Ichiban Utsukushiku (1944)
Genre: Action / Drama
Duration: 85 minuten
Alternative titles: The Most Beautiful / 一番美しく
Country:
Japan
Directed by: Akira Kurosawa
Stars: Takashi Shimura, Takako Irie and Shôji Kiyokawa
IMDb score:
5,6 (2.769)
Releasedate: 13 April 1944
This movie is not available on US streaming services.
Ichiban Utsukushiku plot
The stories of several young women who work in a precision instrument factory during World War II. Despite illness, injuries and personal problems, the women persist in their task, committed to their work and their country.
Actors and actresses
Chief Goro Ishida
Soichi Yoshikawa, Chief of General Affairs Section
Ken Shinda, Chief of Labor Section
Noriko Mizushima, dorm mother
Tsuru Watanabe, president of women workers
Yuriko Tanimura, vice president of women workers
Sachiko Yamazaki
Fusae Nishioka
Asako Suzumura
Masako Koyama
Reviews & comments
Roger Thornhill
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- 6070 messages
- 2476 votes
Propaganda indeed, but made by a director who saw how passionately his compatriots worked in that extreme crisis situation to avert the impending defeat, and although he had no affinity with Japanese militarism, he could sympathize with the (misguided) idealistic efforts , much as Steve Earle criticizes US military actions in the Middle East, but not the deployed soldiers. Or were there even at that time critical viewers who saw right through the (in our eyes absurd and offensive) hammering on all patriotic slogans? But that may be hoping too much.
The film itself is sometimes moving, sometimes a bit overdone, but still quite fascinating until the end, with effective use of many close-ups, and towards the end a short trip to a snowbound village that gives the viewer a glimpse of a different reality. The closing scene, mentioned earlier, with the woman whose watery eyes prevent her from looking through her microscope is beautiful. Because of the closeness between cast and crew during the filming, Kurosawa wrote in his autobiography, "The most beautiful is not a major picture, but it is the one dearest to me."
Translated from Dutch · View original
mjk87 (moderator films)
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- 14602 messages
- 4554 votes
I think the least Kurosawa in the end. Not so much that this is propaganda. I don't care much about that and K. also takes a pretty positive subject in that regard. Well, as a movie, this thing is kind of a failure. Certainly the first part that should be more like a documentary in which characters say things precisely to convey information. Completely fake and poorly acted. After that, the drama predominates, but the film does not rise above that first part. Kurosawa's compositions are still okay, but visually there's not much interesting in them either. 1.5*.
Translated from Dutch · View original
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