Andrew Sorbo

One of the greatest and most influential films of the middle of the 20th century. Unlike most flashback films, this one puts a burden on the audience to view 4 versions of whether and how a murder took place. It asks basic questions in human psychology: can we ever really know THE TRUTH? Is anyone free from unconscious biases? Or even free of self-serving renditions of what one actually “saw”? Would anyone admit to a crime that he/she did not commit? And if so, why? Kurosawa’s film forces us to think about these and other uncomfortable questions while giving us no simple flashback with a neat and tidy conclusion.