Kubi — Takeshi Kitano [Japan Cuts ’24 Review]

Passion projects like Kubi almost always deserve greater appreciation and more careful interest than a mere evaluation of their qualitative values can merit. Takeshi Kitano has been mulling over the concept for his historical adaptation of the Honnō-ji incident for around 30 years — a true lifelong passion project. Entire sub-genres and cinematic universes have come and gone in the time that Kitano has been trying to make his complicated samurai epic, and for that film to finally arrive, a carefully directed opus with a preposterous abundance of artistic intentionality behind it, viewers would be wise to allow Kitano’s vision to overwhelm them as thoroughly as possible. Then and only then can one properly evaluate and appreciate such a passion.

Set right after Lord Oda Nobunaga (Ryo Kase) tries to unite Japan and the subsequent rebellion and disappearance of vassal Araki Murashige (Kenichi Endo), Kubi drops us into a chaotic world with too many rulers, too many allegiances, and too many lovers. New leaders come and go as late as 90 minutes into the two-hour film, forefronting the chaotic atmosphere that Oda was trying to tame in the first place. Even to an audience more literate in Japanese history, the sheer amount of who’s-who and backstabbing may still (intentionally so) confound first-time viewers. The same-sex love triangle between Oda, Araki, and Akechi Mitsuhide (Hidetoshi Nishijima) adds a little steam to the orgy of violence, and offers even more allegiances to be broken and manipulated.

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