Author: Wang Jinxia, School of Rule of Law, Northwest University of Political Science and Law Source: People's Court Daily
Hunt the witch Lin Shengbin, and then look at "Rashomon Gate". A complex story is superficially complex, but it is not difficult for well-trained legal people to find clues in it.
An important aspect of the reason why the classic is called a classic is that it can arouse people to think continuously. Although "Rashomon" is a 1950 work by Japanese director Akira Kurosawa, it has been repeatedly mentioned in modern and contemporary contexts, and Rashomon has become synonymous with everyone weaving lies from their own favorable angles, making the truth confusing.
However, when modern people rethink Rashomon, they will be substituted for the socio-historical situation and the way of life practice in this era, and thus discover something new. Whether it is the original author of Rashomon, Ryunosuke Wasagawa, or the screenwriters Akira Kurosawa and Shinobu Hashimoto, the law is not an aspect of their consideration, but from the perspective of law, it can be an interesting angle and interpretation method for us to understand Rashomon.
01 Overlapping facts in polyphonic narratives
From the overlapping parts of the four narratives, we can find that the robber is the main promoter of the storyline, and we have to admit that the robber has the "wisdom" (deception technology), "courage" (think that you can do it), "take responsibility" (finally dare to take responsibility), etc., the image of the robber is actually tall. On the contrary, the hypocrisy of Tatsushimaru is also less in comparison, and even a little more real and cute, such as frankly expressing his desires, confessing his true feelings to real sand, and so on. In another bystander, Lang Ren, there was a hint of envy when he talked about the deeds of Tadashi Maru. As a man of great evil, the robber did not receive much condemnation, which may be an important feature of the era of suffering that Ryunosuke Wasagawa and Akira Kurosawa want to describe.
02 How judges solve the mystery of facts
"The devil is hidden in the details", a key question, how did the samurai die? Was it suicide or was he killing? What weapon killed him? In the case of the robbers and woodcutters, they were killed by swords, and in the samurai and real sand versions, they were killed by daggers, which could be an important breakthrough. Being killed by a sword and a dagger must have different wounds, and the angle and magnitude of the wounds will be very different from that of suicide and other killings, which can become the key aspects of determining who is lying.
The first narrative that can be excluded may be the samurai narrative, and what is possessed by the gods and ghosts is not credible. In the four-fold narrative, only the samurai narrative is suicide, which is difficult to confirm, and from the perspective of trace identification, the wide range of traces of live fighting is enough to indicate that there is likely to be a dueling process. The second narrative that can be excluded may be the narrative of Maasa, one is that Maasa is vague in describing her process of killing samurai, and her motive for killing samurai is also a bit suspicious. Japanese culture is deeply influenced by Chinese culture, husband power may be an important aspect, a wife may need a stronger motivation to kill her husband, and a contemptuous look from a husband can be a motive for a wife to kill her husband, which seems unlikely.
The narrative of the robber and the narrative of the woodcutter overlap the most, such as the samurai are killed by the sword, and both go through a duel process, although the description of the duel process is very different, but in the end it is the robber who finally kills the samurai. If it coincides with the previous autopsy and trace identification of the deceased, it is not difficult for the judge to make a decision on the case. But this also needs to be based on a number of premises: whether the woodcutter lied because the woodcutter stole the dagger, and probably for this reason it is said that he was killed with a sword; whether the judge can find out that the woodcutter witnessed the whole process of the case; and so on. We can see that even from a modern perspective, the case is still overshadowed. Therefore, "Rashomon" is not a delicate suspense film after all, and "Rashomon" cannot be understood in a suspenseful way.
03 The "shame" of Japanese culture appears
There are also some obscure and interesting aspects that can be explored in the legal perspective. Proceeding from the rational man hypothesis, a criminal suspect who may be convicted is most often considering how to circumvent the punishment of the law. However, neither the triple narrative in Ryunosuke Wasagawa's novel nor the quadruple narrative in Akira Kurosawa's films shows any attempt by the suspect to evade responsibility. What is seen is that the samurai takes the initiative to take responsibility for rape and murder, and even has a feeling of "generous death"; what is seen is that the real sand admits that he killed her husband; and even the samurai himself says that the robber can be forgiven on some level, because the robber re-untied his rope and handed the real sand to his disposal...
After World War II, the American cultural anthropologist Ruth Benedict famously made a famous analysis of Japan's national nature in "Chrysanthemum and the Knife", arguing that Western culture was influenced by Christianity and could be called "guilt culture", and "guilt culture" advocated the establishment of absolute standards of morality and relied on it to develop conscience. This is in stark contrast to Japan's "shame culture", which relies on external coercive forces to do good deeds, and the real "guilt culture" relies on the inner reaction of guilt to do good deeds. Japan has put shame at the heart of its moral system, so other groups need to cater to this quality of Japanese society. Although Benedict's claims have been criticized by many people, such as whether Japan has a unified national character, whether there is a consistent cultural model, whether there are many errors in the details on which Ben's understanding of Japanese culture is based. However, the "culture of guilt" fits the national imagination of Japanese cultural people like Ryunosuke Wasagawa and Akira Kurosawa. In Rashomon, because of "shame", the robber has to hide his cowardice and clumsy martial arts; because of the "shame", Masaha will claim to have killed the samurai; because of the "shame", the samurai will commit suicide.
Akira Kurosawa once said, "This script describes the nature of people who cannot live without false decorations, and it can even be said that even if people die, they will not give up false decorations, which shows how deep people's sins are." It is a wonderful picture of man's innate sins, of his immutable nature, of man's ego—and if you read it by focusing on the incomprehensible point of the human heart, then I think it is easier to understand the script. However, the script itself may be smarter than Akira Kurosawa, breaking through the "shame", abandoning the illusion, taking off the mask, breaking free from the self-performance of life, and returning to the most real human nature, which can also become the reflection direction of Rashomon.
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