ikiru is almost guaranteed to prod the viewer to examine his or her own mortality and ponder how, in the end, the scales will tip. - 100
LarsenOnFilm
The genius of Akira Kurosawa’s Ikiru is the way this deeply sentimental film continually deflates sentimentality. - 100
Total Film
This is the flip side to his samurai films, an introspective, naturalistic contemporary drama combining progressive social criticism with a universal humanist message. - 90
Variety
Kurosawa performs a tour-de-force in keeping a dramatic thread throughout and avoiding the mawkish. It is technically excellent with a telling Occidental-type musical score. - 80
Los Angeles Times
Like “Stray Dog” and “Drunken Angel,” it illuminates a reeling society while telling a story of deep human emotion. - 80
Time Out
Kurosawa’s eclectic style is a delight: his striking, varied compositions reflecting the old man’s journey from darkness to some kind of light right until the moving finale. - 75
New York Daily News
Akira Kurosawa's talent for analysis, interpretation and projection is again apparent in "To Live." [30 Jan 1960, p.22]
