Rashomon, Film Analysis.
...s of the husband. The scene showing the wife fainting and waking to find the dagger she had been holding in the chest of her husband seems unreliable. One may believe that the wife fainted, but to believe that she stabbed her husband with enough force and precision to kill him when she fainted is a bit incredible, though it is plausible. In this instance, the scene shows the faint, and the husband dead with dagger protruding, but does not show that the wife was responsible for this. It is entirely possible that someone else killed the husband. One must ask though, why would the wife claim responsibility if she was unsure? No credible answer is evident so we must conclude that the wife is telling the truth, albeit her version of such. The wife’s story, as narrated by the priest, is an example of words and images being equally credible, and supporting each other. The story of the woodcutter, told by the woodcutter himself, (the only witness not directly involved) should be the most reliable and credible of any of the stories, as it is told in first person by an eyewitness. However there is a possibility that he is concealing his theft of the dagger, the murder weapon in the wife’s and the husbands story (both narrated by the priest). That the dagger is conspicuously absent in the story of the woodcutter and the bandit, (whose story is also narrated by the woodcutter) seems to cast an air of suspicion on the words of the woodcutter. (Richie, ‘Rashomon’) The idea of the woodcutter lying to conceal his theft is supported specifically by two scenes; the scene at the trial, where the husband is speaking through the medium and mentions the removal of the dagger. The woodcutter can be seen in the background looking distinctly agitated, and this would be reasonable if he had stolen the dagger and did not wish for it to be pointed out. The other scene that supports this theory is when the priest, woodcutter and commoner are together, and the commoner hypothesizes that the woodcutter has stolen the dagger. This scene shows the woodcutter refuting the accusation, but the commoner is unconvinced, and the agitated movements of the woodcutter undermine his efforts at denial. The story told by the woodcutter, despite the possibility of his being an unreliable narrator, is credible. The first premise we must take into account in the story of the husband, is that the dead can communicate with the living through a ‘medium’. Even if one can accept this as fact, we may still consider this to be an unreliable narrative. The priest, (who is the storyteller for this version) may be telling the truth as believes he heard it, but this does not make him reliable. If one does not believe in the powers of the medium, then the whole story may be discounted as a complete fabrication. In terms of credibility, the story of the husband is plausible (though to a lesser extent than the other versions). The scene that shows the husband overcome with emotion, and eventually stabbing himself with the dagger is plausible, perhaps he did love his wife, and felt guilt for not being able to save her from the bandit. However, his previous words do not lead one to believe that this is the case. The husband (albeit through the medium) says that he was willing to forgive the bandit for the rape of his wife, when the bandit offers to kill her for insisting that the bandit kill her husband. These are surely not the words of a man who will later kill himself out of grief or even shame; these are the words of a man who wants his audience to believe that he has acted honourably. The scene with the medium whirling around to the accompaniment of wind and speaking in a voice obviously not her own, while very ‘otherworldly’, is incredible. Even if one believes in the communicating dead, the actions of the medium seem to be overly theatrical, and therefore suspect. In a general sense, the husband’s story is credible, but specific to this case, the words and images seem to be at odds with each other, which makes the entire story seem unreliable. Finally, we come to the bandit’s story, as narrated by the woodcutter. Again we have the trouble of reliability, the woodcutter-as mentioned previously- may have reason to lie, and even though the priest was also present at the trial we may not assume that he would correct the woodcutter if he lied. If the woodcutter is reliable ...