Written by Spence D.
Translator: Qin Tian
Proofreader: Yi 23
Source: IGN Japan (August 23, 2001)
For most Western moviegoers, Kurosawa's work and name (he is not related to the famous film director Akira Kurosawa) are almost unknown.
However, in his native Japan, Kurosawa is a film director with an extensive resume, having shot a total of 14 films in the past 18 years. But his relative "obscurity" in the West is about to change, thanks in large part to the influence of European critics and film lovers.
Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Kiyoshi Kurosawa graduated from Rikkyo University's Faculty of Sociology, but he was most interested in film. He soon switched from 8mm short films to feature films. In the 80s, he was known for shooting pink films, and based on this, he began his own film career. (It's worth noting that Kurosawa's view of erotic films is not traditional, preferring eclectic quirky storylines and strong visuals rather than traditional erotic passages.) ）
But it turned out that Kurosawa's later works not only opened the eyes of Japanese movie fans, but also broadened the horizons of fans around the world. Kurosawa chose to shoot traditional genre films, such as tried-and-true crime stories, in which there is always an iconic tough guy detective who approaches cases in a tough way and mixes the story with supernatural and unexplainable elements, Kurosawa has succeeded in creating an avant-garde, eerie thriller subgenre reminiscent of Rob Bowman's The X-Files: Conquest of the Future and Yasujiro Ozu's The Daughter of the Extraordinary Line.
The Daughter of the Extraordinary Line (1933)
Kiyoshi Kurosawa recently promoted his film "X Saints" in San Francisco. Although the film was released in Japan in 1997, it was not released in some theaters in the United States until this year in a restricted release format, and for many American audiences, it may be the first time they have seen Kurosawa's work.
This is a tense and creepy thriller in which the protagonist is a serial killer who uses deep hypnosis to do his own "murder experiment" - that is, to use it to influence people's minds. It can be said that the unique setting and narrative of "X Holy Rule" takes the story of serial killers to a completely different height.
"X Holy Rule" (1997)
Kurosawa was dressed in black, his thick black hair was dotted with white hair, and his beard was carefully trimmed, looking both thoughtful and worried, but also humble and polite. He spoke very little English and had an interpreter sitting next to him, switching between quick Japanese and English for our Q&A. This may not be the most conventional way to conduct in-depth interviews, but it works.
Q: I'm curious, you originally studied sociology, why did you want to make films?
Kurosawa: I think it may be the difference between American and Japanese universities. But in Japan, people think that if you choose sociology at university, you have to take it seriously and work in sociology in the future. I've loved movies since I was a kid and I've always wanted to make movies during college. That's when I started making 8mm films, and although there wasn't a filmmaking course in school at the time, I became so obsessed with making 8mm films that I stopped studying sociology and kept thinking about film.
Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Q: The core sociological theme of the film "X-Healing" is related because it explores the human condition and its processes affected by hypnosis and psychological awareness. So it seems that you are not abandoning sociology entirely, but incorporating it into another medium.
Kiyoshi Kurosawa: There are a lot of sociological elements in X-Ji, but most of them have nothing to do with my sociological background, but because I've seen so many movies. I would say that probably only one percent of that came from what I learned in college, and the remaining ninety-nine percent came from my film education.
Q: If most of the elements come from things you've seen in other films, how do you get your experience from real life? I can't imagine that the nutrition of all your films is just based on other movies, and there must be your shadow in them.
Kiyoshi Kurosawa: It's true that I mainly learn from other films, but in the process of making films, I also learn from my own experience. Basically most of my knowledge comes from movies, and then I combine that knowledge with what I've seen and observed over the years, and I'm always thinking. In fact, making movies is an opportunity and channel for me to express these ideas.
Q: It's a bit like a character in X-Reign says – let the ego subconscious and mind go beyond the limits of the flesh so that he can feel what other people think. Do you also look at filmmaking in this new existential way, where you put all your ideas into the film and then watch how others react to it?
Kiyoshi Kurosawa: Making movies is not my whole life, but I often ask myself the question: "What would I do in certain situations?" "What do the actors and individuals who are in a certain scene do?" These are things that I have to consider when shooting on location. For example, when the protagonist in "X Healing" says, "I feel like I'm becoming very empty, and I want to put these thoughts out."
I asked the character to say this not because I had read it in any previous movie or book, or because it was related to external knowledge. I say this because I thought about it, and I would communicate and discuss with the actors. I would think, "How would I feel if I were him?" Only then slowly confirmed what he would say. For me, the process of making a film is not simply about putting in what you have learned, but also about putting yourself into it, thinking about the situation, treating those scenes as a possibility, and I think that's what making a movie is all about.
