Spotlight: Kiyoshi Kurosawa

[Roland Domenig]

I am a little bit irritated by the recent craze about Kurosawa Kiyoshi. 
I appreciate some (but not all) of his films and he is definitely of the
most prolific filmmakers in contemporary Japanese cinema but I wouldn't
go as far as to call him "the probably most influential" one. 
I wonder if he really is that influential on the younger generation of
filmmakers. Isn't it rather the Hasumi-school that is influencing them.
Kurosawa seems to have been strongly influenced by Hasumi, who, as far
as I have heard once, was one of his teachers. Someone on the list might
know more about this. I'd appreciate to hear some comments. 

As for the programm of the Toronto Festival I am a little disappointed
because it is almost identical with the one of the last Hong Kong
Festival. I had hoped they  will include more of the older films, like
Chigoku no keibiin, Door III or Kandagawa inran senso.   

Roland Domenig
Institute for Japanese Studies
Vienna University