The section of Kurosawa's Dreams that I watched was "The Weeping Demon." In this section, the setting is placed in a very dark, cold looking environment, and there appeared to be mountains in the background. There are two men, one human and the other a demon. The human seems to be new to this world, which seems to most closely resemble hell in my opinion. The demon is very depressed in this world, calling it "stupid." He tells the human about how this world used to be "a field of beautiful flowers, but then missiles came and turned it into a desert. As a result, strange flowers began to grow." These flowers were yellow, monster dandelions which were really big, even bigger than the size of the humans. In this world, the demon mentions how the flowers are crippled, along with the human beings (just look at him, for example). The demon then complains about how "stupid mankind is" and how the planet has become a junkyard for poisonous waste, causing nature to vanish from the earth. Also, the fact that the planet's condition is so bad has caused there to be deformities in the animals (such as a one-eyed bird). He goes into talking about how there's no food and the demons must feed on each other. The weaker ones go first, and the demon mentions how he thinks he'll be next. Towards the end of the clip, the demon showed the human how tortured the other demons were, you can see it in their appearance. These demons can't even die if they want to. Their "punishment is immortality and they must suffer forever." Then, we hear the demons screaming in pain, and the he mentions how their horns hurt them worse than cancer, but since they aren't allowed to die they just scream. At the very end of the clip, he mentions how his horns are beginning to hurt too, and orders the human to go away. Then the demon's tone changes and starts to come after the human, who begins to run away.
I related this section of Kurosawa's Dreams to the slide on Shinto Afterlife. I think the world that is portrayed in this clip is the Other World of Yomi (the Underground). At first, I thought the setting was in the Other World in the Mountains, just because I thought there were mountains. However, seeing how tortured these demons were and looking at the fact that they couldn't die, I definitely saw this suffering as the kind that I would imagine to take place in the Underworld. The Shinto believe that the human spirit remains forever, meaning that the demons' spirits will last (even though they aren't allowed to die). Another thing I found that related to the Shinto lecture was concerning the Shinto ethics. It mentioned how there was a story of how a kami destroyed a sacred rice field and was punished. The demon that was the main character in this section was a farmer as a human who had dumped gallons of milk in the river to keep prices up. Now he had gravely regretted it because it landed him in the Underworld.
It seems like Shinto beliefs really focus on how death is not the worst thing that could happen to someone. I usually think of death as a scary thing, but to the Shinto people it could be a relief in some situations. In "The Tunnel," a lot of emphasis was put on the fact that dishonor was worse than death.
ReplyDeleteSona- I also wrote my blog on the "Weeping Demon." We made a lot of the same connections but others we did not. I did not identify the segment as the Shinto Afterlife but now that I look back at it, I completely understand how you made that connection. The demons seems as if they are the doomed of man kind. They have become demons because of their sins.
ReplyDeleteI really like how you related your observations to Shintoism. I read a few posts before yours on "The Weeping Demon" and was unable to find myself in a state to respond with a comment until I read yours. I feel it offers a good clarity and summation in terms of Shintoism and the clip together. I enjoyed how you perceived it to be a focus on the afterlife, and it seems to make great sense to me. The constant suffering and pain conjoin to make that a sound conclusion. I also thought it was interesting to wrap it up with the parallel of the rice field and the farmer. Very well done!
ReplyDeleteI didn't watch this segment but you painted a vivid picture so I didn't have to! I always looked at demons in a way that made me think they enjoyed their gruesome activities, this makes me think of them in a completely different way.
ReplyDeleteI did not watch this video segment, but it sounds like an extremely interesting one in the way you described it. I never imagined hell(yomi) to be a place where demons suffered. On the contrary, I believed that demons flourished and were happy to have the sinful humans sent down to them. Well, this is probably because this is what I was taught to believe in my religion. Death is certainly not something to gain relief from because if you have sinned you will continue to suffer. Sin against nature, especially, is one that is bound to bring bitter ends in the shinto after-life. Thanks this was a joy to read :)
ReplyDeleteI chose the weeping demon as well to explain Shinto. I agree that the world they were in was definitely like one of the other worlds of Kami, more so the Underground. I also agree that the demon suffering could be compared to idea that human spirits last forever. They cant die so they spirits are everlasting in a state of suffering. This definitely seemed similar to the underground other world, or idea that hell exists, except this hell was on earth.
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