Q: The story of "X Holy Cure" is related to the theory of Messmail, the founder of modern hypnosis, and hypnosis techniques.
Kurosawa: Oh, never. I've had a few chances, but to be honest I was scared. While I am completely confident that I will never be hypnotized, some people have told me that it is those who are most convinced of this that are most easily hypnotized. So when I had the opportunity to get into hypnosis, I usually turned it down.
Q: What scares you? I read one of your essays on X Reign and your film, and you talked about exploring the fear associated with ordinary people — as you said before, thinking about how characters react in a given situation. Do you yourself have anything to be afraid of?
Kurosawa: I think there are many layers of fear. It's not scary to make a change, it's really scary to be a person who never changes, always the same thing. I think the most embodied of this state of mind, which never changes at all, is death itself.
Q: Can you say that you are also afraid of death?
Kurosawa: I haven't experienced death, so I'm not sure if it's fear or some other emotion. But I'm still a little scared, mainly because death is an eternal state, and that's what scares me the most.
Q: Your relationship between directing and this question is interesting. Because as long as a movie can be properly preserved, it can last forever. The film captures the reality in a specific period of time, freezes a specific period of time, and allows future generations to watch it repeatedly, creating a visual legacy of watching the past to some extent. So as long as your movie is still being reflected, you'll never die.
Kiyoshi Kurosawa: That's an insightful statement. The passage of time becomes a reality, but when the film can be preserved, it can coexist with that moment. But I sometimes worry that what I've made is scary because it will never change, and the reality is not. This is what I really think.
Q: One of the things that appealed to me most about X Cure is that it's ostensibly a serial killer/crime thriller. But beneath the surface, the film has a philosophical overtone of "malice". I mean, Killer Miyami keeps asking everyone, "Who are you?" He was definitely trying to find out who he was, but he also hoped that others would question their respective identities as well. I think in such a film it's an interesting binary opposition. Because American audiences may simply see it as a crime movie, but its tone is philosophical and very different from most American crime movies.
Kiyoshi Kurosawa: "X Saint" is indeed a psychological thriller, a detective story, and I borrowed the style of the genre from American genre films. And in fact, the first half of the film may fit this framework very well. But in American genre films, as the story unfolds, it seems that the detective as the protagonist has not changed. There will always be a mystery in the movie that will eventually be solved, but as the truth comes, it seems to have little to do with the detective himself. I want to try to avoid this.
Probably because I'm a Japanese director, I wanted to have some development and change in my character, and some fluctuations in my state of mind. At least I got that feeling from my own experience. In the process of studying American genre films, what I really wanted to express was the relationship between the Interpol High and his wife, his daily life, and the society and the world around him. That's essentially what I care about the most. In dealing with the conflict between Gao and the society that surrounds him, I see the conclusion that he found complete freedom by cutting himself off from society.
Q: I really like a lot of the stylized approach you use in the film. First of all, this is a work with a sense of transcendence. The whole film has a very cold, posthumous feeling. Also, your use of silence and sound is good. Your handling of sound effects in hospital scenes is astounding. At key moments in the film, you don't add any sound, which creates an eerie tension. The use of sound and silence in film as a dramatic means of impacting the audience is rare in the work of many directors today.
Kurosawa: First of all, visually, I really didn't use too many close-ups. I think directors use too many close-ups of faces now. Indeed, facial close-ups are very effective in revealing the psychology of the character and his feelings. But in terms of the narrative of the film, I don't think it's very useful. The real strength of the medium of film is the ability to record what is happening in front of your eyes. I think this element must be utilized. This is the root, foundation and power of live-action shooting. Therefore, the lens size I am most accustomed to using is able to clearly reveal what is happening in front of me. And these shots just happen to be long-range shots.
In addition, I also want to talk about soundtracks, many young filmmakers do use a lot of soundtracks nowadays. But once the soundtrack is added, the atmosphere and emotions of the characters of the whole scene are exposed and too obvious. I wanted to let the audience find their own feelings and answers through the film, so I felt that the soundtrack was inherently unnecessary. Once I substitute music for audience feelings, it turns questions into answers. I want to leave the thought to the audience and let them find their feelings in the film, which is my goal.
Q: Through your explanation, I seem to be able to understand why X Reign has such an open ending.
Kiyoshi Kurosawa: No matter how you interpret a movie, I don't believe a movie is limited to its beginning and end. Before and after that, there is a world of its own. I think movies are just a small window into a corner of real life. What I tried to achieve with X Sancage was to make it very open and allow the world behind this crime story to emerge. I want the audience to feel that this movie brings them something other than horror.