Composition and Mood: A Scene from Ikiru
Jul 4th, 2008 | By Rick | Category: Akira Kurosawa, Great ClipsNobody was better at composing for the 4:3 frame than Akira Kurosawa. Like many of the directors of the day, he routinely used normal to slightly wide lenses; with the advent of widescreen, he abandoned them in favor of telephotos, and rarely looked back.
Here’s a scene from Ikiru (1952) that illustrates. The protagonist Watanabe (Takashi Shimura) has been having stomach pains; he has finally gone to the doctor. The scene takes place in the waiting room and proceeds in four movements, each one characterized by a different composition.
In part one, he enters the room; note the multiplane composition at which Kurosawa excelled. Notice also the newspaper in the foreground — it punctuates the scene, at the beginning and end, like bookends.
After Watanabe is seated, the man with the newspaper moves to sit opposite him. The composition is more or less symmetrical: another patient is between, forming the apex of a triangle, and a “window” on either side (the one on the right is actually the glass door to the waiting room). Although the composition is symmetrical, it’s not quite centered — the the entrance to the doctor’s office is to the right, waiting for him.
The man between them is called into the office; the third movement begins when Newspaper Man moves to sit beside Watanabe. The camera shifts slightly; now the composition is unbalanced; the weight is to the right, with another patient and the door to the office on that side. Newspaper Man begins to talk about the poor guy who just got up, about his symptoms, how the doctors said its just an ulcer, but that it’s really stomach cancer. As he describes the fatal symptoms, Watanabe becomes increasingly distressed and agitated, sliding down the couch to get away, and finally moving to another seat.
In the fourth movement, we get the first close-up of the scene, of Watanabe’s distressed face. The other patient is out-of-frame, all that remains is Watanabe and his tormentor, the yawning maw of the office, where his fate will be sealed. Watanabe crumples his hat as newspaper man prattles obliviously away. Our perspective is distorted so that a third of the frame is filled with Watanabe’s face; we cannot miss his agony.
Finally, newspaper man figures out what’s going on and, with a wonderful “Oh, crap!” expression, sits back and raises his newspaper to cover his face. With that, Watanabe’s isolation is complete.
The composition supports and augments the growing mood of despair in the scene, underlining and clarifying Watanabe’s anguish. At first, the composition is relatively balanced, as Watanabe has no reason not to believe that he has a relatively benign, though possibly chronic, condition. Then it becomes increasingly asymmetrical as it becomes clear to Watanabe — and us — that his symptoms are the same as the fatal ones Newspaper Man describes. Another thing to notice is that as the scene progresses, the weight of the composition falls increasingly upon Watanabe; eventually, he’s completely isolated in the frame, courtesy of that newspaper.
Even though we are told the protagonist’s symptoms in exposition, they are underlined and driven home by the staging and composition. Here’s the entire scene for your viewing pleasure. Note how it evolves organically, flowing from bad to worse within the frame. It’s a single shot, and although Kurosawa could have cut from composition to composition, he did not, preferring to do it by moving his actors around instead. Enjoy!
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(note: Ikiru is every bit a masterpiece as Rashomon or The Seven Samurai; it is available in a very good Criterion edition. Highly recommended)
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This is brilliant Rick, I had never thought of it that way.
The worse Watanabe’s discomfort the closer he gets to the camera, until that point at the end of your clip where his despair is filling up the majority of the shot.
I’ve always wondered why I’ve wanted to put my hands through the screen and give him a big hug at this point.
I so adore this film, as my banner will testify, thanks for shedding new light on it for me.
I’m curious what Brazil would be like if it hadn’t been for Ikiru. Some strong influences there.
Thanks, Ib … Kurosawa was a fabulous director. And Shimura — I’m always amazed that this is the same guy who plays Kambei in Seven Samurai just a year later. What an actor!
And Striderdemme: I never noticed the similarities before. Gonna have to watch Brazil again. Unfortunately, all I’ve seen is the butchered theatrical release.
The main thing that I noticed was the scene from Ikiru at the beginning when the women are trying to get through all the endless paperwork. Parallel that in Brazil when the main character is trying to find the woman.
Rick-
Last week I read a post about Renoir, and subsequently queued up 5 of his movies. One being, THE RULES OF THE GAME, which I watched and loved!
Now, I have to get IKIRU asap. It is one of those classic Kurosawa films that I never got around to. I adore RAN and HIGH AND LOW, along with all the other classics. If this is half as good as those (and it looks like it is based on your shot analysis) I can add it to my list of Criterion Collection’s on my shelf.
Great post by the way. I love this.
Joe, I think that “Ikiru” is every bit the movie as “Ran” and “High and Low”, and I’m sure you’ll love it.
“Rules of the Game” is fabulous, isn’t it? You can watch it time and again and still see new things.