Following World War II, a retired professor approaching his autumn years finds his quality of life drastically reduced in war-torn Tokyo. Denying despair, he pursues writing and celebrates h... Read allFollowing World War II, a retired professor approaching his autumn years finds his quality of life drastically reduced in war-torn Tokyo. Denying despair, he pursues writing and celebrates his birthday with his adoring students.Following World War II, a retired professor approaching his autumn years finds his quality of life drastically reduced in war-torn Tokyo. Denying despair, he pursues writing and celebrates his birthday with his adoring students.
- Awards
- 6 wins & 4 nominations
- Amaki
- (as Jôji Tokoro)
- Directors
- Akira Kurosawa
- Ishirô Honda(uncredited)
- Writers
- Ishirô Honda(uncredited)
- Akira Kurosawa
- Hyakken Uchida
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaFinal film of both Akira Kurosawa and Ishirô Honda.
- GoofsThe story depicts Professor Hyakken's 60th birthday toward the end of World War II (1943-1945). But he was born in 1889; thus, he turned 60 years old in 1949.
- Quotes
Professor Hyakken Uchida: Gentlemen, today's my last day for me to be called "professor." As of today, I am resigning my professorship. Somehow, my writings have found a market. I can make a living off them. That's not to say - that I dislike teaching. But as they say, "He who chases two hares catches neither." So, I am quitting teaching.
Takayama: Professor. Even if you quit, you'll still be our professor. My dad graduated from this school, and so did his friends. To this day they still call you Professor. They also say you're pure gold.
Professor Hyakken Uchida: Pure gold?
Takayama: A lump of gold with no impurities. I guess they mean you're a true professor. You're our German professor, but I feel you've taught us a lot of other very valuable lessons.
- ConnectionsFeatured in Kurosawa: The Last Emperor (1999)
- SoundtracksL'ESTRO ARMONICO Op. II, Concert No 1 in D Major, RV 230
Music by Antonio Vivaldi
Performed by Solisti Veneti (as I Solisti Veneti)
Conducted by Claudio Scimone
Courtesy of ERARO DISQUES S.A.
The professor is Hyakken Uchida (Tatsuo Matsumara, his first film for Kurosawa), and he's based on a real professor, who wrote many books and was also much beloved in Japan. There's no real story here, per-say, at least when comparing it to the tight structures of the director's bulk of work. It's a series of vignettes showing how, upon retiring from teaching, his students become his best friends and most ardent supporters through good and bad times. This includes his home being destroyed during WW2, attaining a new home (and the problems with that, at first), and also in the most tragic section of the picture when he loses his cat. The latter of these almost had me in tears, which is a little crazy as I almost never (sans Umberto D) feel emotionally tugged and pulled over a pet problem in a story. But by this point in the film there's been so much that's happened in the side of sweetness and joy with Uchida- his yearly celebration thrown by his students that involves revelry and drinking and songs and all that- as well as the great bits of wisdom and nuance, that this comes as an unfathomable shock. And it's in due really to how Tatsumara plays it, how the character is completely believable in having this intense vulnerability on the flip-side of his kindness and humility, and Kurosawa's tact with this story in general. It ranks up there with the best emotional scenes in Ikiru.
But for the most part, Madadayo is a serene near-masterpiece of moods, and the primary mood here is that on the other side of despair, as Sartre once put it, life begins. Even through losing his house and seeing the rubble all around him, and the emotional crisis with the cat, Kurosawa's primary strengths here are in getting the little details perfect, the student characters that (perhaps a little underdeveloped) are totally indebted to the professor and love him like a kind of Sensai. The big 60th birthday celebration contains such little details sewn in, like the one character who wont stop naming the train-stations as everyone else around him sings and dances and gives speeches in revelry, and in its own minor-key way is like a supreme sequence to rank with Kurosawa's other major sequences in his films. There's also the little asides that show early on that Uchida is not just a conventional-lovable old man, but very intelligent and with an intuition that strikes to the core of matters. I also loved the moment when he says that if one isn't afraid of the dark, there's a defect in that person, without the side of imagination.
Meanwhile, Kurosawa guides this work of two-thirds happiness and one-third sorrow in a very personal tone, as if he meditated on each scene before going into the cutting room. Rarely does he falter in getting the emotional notes right, even the sappy ones, and he gets from Uchida a fully rounded performance. He also decides to leave his film- with children in Uchida's dream doing the 'Not Yet' game- with one of his most staggeringly beautiful compositions (maybe an all-time great closing shot too). As I mentioned, I'm not even sure if Kurosawa knew this would be his last film, but he makes it as a light-hearted, humorous yet serious tome on living peacefully, loving both people and animals (feel the chill in the room when the character mentions skinning cats), and it's enlightening in how facing death is shown as a sign of the ultimate, superlative strength.
- Quinoa1984
- Feb 6, 2007
- How long is Madadayo?Powered by Alexa
Details
Box office
- Budget
- $11,900,000 (estimated)
- Gross worldwide
- $596
- Runtime2 hours 14 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.85 : 1