Yay, bit late, but yaaay. I finally get to read these comments
(I snuck a look beforehand, but they didn't spoil nowt - just covered and whipped me with light-dappling branches, and intrigued me)
I'll start again...
Rashomon
Can't really add much to what's been said - and i'm gonna have to buy the blessed thing now, coz it so is worth multiple viewings
All i'll say is...
Brian/Slay's point that the Rashomon is actually an outer gate/first line of defence made me think of the lies that've been told. That seems to ring true as a theme for the film - the defensive purpose of lies - as much as the subjectivity that is also intimately involved.
lines's point about each scene being presented in ways that are not entirely modelled on the narrator's subjectivity is an intriguing one. I had a similar feeling at points - but looking back i feel each story does mirror the subject well. The woodcutters 'intro' walk could almost be seen as him getting caught up in the lie - a well meaning man finding himself entangled in a far-ranging problem, which envelops/over-awes him for a while. The thief is just, what can i say, a Mifune pirate-bravado display which works all the way. And on and on. I liked the way the wife got a lot of time weeping and sighing to the invisible judges as well - just as Mifune's image-projecting bad-boy did. It helped suggest a certain desire to 'present' themselves.
What a bizarre twist-n-turn the medium is tho. Felt almost like there was an neat little jab about the role of lies, pride and norms in religion there (just as there was in the law court too) - with both aspects given a second representation in the straight-arrow priest and the highly-subjective lawman too. I'm almost certainly adding too much symmetry here, but i like the way both religion and law have an inner world to protect as well, which may be defended by lies - but both can also be seen as groups that seek to overcome those human frailties and wiles.
Slay's comment about the husbands 'In the forest, i heard a weeping' just sums up that bizarre, isolated, tortured 'testimony'. And at this point i'd also say that the S's egos/victims-of-circumstance assessment of all the protagonists fits well n'all. Both aspects are in play.
I think, to stop myself, i'll just comment on Seds point about the way the peasant pulls the Rashomon gate apart so unreflectively. Seeing the gate now as a representation of our defensive lies, it makes sense that he does so - because for him lies are merely practical things - and perhaps he has no decent human aspect left to protect. He has been stripped of as much human frailty as possible already - what does he, the nihilist, care if his actions ultimately destroy his last hopes for warmth and sanctuary.
Or some such thing
Anyways, great movie
Oh, PS - i took the woodcutter's second tale to be the closest to the truth. He was standing more before the 'lawcourt' of his conscience at that moment - or at least, he was presenting his first case
Oh, and the baby - yeah - perhaps a bit too sweetly wrapped, amongst the rags - but ultimately it worked for me - with the woodcutters face leaving the priest sillouetted in the storm-dawn-lit gate.
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