RASHOMOM

RASHOMON

Roshomon is a movie written and directed by Akira Kurosawa. It tells a very simple story about rape and murder. The director used an intriguing and experimental approach to cinematography to tell the story. The shift of perspective and plenty of close-up captions of the characters successfully captures the character’s traits and psychological process. 

There are 6 charters in the movie. The bandit, Tajōmaru, the wife, the samurai, the woodcutters, the monk, and the beggar. After the woodcutter claimed he found the body of the samurai, people related to the murder were summoned to the courthouse to declare what they knew about the murder. However, the stories depicted by the bandit, the wife, the samurai, and the woodcutters were totally different and contradictory. 

 

The bandit’s story:

He was attracted to his wife and decided to trick the samurai and assault his wife. The wife failed to defend herself with her dagger and then begged him to kill the samurai because she felt ashamed. Therefore, he set the samurai free and fought with him, and eventually killed him without realizing the wife had fled.

The wife’s story:

The bandit left right away after he assaulted her. She used the dagger to set his husband free but found out his husband was staring at her coldly and scornfully. Clearly, he was blaming her for what just happened

. She begged him to kill her, but he just sit still and stared at her. In a state of disbarring, she fainted away. After a while, she woke up and found her dagger stabbed into his chest. 

The samurai’s story: 

The story of the samurai was told by a medium. He claimed that after the incident, Tajomaru asked his wife to go with him. She agreed with the request to kill her husband. Tajomaru was immediately disgusted by his wife. While he was asking whether he needed him to kill his wife, the wife fled. Failing to capture her, Tajomaru came back and freed him. He, then, committed suicide with the dagger, which he felt was taken away later on. 

The woodcutter’s story:

He claimed he witnessed the whole murder, but rejected to testify at the courthouse. 

The reality is distorted. What is true? Who’s telling the truth? Are the memories distorted or is the intention (free will) to change the memory.

Rashomon Effect

“The Rashomon effect describes how parties describe an event in a different and contradictory manner, which reflects their subjective interpretation and self-interested advocacy, rather than an objective truth.”

What happened in the movies is about distorted false memory or free will?

I don’t know what exactly happened in the brain when people try to distort the truth according to their own insecurities. But this could be related to the caregiving system in the brain. Amygdala will activate the Medial Preoptic Area of the Hypothalamus to turn OFF the mobilization of sympathetic stress and turn ON the motor response through dopaminergic inhibition of reward centers to active helping behavior. According to the polyvagal theory, the caregiving system will be activated only when people feel safe. None feel safe in the movie.

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