Production History (Rashomon) Rashomon

Kurosawa adapted two Akutagawa short stories into a single screenplay

The film draws on two works by Ryunosuke Akutagawa: "In a Grove" (1922), which provides the contradictory testimonies about the murder, and "Rashomon" (1915), which provides the setting of the ruined gate and the frame story's tone of moral decay. Kurosawa co-wrote the screenplay with Shinobu Hashimoto while the two stayed at a ryokan in Atami. They worked in daily increments of roughly twenty pages, exchanging feedback with Kurosawa's friend Ishiro Honda — the future director of Godzilla (1954). (wikipedia)

"I like silent pictures and I always have. They are often so much more beautiful than sound pictures are. I wanted to restore some of this beauty. I thought of it, I remember, in this way: one of the techniques of modern art is simplification, and that I must therefore simplify this film." — Akira Kurosawa, Something Like an Autobiography (1982) (book, not available online)

Toho rejected the project; Daiei reluctantly picked it up

Kurosawa initially developed Rashomon at Toho, his regular studio, but both Toho and its financing company Toyoko rejected it as a financial risk — a period film with no stars in conventional roles and a plot that refused to resolve its own mystery. After Kurosawa completed Scandal (1950) for the Shochiku studio, producer Sojiro Motoki pitched Rashomon to Daiei Film. Daiei also turned it down initially, then agreed to produce and distribute. The studio's willingness was grudging at best. (wikipedia)

The budget was small and the sets were few

Budget reports vary: UNESCO reported 15 million yen (approximately $42,000 USD at 1950 exchange rates); other sources cite 20 million yen, with total production expenses reaching 35 million yen. Western estimates range as high as $140,000, roughly double the typical Japanese studio production of the era. The small budget restricted the film to three primary sets: the Rashomon gate, the forest, and the police courtyard. (wikipedia, deepfocusreview)

The Rashomon gate itself was the most expensive construction. Kurosawa insisted on building a full-scale reproduction in the square in front of Daiei's Kyoto studio, and the gate's cost pushed the production over its original estimate. The gate had to look ancient and half-collapsed — a ruin convincing enough to represent moral and social decay — while being structurally sound enough to shoot in and around for extended sequences in heavy artificial rain. (wikipedia)

Cast and crew lived together during the 41-day shoot

Principal photography ran from July 7 to August 17, 1950 — forty-one days, shot primarily in Kyoto. The cast and crew lived together at the studio during production, a communal arrangement that facilitated the intensive rehearsal and experimentation Kurosawa demanded.

Kurosawa originally wanted Setsuko Hara for the wife's role, but Hara declined due to opposition from her brother-in-law, filmmaker Hisatora Kumagai. Daiei recommended Machiko Kyo, and Kurosawa accepted after she shaved her eyebrows for a makeup test — a demonstration of commitment that persuaded him she could handle the role's emotional extremes. (wikipedia)

Miyagawa's cinematography broke a fundamental taboo

Cinematographer Kazuo Miyagawa's work on Rashomon is now considered one of the greatest achievements in black-and-white photography. Kurosawa himself declared:

"I think black-and-white photography reached its peak with that film." — Akira Kurosawa, as quoted in Color Culture

Miyagawa's most celebrated innovation was pointing the camera directly at the sun through the forest canopy — a technique considered taboo because it risked damaging equipment and overexposing film. The resulting images, with sunlight fragmenting through dense foliage, created the dappled, unstable light that became the film's visual signature: truth glimpsed through obstructions, never seen whole. (wikipedia)

Additional techniques included:

• Mirror reflection: Miyagawa used mirrors to bounce natural light onto actors' faces in the forest, avoiding the flatness of artificial fill light.
• Black-dyed rain: Black ink was mixed into the artificial rain to make water droplets visible against the sky, ensuring the rain read as weight and obstruction rather than disappearing into the frame.
• Triangular compositions: Shots were framed to emphasize the spatial and power relationships among the three central figures — bandit, wife, samurai — through triangular blocking.
• 407 shots: Donald Richie counted 407 separate shots in the film, "more than twice the number in the usual film," yet the editing is so seamless that the cuts never call attention to themselves.

(wikipedia, asianmoviepulse, deepfocusreview)

Hayasaka's bolero-like score provoked a plagiarism controversy

Composer Fumio Hayasaka scored the film using a recurring rhythmic pattern inspired by Maurice Ravel's "Bolero" — the same background rhythm and a similar orchestral build-up, but with distinct melodic lines. Kurosawa wanted a unifying musical structure to hold the four contradictory narratives together, and he specifically asked Hayasaka for a Bolero-like approach. Hayasaka created contrast by varying the solo instrument carrying the melody across the different testimonies. (wikipedia, moviemusicuk)

The resemblance provoked accusations of plagiarism, particularly after the film's French release. Bolero's publisher sent a letter of protest to Hayasaka. In late 1950, the Motion Picture Producers Association of Japan vetoed Rashomon from its selection list for the 4th Cannes Film Festival over copyright concerns — though the film went to Venice instead, where it won the Golden Lion. (wikipedia)

Musicological analysis has since distinguished Hayasaka's composition from Ravel's. Where Ravel uses a diatonic C major scale followed by C Phrygian, Hayasaka employs E Phrygian with a raised third (E Phrygian dominant scale), incorporating Japanese musical elements into the Western-inspired structure. (moviemusicuk)

Post-production was disrupted by fires and completed in a week

Editing took approximately one week, with Kurosawa serving as his own editor — a practice he maintained throughout his career. The process was delayed by two fires at the studio. Recording engineer Iwao Otani added Mifune's post-dubbed dialogue using different microphone equipment from the production recordings. (wikipedia)

Kurosawa employed transitional wipes — horizontal lines sweeping across the screen — as the primary editing device between scenes. These wipes, drawn from the vocabulary of silent cinema, would later influence George Lucas, who adopted the technique for the Star Wars films. (deepfocusreview)