Max Everest

An incredibly genuine and holistic view of the life of the greatest director to ever do it, from his very beginnings in an old Samurai family to the release and international acclaim of Rashōmon, Kurosawa lays his life, his beliefs however enthusiastic or despairing, and his filmmaking philosophy bare - giving invaluable insight to the screenwriting, dubbing, directing process - while remaining humourous, entertaining, and fast paced throughout.

I haven't been so excited to read a passage of a book in years, from "Ready, Start!" right to the end as he gives anecdotes and advice from each of his early films - with a lovely chunk dedicated to how "strangely attractive" Toshirō Mifune is!

Moreover, this book provides an incredible resource for discovering older Japanese directors/actors/cinematographers and films as each name or film is given with enough information to grow my Letterboxd watchlist exponentially, with key names such as Yamamoto Kajiro, Hashimoto Shinobu, and Uekusa Keinosuke.

While it is a shame Kurosawa's "Something Like an Autobiography" doesn't extend far beyond 1951, and with some chapters pertaining to his less essential work such as Sugata Sanshiro Part 2 having less than I personally hoped for in terms of anecdotes or fury at the Japanese Interior Censorship Board (though there is plenty of that here!), I think the message he ends on with this, "There is nothing that says more about the creator than the work itself" and the amazing subsequent Notes on Filmmaking make up for this absense.

An essential read for any film buff!