The Cinematheque

“Unquestionably one of [Kurosawa’s] finest works—charged with energy, imagination, and, in keeping with the subject, sheer horror.”

Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader

“After finishing Rashomon [in 1950], I wanted to do something with Shakespeare’s Macbeth,” Kurosawa said. ​“But just about that time the Orson Welles version was announced, so I postponed mine.” Released in 1957, Kurosawa’s rousing, ravishing take on the Bard’s great tragedy ranks as one of the director’s finest works, and one of cinema’s great Shakespeare adaptations. It was also said to be T.S. Eliot’s favourite film. Transposing the action to medieval Japan and featuring Mifune Toshiro in the Macbeth role as the samurai general Washizu, Throne of Blood combines the conventions of traditional Noh theatre with the most dynamic modern cinematic techniques, making stunning use of glorious costumes, décor, pageantry, and violence. Yamada Isuzu, as Washizu’s wife Asaji, is a memorably chilling Lady Macbeth.

In Japanese with English subtitles

“Throne Of Blood defeats categorization. It remains a landmark of visual strength, permeated by a particularly Japanese sensibility, and is possibly the finest Shakespearean adaptation ever committed to the screen.”

Derek Malcolm, The Guardian

“Throne of Blood is possibly Kurosawa’s definitive expression of the estrangement one experiences from their own life as it spins wildly out of control, and he goes about invoking this existential damnation with a ruthless precision.”

Chuck Bowen, Slant Magazine