Aspiring to be the personal physician of the Shogunate, the young and arrogant doctor Noboru Yasumoto (Yūzō Kayama) must complete his post graduate studies at a rural clinic under the mentorship of the gruff yet kind-hearted Dr. Kyojō Akahige (Toshiro Mifune) or “Red Beard”. While Yasumoto is resistant to the ways of the lowly hospital, Red Beard models compassion as he listens to his patients, unafraid to take matters of social justice beyond the hospital into his own hands.

A humanist, existentialist epic, Red Beard ranks among Akira Kurosawa’s very best. Adapting short stories by Shūgorō Yamamoto and Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Humiliated and Insulted, Kurosawa takes his time in really listening to each and every character, revealing the complexities, circumstances and histories of a life and how it can all be decimated by a quick judgement. And yet, amidst the philosophical parables, Red Beard still knows how to pack a (literal) punch. This was Kurosawa’s last film shot in black and white as well as his final collaboration with the legendary Toshiro Mifune (who won the Volpi cup at Venice for his performance here).