the encyclopedic entry of Dodesukaden

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Dodesukaden

is a film by Akira Kurosawa set in a Japanese rubbish dump in the period immediately following World War II. The film focuses lives of a variety of characters who happen to live in a dump. The first one introduced is a mentally retarded boy who pretends to be a tram conductor by following a set route through the dump in an imaginary tram that he mimes. The film title refers to a traditional Japanese onomatopoeia for the sound made by a tram or train while in motion ("Do-desu-ka-den do-desu-ka-den do-desu-ka-den"). The sound is made by the boy as he makes his daily faux-tram route through the dump. Dodesukaden was filmed on an actual dump in Tokyo.

This was Kurosawa's first color film, and he took full of advantage of the new color medium. After the success of Red Beard, it took Kurosawa five years before this film appeared. None of the actors from Kurosawa's stock company of the 1950's and 60's were in this film and most of the cast were relatively unknown. Dodesukaden was unlike anything that Kurosawa had made before, and was critically panned in Japan despite earning an Academy Award Nomination for Best Foreign Film in 1970. Dodesukaden was Kurosawa's first financial failure and came during the worst possible time in his life. When Dodesukaden was filmed Kurosawa had been going through a lull in his career and personal life - he was finding it increasingly difficult to obtain finance despite the critical and financial success of his previous films, and rumors about his deteriorating mental health only made matters worse. Dodesukaden was only made by the cooperation and co-producing of three other Japanese directors, Kinoshita, Kobayashi, and Ichikawa.

The critical failure of Dodesukaden sent Kurosawa into a deep depression, and in 1971 he attempted suicide. Despite having slashed himself over 30 times with a razor, Kurosawa survived his suicide; however, he would not return to filmmaking for five years, releasing Dersu Uzala in 1975.