Akahige = Red beard (Cinemascope Print)

Japan, 1965

Film
Please note

Sorry, we don't have images or video for this item.

Under the guidance of an aging, autocratic doctor, an arrogant, socially ambitious new intern learns the rewards of treating the poor in a public health clinic in this social drama that followed ‘Sanjuro’, the final film in Kurosawa’s samurai trilogy. While vaguely cyclical the complex narrative lacks a clear over-riding structure. Rather, it is purposely amorphous, full of incident and detail, sentiment and poetic fantasy. The film took over two years to shoot with Kurosawa going to painstaking lengths to achieve a realistic reconstruction of 19th-century feudal Japan. Also available on 16mm.

Credits: Producers, Tomoyuki Tanaka, Ryuzo Kikushima ; director, Akira Kurosawa ; writers, Akira Kurosawa, Ryuzo Kikushima, Hideo Iguni, Masato Ide ; photography, Asaichi Nakai, Takao Saito ; music, Masaru Sato.
Cast: Toshiro Mifune, Yuzo Kayama, Tsutomu Yamazaki, Kyoko Kagawa, Terumi Niki, Kamatari Fujiwara.

Content notification

Our collection comprises over 40,000 moving image works, acquired and catalogued between the 1940s and early 2000s. As a result, some items may reflect outdated, offensive and possibly harmful views and opinions. ACMI is working to identify and redress such usages.

Learn more about our collection and our collection policy here. If you come across harmful content on our website that you would like to report, let us know.

How to watch

This work has not been digitised and is currently unavailable to view online. It may be possible for approved reseachers to view onsite at ACMI.

Learn more about accessing our collection

Collection

In ACMI's collection

Credits

director

Akira Kurosawa

producer

Ryuzo Kikushima

Tomoyuki Tanaka

production company

Kurosawa Productions

Toho Kabushiki Kaisha

Duration

03:10:00:00

Production places
Japan
Production dates
1965

Collection metadata

Please note: this archive is an ongoing body of work. Sometimes the credit information (director, year etc) isn’t available so these fields may be left blank; we are progressively filling these in with further research.

Cite this work on Wikipedia

If you would like to cite this item, please use the following template: {{cite web |url=https://acmi.net.au/works/115697--akahige-red-beard-cinemascope-print/ |title=Akahige = Red beard (Cinemascope Print) |author=Australian Centre for the Moving Image |access-date=20 June 2025 |publisher=Australian Centre for the Moving Image}}