The Bad Sleep Well

One of Kurosawa’s most underrated works, this powerful tale of corporate corruption and conspiracy could be torn from today’s headlines; it is often described as Kurosawa’s Hamlet. Toshiro Mifune plays Nishi, the apparently meek private secretary of a ruthless corporate president. When Nishi marries the boss’s daughter, it proves to be part of a complicated scheme to avenge the suspicious death of his father, officially ruled a suicide, some five years before. Masterfully shot in CinemaScope, the film opens with a bravura wedding sequence that has “a brilliancy unparalleled even in Kurosawa” (Donald Richie). Francis Ford Coppola has called The Bad Sleep Well “better than Shakespeare . . . The first thirty minutes seem to me as perfect as any film I have ever seen.” “An intricate revenger’s tragedy that doubles as a critique of corporate corruption . . . The film has its longueurs, but Mifune’s buttoned-down avenger is a compelling portrait of righteous obsession foundering on unpredictable reality” (Ed Park, Village Voice). “Samurai capitalism . . . a prophetic indictment of Japan’s cutthroat, feudalistic approach to business . . . One of Kurosawa’s finest achievements” (James Monaco). B&W, 35mm, in Japanese with English subtitles. 151 mins.