The importance of "Dream" as Kurosawamin's proud work in his later years is beyond doubt. What kind of dreams echoed in the heart of this lonely old man who had committed suicide many times when his life went to death? Perhaps this dream is not just a personal dream of Emperor Kurosawa, it is a dream of humankind's yesterday and tomorrow.
The first dream: The fox marries a daughter. According to
Japanese folklore, when the sun rains, it is the fox marrying. The mother warned her children not to go out in this weather, so as not to anger the fox. The child ran alone into the forest with towering ancient trees, and saw a human-shaped fox marrying the team in the smoke. As soon as the child returned to the door, his mother told him that the fox had already come and left a "rib" (dagger).
"Seeing things that shouldn't be seen, our family can't keep you." Because he knowingly violated the fox's taboo, he must commit suicide by caesarean section to apologize, or go to the fox to ask the fox for their forgiveness. The child is going to ask for forgiveness, and the fox's home is under the rainbow. So the child walked down in front of the world with sun, rain, forest, rainbow and flowers...
If dreams are the unconscious catharsis of human desires, then Kurosawamin in this story at least reveals his subconscious questioning of human suffering-humanity Why would you die? Moreover, human beings need to endure all kinds of suffering when they die in the world. Where and what is the source of death and suffering? How can human beings escape death and suffering?
In Japanese creation mythology, the two gods Iyenaki and Iyenami were ordered by the gods to give birth to the Japanese islands and then to the gods such as stones, soil, rivers and seas, water, and fog. In the end, Yenami was burned to death because of the fire god, so Iyenaki was angry and killed the fire god. The death of Iyenami can be regarded as the earliest record of suffering in the Japanese creation myth. But Japanese mythology does not explore the source of suffering. But Kurosawamin’s taboo on foxes is very similar to the taboo on the tree of good and evil from God’s self-revelation.
"Genesis" records: "Jehovah God commanded him to say that you can eat the fruit of all the trees in the garden. You can only eat the fruit of the tree that distinguishes good and evil. You must not eat it, because you will die the day you eat it. ( Chapter 1 verses 16-17)” But because humans violated God’s command to "not eat the fruits of the tree to distinguish between good and evil", humans have since fallen into a situation where they are just as mortal as a boy peeking at a fox’s marriage. What makes me even more surprised is that Kurosawamin proposed that the remedy for human crimes lies in "asking for forgiveness", which is very similar to the way of salvation provided by the Bible for mankind. Therefore, Jesus Christ had to die on the cross and use himself as a way of salvation. The sacrifice asked God the Father for forgiveness. For this reason, I couldn't help but associate "Dream" with the Bible.
The second dream and the third dream: Peach Blossom Little Demon and Snow Girl
on March 3rd "Peach Puppet Festival", Taro always sees another girl in the room who is invisible to others. Who is this beautifully dressed girl and why not invite herself? Taro decided to chase the girl to find out.
It turns out that this girl is a peach blossom little demon. Because of the Peach Puppet Festival, people have cut down all the peach trees, and the peach trees that have been cut down are crying. Taro also wept in distress over the felled peach tree, and the peach blossom transformed into a human form in the dim eyes of tears gave the final Noh performance amidst the flying peach blossoms and the dense peach forest. Taro suddenly saw the peach blossom demon hidden among the peach blossoms. When Shima Taro ran closer, he saw only the stump with resin remaining. Vaguely, one could still hear the sound of the little girl's foot bells fading away...
and the third dream was related to the legend of the "Snow Girl" in Japanese tradition. Tired climbers were struggling in the blizzard and heavy fog. They trudged on the way to the camp, and their heavy breathing was also full of pressure.
"Night is coming!"
"This blizzard will never stop! What is waiting for us is death!"
Everyone was too sleepy, and finally couldn't bear to fall into the blizzard one after another. Then there came the Snow Girl in the ice and snow, and covered the climbers with feather blankets, and constantly comforted them: "Snow is warm. Ice is hot."
