Variety ran what is obviously a press release sent to them by Harbor Light Entertainment saying they were going to make an Americanized bastardization of Akira Kurosawa’s Rashomon, which will move the original story from ancient Japan to contemporary America, where a court must decide the facts about the rape of a woman and the murder of her husband.
The Kurosawa original is considered a classic and was well ahead of its time using its flashback techniques (none of which agreed with the other), by winning the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, moving on to win the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film and inspiring such films as The Usual Suspects, Basic and Reservoir Dogs. The idea of moving this film from ancient Japan into the courtrooms of America is just ridiculous and Harbor Lights knows that. I wouldn’t even be surprised if this is the last we hear of this flick, at least in terms of a major theatrical release.
This isn’t the first time Harbor Lights has tried this. They first announced this idea back in 2001 and couldn’t get it to move forward and now they are saying it will be out by 2010. Now they have collaborative backers, but no director named and not even a script is mentioned.
Just forget about this one and take the time to watch the original, which is actually available online right here.
