Akira Kurosawa and Intertextual Cinema

In studying cinema as complex as the work of Akira Kurosawa, argues James Goodwin, recent ideas about intertextuality provide a more helpful paradigm than traditional notions of auteurism. In this text, he draws on contemporary theoretical and critical approaches to explore Kurosawa's use of a variety of texts to create cinema that is both intertextual and intercultural. Examining major films as well as lesser-known works, Goodwin finds in Kurosawa's themes and techniques the capacity to restructure perceptions of Western and Japanese cultures and to establish new intercultural meanings. The work of Dostoevsky, for example, emerges as a primary intertext for Kurosawa, with traits such as extremism, psychological doubling and paradox. Goodwin's discussion encompasses the Russian intertexts to "The Idiot" and "The Lower Depths", modernist narrative in "Rashomon" and "Ikiru" and the issue of heroism in "Throne of Blood" and "Ran". He concludes by extending his analysis of visual, musical and biographical intertexts to Kurosawa's other films. James Goodwin is the author of "Eisenstein, Cinema, and History".