But one of the climbers heard the sound of howling wind and snow! "Can't sleep! If you fall asleep, you will die!" He suddenly woke up in his dream and pushed the Snow Girl away...The snowstorm subsided gradually, and the sound of a horn came from outside the mountain. The camp was close at hand, and they saw the red flag of hunting.
If the second and third dreams are regarded as the continuation of the first dream, then these two dreams are the consequences of Kurosawamin's discussion of the taboo of human infringement. Because of the violation of taboos, human beings facing death cannot continue to live in harmony, but continue to repeat the ruins of destruction and retaliation. The dream of "Peach Blossom Little Demon" has sentimental emotions, because human beings destroy nature for their own selfish desires, just as the first thing after Adam and Eve's crime is to destroy nature. After mankind violated the taboo, nature no longer works for mankind, instead it has become a huge threat to mankind. Perhaps the original blizzard was a poignant sight for mankind, but now it has become a deadly enemy. I seem to hear Kurosawamin repeating: "...The earth will be cursed for your sake. You must work all your life to get food from the earth. (Genesis 3:17)" The
fourth dream The fifth dream: The tunnel and the Van Gogh
war are over, and the retired military officer passes through a dark tunnel on the way home. Death captured all the officers' subordinates, and he was the only survivor. In the tunnel came a dead soldier who did not admit his death, but in fact he had died in the arms of an officer during the war. The soldier looked at his home from a distance, crying and telling the officer to go home to honor his parents. The officer repeatedly proved that the soldier was dead, and he reluctantly walked back into the dark tunnel.
But the story did not end. Immediately afterwards, all the third squadrons that were killed also lined up from the tunnel in neat steps. The captain reported to the officer—"The third squadron reported to the lieutenant general! No death!" The living and the dead have lost their boundaries here, and the living and the dead meet in this tunnel. The deceased did not think they had all died in battle, but the officers lived a life of walking dead in the world. Or death is not gruesome, but the officer feels guilty because he did not die in the battle, "I have no face to see you for the rest of my life! I was captured!" Yes, the war is indeed over, but the wounds of the war are still torturing the living. .
As the deepest and most serious manifestation of human suffering, war and death caused by war occupy an absolute advantage in this dream. It entangles human beings like a ghost. It tortured the living and the dead in its devil's claws. The painful officer could not comfort his men, and in the end only ordered them to return to the darkness of the tunnel. After the team disappeared with the sound of their steps, the officer squatted on the ground in grief. The dog with the grenades rushed out again to pester the officer... When the
young painter was admiring Van Gogh's paintings in the art gallery, he walked into the world of Van Gogh's paintings. He found that Van Gogh, who had just come out of the mental hospital, hurriedly went to the field to sketch. Van Gogh burns his life like a sunflower under his own brush. In his eyes, the mission of the artist is to discover the beauty of nature. Beautiful nature alone is not enough. The artist needs to discover the beauty of nature. Show him.
But it is undeniable that because of human destruction, the natural environment is gradually disappearing irretrievably from our field of vision. Therefore, Van Gogh wanted to preserve the beautiful natural environment through art, just like the god hiding in the woman's womb in Japanese mythology, to escape the pain caused by the destruction of the beautiful environment. He said: "You have to paint by hand, and paint desperately, like a locomotive..." But history regrets to tell us that Van Gogh's desire did not preserve the beauty, but was engulfed by death.
"...You are dust, but you still have to return to dust. (Genesis Chapter 19)"
Sixth Dream Sixth and Seventh Dream: Red Mount Fuji and the Weeping Devil
Burnt Mount Fuji like an expressionist painting , Full of turbulence and turmoil.
The rioting crowds and the diffuse red and yellow smoke, people with nowhere to escape jumped into the sea to commit suicide... Mankind used proud science to create nuclear power plants, but the result was uncontrollable and devastating disasters. The continuous nuclear explosions have caused panic on the Japanese islands. Everyone fled to the beach but found that there was nowhere to escape. Kurosawamin also arranged that the designer of the nuclear power plant was also among the fleeing crowd, and committed suicide while facing the vast sea.
