Lower Depths (Criterion) DVD

• 1.0 Dolby Digital Mono (French)
• 1.0 Dolby Digital Mono (Japanese)

(Les Bas-fonds) Jean Renoir 1936:

• Introduction to the film by Jean Renoir
• A new essay by film scholar Alexander Sesonske, author of Jean Renoir: The French Films 1924-1939

(Donzoko) Akira Kurosawa 1957:

• Audio commentary featuring Japanese-film expert Donald Richie, author of A Hundred Years of Japanese Film
• A 33-minute documentary on The Lower Depths from the series Akira Kurosawa: It Is Wonderful to Create, including interviews with Kurosawa, actress Kyoko Kagawa, art director Yoshiro Muraki, and others
• Cast Biographies by Stephen Price, author of The Warriors Camera: The Cinema of Akira Kurosawa
• A new essay by authors Keiko McDonald (From Book to Screen: Modern Japanese Literature in Films) and Thomas Rimer (A Reader's Guide to Japanese Literature)

Director: Akira Kurosawa
Toshirô Mifune, Isuzu Yamada, Kyôko Kagawa, Ganjiro Nakamura, Minoru Chiaki

Director Akira Kurosawa’s transformation of Maxim Gorky’s classic proletarian play, The Lower Depths, demonstrates another side of the acclaimed filmmaker's remarkable versatility. In contrast to his usual broad canvas and kinesthetic filmmaking style, here he explores the possibilities of the stage, finding intimacy in his examination of a group of destitutes set, ironically, within Japan’s prosperous Edo period. Starring an ensemble cast that includes Toshiro Mifune, Isuzu Yamada, and Minoru Chiaki, this adaptation is a Buddhist meditation on the human condition, a poignant yet comic investigation of one of Kurosawa’s favorite themes: the conflict between illusion and reality.