Another one off the “before I die” list.
When I was 16, Akira Kurosawa’s movie Ran came out. Being an artsy girl, I naturally wanted to see it with the artsy boy I was dating. We both loved film. However, we were both also teenagers, so when we actually met at the theater to see it… we wound up going elsewhere and necking (just necking!) in a parked car. I don’t remember if it was his idea or my idea. I really did want to see the movie, but hormones will be hormones.
When I got home that night, my mother was awake but in bed. As I got ready to go to sleep, she called through the wall separating our bedrooms that she had had to leave in the middle when she saw it (that’s reasonable, it runs almost three hours) and she wanted to know if the old man died.
Frozen like a deer in headlights, I said something like, “Uh, I really don’t remember. I think so?”
This was clearly a bogus response. The old man was the central character in the film, and if I’d seen it, there’s no possible way I wouldn’t have remembered. To this day, I don’t know if it was an innocent question or if she was suspicious and asked to see if she could catch me out. (Mom reads my blog, so if she even remembers this, maybe she’ll tell me.) A very unpleasant conversation through the bedroom wall followed, with my mother justifiably angry that I’d lied and me feeling miserable and apologetic. I was a pretty good kid, overall, so parental disapproval was very upsetting. Damn you, hormones!
Anyway. I saw other Kurosawa films, but never did get around to actually seeing Ran before it left theaters. I always wanted to, because I really like Kurosawa and because at some point it seemed ridiculous that I still hadn’t seen it after all that turmoil.
So now I’ve seen it. And I’m glad I did. Two thumbs up. And I get to mark it off of my “things to do before I die” list so it won’t bother me anymore. So today, that’s definitely one in the “win” column!