Science is of course a powerful tool for human development, but science will always only have tool value and no intrinsic value. If science itself one day acts as a reliance for mankind to face the unknown and boasting, then science may become another tower of Babel built by mankind in history. "They said, come on, we are going to build a city and a tower with the top of the tower reaching the sky, in order to preach our name so that we don’t get scattered all over the earth. (Genesis 11:4)" On
top of a ruin , Walking a traveler. Roses and dandelions that are deformed due to genetic nuclear contamination grow to more than two meters high, and their bodies are full of toxins. The traveler suddenly encountered an ogre. The ogre ran out in order not to be eaten by other ogres. Every ogre is painfully twisted in a pool of blood because it cannot survive and cannot die. This reminds me of the words in the book of Revelation: "In those days, people demanded death, and must not die. Willing to die, but death is far away. Avoid them. (Chapter 9 verse 6)" The ogre said that in a world devastated by nuclear weapons, all living things are poisoned by nuclear contamination created by humans, and occasionally they can see two-faced rabbits, one-eyed Birds and hairy fish.
The world the ogre tells us is not far away from mankind, maybe it will be tomorrow. This will be our future, this will be our world, and the same sad story is revealing the slightest chill in the marrow of Kurosawa's name. "These are the evil consequences of stupid human behavior!" What Kurosawamin is discussing is the paradox encountered in the development of human history-science brings progress while bringing disastrous consequences of modernization. This is a paradox that human beings have to face in the process of development. Human desire determines that it is impossible to retreat to a backward lifestyle, but the result of continuous development is doomed to the inevitable demise of mankind... It was the starting point for Kurosawamin to question in two or two dreams.
The eighth dream: the village of waterwheels.
Travelers have discovered a new world-the village of waterwheels.
There are vibrant, lush grasses, clear rivers, and watermills slowly turning with the water... The simple villagers maintain the simple way of life of the past, using firewood for cooking and waxing for lighting.
A centenarian talked to a traveler about life in Waterwheel Village and said that he used flowers to enshrine the death of a patient; “it should be dark at night, and it’s too bright to see the stars.” Because the night is dark, why should it be done? Like during the day? Charcoal is derived from fallen trees, which not only meets the needs of human beings, but also protects the lives of trees.
This old man who claimed to be a hundred and three years old and was working as a waterwheel in a straw hat went to the funeral with singing and dancing. The dead old woman was his first love. "But she let me fall in love, but she married someone else!" He laughed. Talking.
Many people think that Kurosawamin’s last dream expressed his hope to regain a good life by returning to nature. But I also think what Kurosawamin expresses is that humans must be able to return to the good life before they violated the taboo through the way of "asking for forgiveness". At the end of the nineteenth century, mankind was still cheering for the rapid development of science. As the Austrian writer Witzger described in his memoir "Yesterday's World", the world at that time was simply a "golden age", and the spirit of optimism permeated human society. But ten years later, the two world wars completely destroyed the self-righteous optimism of mankind. The morals, ethics and institutions established by mankind for thousands of years were all in ruins overnight. In despair, the Witzgers committed suicide by drinking bombs like Van Gogh. They could not bear the burden of living in this corrupt world.
Therefore, if there is no way of "asking for forgiveness," the world that has long been corrupted by human sins is by no means the destination for humans to return. It's not that Kurosawamin doesn't know that there can be no existence similar to the village of the waterwheel in the sinful human society, with a ruin that is just described as an ogre. Because of the hopelessness of the world on this shore, I believe that Kurosawa is looking forward to a place similar to the village of waterwheels, which is not on this shore.
The place where the person and the universe, man and nature, and man and man coexist in harmony can only be found on the other side. "These people died in faith, and did not receive the promise, but they saw it from a distance and greeted them with joy, and admitted that they were aliens and foreigners in the world. Those who say this are Show that you are looking for a hometown. (Hebrews Chapter 11 verses 13-14)"
September 4, 2007
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