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The Lower Depths (1957)DramaRating 61/100

One of Akira Kurosawa’s darkest, most uncompromising films, this by turns bleak and blackly comic adaptation of Maxim Gorky’s social-realist play transplants the story to nineteenth-century Japan, where the residents of a squalid boardinghouse navigate love, tragedy, and the conflict between their illusions and harsh reality. Making maximal use of the theatrical, claustrophobic setting and a powerhouse ensemble cast headed by Toshiro Mifune and Isuzu Yamada, Kurosawa channels Japan’s postwar disillusionment into a howl of existential angst.

Cast: Toshirō Mifune, Isuzu Yamada, Kyōko Kagawa, Ganjirō Nakamura II, Minoru Chiaki, Kamatari Fujiwara, Akemi Negishi

Director: Akira Kurosawa