Ikiru Blu-ray

Release Year: 1952

Runtime: 143 min

Director: Akira Kurosawa

Cast: Takashi Shimura, Haruo Tanaka, Nobuo Kaneko, Bokuzen Hidari, Miki Odagiri

Studios: TOHO

Kanji Watanabe is a middle-aged man who has worked in the same monotonous bureaucratic position for decades. Learning he has cancer, he starts to look for the meaning of his life.

Special Features:

New, restored 4K digital transfer, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack

Audio commentary from 2003 by Stephen Prince, author of The Warrior's Camera: The Cinema of Akira Kurosawa.

A Message from Akira Kurosawa: For Beautiful Movies (2000)

A ninety-minute documentary produced by Kurosawa Productions and featuring interviews with the director.

Documentary on Ikiru from 2003

Created as part of the Toho Masterworks series Akira Kurosawa: It Is Wonderful to Create and featuring interviews with Kurosawa, script supervisor Teruyo Nogami, writer Hideo Oguni, actor Takashi Shimura, and others.

Trailer

New English subtitle translation.

PLUS

An essay by critic and travel writer Pico Iyer and a reprint from critic Donald Richie’s 1965 book The Films of Akira Kurosawa.

Technical Specifications:

• 4K digital transfer
• Uncompressed monaural soundtrack
• Aspect ratio 1.37:1