Kurosawa's 'Cure' - A truly haunting film streaming on the Criterion Channel
Kiyoshi Kurosawa's 1997 breakout hit grows better with age.
Japan 1997, 111 mins | Crime, Horror, Mystery | Starring: Kôji Yakusho, Masato Hagiwara, Tsuyoshi Ujiki, Anna Nakagawa | Written and directed by: Kiyoshi Kurosawa| Prod. Company: Daiei Studios; distributed by Janus Films.
Now streaming on: Criterion Channel
Reasons to check it out on Criterion
Luckily for cinephiles looking to fill blind spots underserved by the major streamers, the Criterion Channel curates an extensive archive with new collections of cinema gems added monthly. If you’re saturated by the “YouTube canon” of Scorsese, Nolan, Fincher, Tarantino, et al, head over to Criterion. There you’ll find rare gems like Kurosawa’s Cure, a haunting modern cult classic. As well you’re likely to find many other titles ready to remind you of cinema’s once mighty power to move and capture your imagination.
Another bonus is that Cure is ready to view along with a full complement of extra features. If you’re new to the channel or have let your subscription lapse, they offer a two-week free trial. A monthly sub is roughly equivalent to three digital rentals, or in the case of Cure, one-third of the price of buying the Bluray. In other words, you can gain its value in a single watch or by streaming three movies a month.
If you’re in Toronto, you may even spy over time, as I have, that TIFF’s regular programming often mirrors releases on Criterion, there, however, you’ll only see one movie for the monthly price of subscribing while incurring transportation costs and exorbitant popcorn fees. Additionally, if the film is programmed as part of Cinematique good luck even getting a ticket.
(N.B. I receive no sponsorship from Criterion, I wish!)
A cinema gem
Diving into Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Cure on a blind watch, I found it truly haunting.
If you’re new to the film or haven’t seen it recently you may be wondering what makes Cure so good. Essentially, its mesmeric power is undeniable. On top of that, it casts a lasting spell. Kurosawa (no relation to the renowned Akira) has created that elusive cinematic concoction well-intentioned filmmakers strive for, a film that grips and haunts the viewer in ever-escalating intensity leaving them spellbound. A sublime act Kurosawa achieves with this enigmatic, four-letter word titled detective mystery, Cure.
Mood and tone over story
For its narrative hook, Cure leans on a reliable crime drama trope: a detective hunting for a killer. In this story, detective Kenichi Takabe played with sublime restraint by Kôji Yakusho masks years of emotional scars suffered from his necessary involvement with the dark side of humanity. The toll of this is causing a disintegration of his marriage. Strangely there is also a parallel descent into madness by his otherwise healthy wife. On the job, which he never gets a break from, Takabe faces a baffling murder mystery that teases the key to restoring order in his life—should he be able to solve its enigma before himself unravelling. Unlike most procedural crime thrillers where the outcome is a foregone conclusion, in Cure the tension of whether his suspect will outwit and overpower Takabe truly keeps us hooked.
Kurosawa’s story hook for Cure has his weathered detective burdened with a string of serial killings with no defining motive. They appear to be committed by random citizens with no connection to each other. Kurosawa’s curiosity as a filmmaker was to investigate what would happen if your neighbour turned out to be a heinous murderer. Takabe’s investigation leads to a suspect who seems to wield a malevolent force.
Takabe becomes obsessed with this person as his own life begins to unravel. His wife is in therapy. Her detachment is growing increasingly taxing on him. The gruesome murders that continue only make matters worse. Then there’s that tumble drier she runs on empty for the white noise. The electric bills alone must be eating away at his sanity. The theme is a prime example of how Kurosawa uses diegetic sound in expressive ways.
Later in the film, he scores an interrogation scene with the rumble of the tumble drier beneath. A technique used by David Fincher in Girl With The Dragon Tatoo. Fincher uses the whirring sound of the janitor’s floor polisher to trigger Lisbeth Salander’s dread. In Fincher’s film it is merely a coincidental conflation of sound supporting emotion. Kurosawa's use is built out of character. He employs the annoying tumble drier used by Takabe’s wife to cause unrest in his mind even when not in its presence.
