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It would be awfully foolish (and arrogant) of Kurosawa to turn around and tell them that they're all full of shit.
I see now that the use of "full of shit" in my orginal post was the wrong choice of words, as it usually is. It looked like I was too tough on Sato. Actually, I think he
is a wise man and he
has been profoundly affected by the post-war occupation, as Mr. Sausage pointed out. I just think that his experience is different in that he hasn't fought in a horrific war.
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He's actually very right when it comes to Yusa. He is a piece of trash
.
Well, I won't try to defend what Yusa did, and I don't think Kurosawa wants to, either. But I do think that [spoiler]Yusa's shrieking frenzy at the end after he hears the passerbys singing and sees the natural beauty all around him[/spoiler] (I have no idea if that's a spoiler or not) hint at his experiences during the war, which only Murakami, and not Sato, can understand. That doesn't let him off the hook, since Murakami had similar experiences and chose differently. At the very least, though, it throws some ambiguity into Sato's speechifying at the end.
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I think the movie had invested way too much in Sato to simply dismiss him as an old fool; it seems to me that he believes what he's saying, and that Murakami is at least acknowledging that he may one day come to agree with him.
Upon further review, I agree.