The Warrior's Camera - The Cinema of Akira Kurosawa

With a career stretching from the chaos of war-torn Japan to the current power and prosperity of his country, the great Japanese film director Akira Kurosawa has been intrnationally acclaimed as a giant of world cinema . Rashomon helped ignite Western interest in the Japanese cinema, and Seven Samurai and Yojimbo remain enormously popular both in Japan and abroad. Providing a new and comprehensive look at this master film maker, The Warrior's Camera probes the complex visual structure of Kurosawa's work. 

Beside a Burning Sea

It’s the fall of 1942, and the U.S. hospital ship Benevolence is cruising the waters of the South Pacific when it is torpedoed by the Japanese. Only nine people survive, and they eventually wash up on an island: the captain Joshua, and his wife, Isabelle, a nurse; Isabelle’s sister Annie and a woman named Scarlet, both nurses; Ratu, a teenage Fijian stowaway; Jake, a black engineer; Nathan and Roger, two officers; and Akira, a wounded Japanese soldier. The group knows it’s only a matter of time before the Japanese war machine reaches their shores, so they valiantly prepare for battle. As they do so, each man and woman struggles with his or her own personal demons.