STRAY DOG, about a rookie homicide detective named Murakami (Toshiro Mifune) searching for his stolen gun in 1949 Tokyo, is the first great film directed by Akira Kurosawa and is equally superb as a riveting detective thriller, a painstaking police procedural, and a sociological study of
the moral and economic conditions of postwar Japan. Kurosawa consciously follows the model of Hollywood films noirs, with lots of moody low-key lighting and the depiction of a morally ambiguous "hero's" descent into the underbelly of society, and as Murakami becomes immersed in his obsessive quest
(a favorite Kurosawa theme), the homeless and unemployed, the defeated soldiers, and ...
Released:
1949
Rated:
NR
Length:
122 mins