Kurosawa's interest lies in the psychology of the everyman. He examines Detective Takabe's character through the lens of a working bureaucrat. One with the added burden of keeping the darkness of his job from his wife. His suffering in silence leads Takebe to seek a connection with his prime suspect Mamiya, the enigmatic amnesiac played by the attractive Masato Hagiwara. The cocktail of this character’s aloof behaviour and his mesmeric talents presents a form of detective catnip to Takabe with an allure he cannot shake. The cat-and-mouse game between the two leads to more questions than answers for Takabe, pushing him toward explosive frustration.
Throughout the process, Kurosawa’s camera creates an endless feast of elegant images. Hitchcock is clearly an influence. A macabre house replete with a translucent plastic shower curtain provides a pivotal location. His influences are re-interpreted with an elegance that never feels derivative. Instead, they are evocative with clear, austere design. The difference is that Kurosawa uses his gaze to reflect and mesmerize rather than shock and frighten for cheap thrills as so many schlocky Hitchcock imitators have done. Look no further than the Friday the 13th film series for a prime example. The result with Kurosawa is a sense of haunting that lingers beyond the film, well past its jagged etched frame overlayed on the end credits.
More so than anything, Cure is a triumph of mood and tone without sacrificing the story. It suggests so much through image alone but not by being in love with its elf visually. Its sound design, bravura cinematography, long takes with effective actor movement, and location work all come together through exceptional pacing to form its mesmeric power. Horrific acts are blunt and unglamorized, shocking in their precision. Punctuating action is relieved by stillness. Time gestates with the Takabe weaving through the narrative to take hold of the viewer.
Ultimately, I found Cure to be a breathtaking cinematic embrace that left me stunned by its creation, which struck me as exceedingly rare. Its evocative power likely surprised Kurosawa as well. The low-budget production was on too tight a timeline to create an intentional masterpiece. The fact that it stands the test of time as one, is a testament to a filmmaker with enough workmanlike talent to put his voice into a personal project. Cure remains a high watermark in his filmography.
Extras on Criterion
The nice thing about watching this film on the Criterion Channel is that they have generously included the full complement of extra features, usually only available on the DVD/Blu-ray purchase. There is a terrific interview with Kurosawa, conducted by breakout Japanese director Ryusuke Hamaguchi (Drive My Car). It’s an endearing one where the master is interviewed by his protege.
Hamaguchi asks Kurosawa to bring us back to the time when he was developing the film and how he was able to get it into production. I found the narrative around this satisfying. Even with a work as vaunted as this one it’s too easy to ascribe it to genius. As with any film, the practicalities of filmmaking dominate. Whatever results that get to be held up as rarified can just as easily be a product of pure happenstance. Kurosawa’s recollections support that this film was made with a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants ethic, without drawn-out deliberations to make it a work of genius.
It turns out Kurosawa had been cranking out straight-to-DVD movies for the video store rental market at a pace of six movies per year! Wow, that’s quite a pace. The films were Yakusa-style gangster riffs. The company he was making them for went under. He then approached another to pitch them parts three and four of a popular title. On the sly, he mentioned he happened to have a personal side project up his sleeve. As it turns out, they were more interested in this rather than more iterations of a B-Movie. They asked him to make this instead. And hence, Cure was then born.
Similarly, in the production of the film a brevity, run-and-gun, don’t-over-think-it approach was taken, leading to what is now hailed as a masterpiece by the likes of Bong Joon-Ho and Martin Scorsese. I like this narrative because it demystifies the process and supplants the genius label with hard work, repetition, inspiration, and a go-for-broke ethic. That’s not to say there isn’t genius at work. It just allows for the concept of inspiration achieved through perspiration rather than the divine.
All that aside, the funny thing for me is when I watch this film, I can’t help but feel I’m in the hands of a genius. I take comfort in the revelation that it was a go-for-broke attitude coupled with a resume of work that brought such a lasting cinematic gem into being. Do yourself a favour and get haunted by it as soon as possible.
Conclusion
A must-watch international modern classic that haunts with an enduring spell, likely inspiring multiple viewings. An ecstatic high bar of cinema.
Rating
5/5
Trailer, if you must, but I’d recommend going in blind. This one at least doesn’t spoil much:
Click here or on the image below for the trailer on the Criterion Channel
More resources on Cure:
Essay: Cure: Erasure by Chris Fujiwara, on Criterion.com
Video essay with spoilers: Creating The Scariest Non-Horror Film
A bootleg of the Hamagachi interview:
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