Dersu Uzala (1975) is Akira Kurosawa's magnificent tone poem that simultaneously exalts the wonders of nature and the glory of human friendship. It is also an unprecedented Soviet-Japanese co-production, produced by the Soviet Mosfilm studio, but with the Japanese Kurosawa directing and his compatriot Asakaju Nakai providing the cinematography. The subject matter is all-Russian but the splendid realization largely Japanese.

The Story: The story of Dersu Uzala was based on the memoirs of Captain Vladimir Arseniev (Yuri Solomin), a Russian explorer in the first decade of the twentieth century who surveyed and mapped the Russian Far East while studying the indigenous peoples. Hindered by their lack of familiarity with the land, Arseniev’s party of soldiers were fortunate to encounter a nomadic Goldi hunter by the name of Dersu Uzala (Maksim Munzuk). Even Uzala’s entrance into the film is grand. As the alarmed soldiers are anticipating a bear, a voice calls out to them, “Please to not shoot! Me are People!” Uzala’s manner of speech is laced with Yoda-like inversions and idiosyncrasies and one wonders if Lucas might not have modeled his Jedi-guru after Uzala, especially since the broader Star Wars concept was based on another Kurosawa film: The Hidden Fortress. While the soldiers laugh at Uzala’s peculiarities as they jabber around the campfire, Captain Arseniev recognizes good fortune when he encounters it.

Arseniev asks Uzala to serve as their guide. They all soon discover that this is a man of unfailing instincts as well as keen observational powers. On the trail, he identifies from tracks and discarded items what manner of people have recently passed. He knows, for example, that a traveler was old because he walked on his heels. He correctly predicts that a hut lies ahead, after spotting a place where bark had been stripped from a tree as a piece for a roof. Even more impressively, Uzala is a man of deep compassion. Finding the hut, he repairs it, even though their party is about to depart, and asks the Captain if he may have rice, salt and matches to leave behind, anticipating that sooner or later some unknown person or persons will arrive at that same hut and perhaps survive because such articles were available. For Uzala, all of nature is animate. He refers to the trees, the wind, the animals, and the river as “men” and affords each the respect due to equals.

Since Derso Uzala has much more to do with character and friendship than plot, I’ll limit further delineation of the plot to just a few revealing anecdotes. Arseniev and Uzala proceed ahead of their encampment to explore Lake Hanka. When a snow storm kicks up and the swirling winds cover their tracks, they become disoriented and unable to find their way back to the camp. They find themselves stranded on a patch of land seemingly surrounded by marsh on all sides and it is getting close to sunset. Uzala immediately realizes that they are certain to freeze to death if they are forced to spend the night unprotected in the cold. Uzala tells the Captain that they must cut the marsh grass as fast as they can and that if they don’t, they will both die. Arseniev has developed so much trust in Uzala’s judgment that he begins slashing the grass and continues until he drops from exhaustion – without so much as asking why. The Captain ultimately passes out from cold and exhaustion, but Uzala continues fashioning a makeshift igloo, using the tripod of the surveying gear as a frame, then weaving and stuffing the grass around the tripod legs. When Arseniev awakens hours later, it is daylight and he is comfortably nestled in the womb of a grass edifice.

Uzala believes firmly in never killing or harming wildlife except as survival necessitates. “Bad to kill animals for nothing,” he says. With the help of the soldiers, he frees several animals from pits that were abandoned but not destroyed by “bad men.” Later, he somewhat impulsively kills a tiger while it was indeterminate about attacking or fleeing. He becomes convinced that the spirit of the forest, “Kangar”, no longer wants him living there and will exact a retribution. In addition, Uzala’s eyesight is beginning to fail with age and he is no longer so quick to spot game or so accurate in felling it. Uzala reluctantly accepts Arseniev's offer to go to live with Arseniev and his family in the city of Khabarovsk. Although Arseniev’s young son, whom Uzala calls the “Little Capitan”, adores the old hunter, Uzala is otherwise entirely out of his element, and finally has to beg the Captain, “Please, let me go back to the hills.”

Themes: Change always entails both gains and losses. Settlements encroach on the wilderness, new industries spoil the natural environment. Yet, change cannot be formulated exclusively in terms of the dichotomy between human civilization and the natural environment. Humans are, after all, a part of nature and change is the essence of the nature of nature. In the world of humans, the calculator has replaced the slide rule. No sooner do train tracks replace canals than freights trains are rendered obsolete by trucking. Each generation, as it ages, yearns for a simpler time – the time in which they cut their teeth, never realizing that the time of their youth was also once the set of changes that wiped out a still earlier epoch. The youth embrace the present, little realizing that it will soon be the nostalgic past. Each generation becomes obsolete in its turn. Understood in those terms, Dersu Uzala is not a depressing film, but merely a reflection of the nature of existence – whether in the wild or in human society. This is not so much about the destruction of the natural environment by human civilization as it is about aging and the sense of personal obsolescence that must inevitably occur for each individual person. We will all be overtaken by change.

Dersu Uzala, in this film, epitomizes the old ways – a nostalgic past in which men were more attuned to nature, living within nature rather than exploiting and despoiling it. Leave aside, for the moment, that such a time never truly existed. Ancient tribes wandered partly because sooner or later they hunted wildlife to the verge of extinction in their old territory and had to move on. Or they farmed the soil until it was depleted of nutrients. Mankind has always committed violence not only against itself but against nature. Captain Arseniev embodies the encroachment of civilization on the Siberian wilderness – surveying and mapping is the prelude to roads and settlements. The train tracks had already arrived. Yet, Arseniev’s education and position, by which he became an explorer, was his only by dint of his privileged position as a member of the Russian Tsarist aristocracy. The film opens in 1910, just seven years before the Russian Revolution, when Arseniev, or at least his privileged status, will be rendered obsolete in his turn. Still later, the communism engendered by the Revolution will be rendered obsolete with the fall of the Soviet empire. Each change must succumb, one after another, to the next. It’s the never-ending cycle of life. Arseniev’s gift to Uzala of a new rifle – the latest model as he says – is what most directly leads to Uzala’s death. The introduction of a single new element from civilization disturbed the old balance in the Siberian wilderness, and a great man fell. Today, that rifle would be a relic – an antique from the good old days.

The real story – the more important theme – of Dersu Uzala is the story of friendship. The worth of a man transcends era or culture. Sensitive men – respectful men – look past the superficials of size, manner of speaking, or which set of cultural accoutrements a person happens to be familiar with to the profounder questions of character and values. Kurosawa’s humanistic bent is in full flower for this film. So to is his deep respect for nature – both in the splendor of his photographing of it and in the almost elegiac respect he expresses for the end of the frontier. Dersu Uzala is as much a spiritual guide as a trail guide for his companions and for us as viewers.

Production Values: Filmed in the unspoiled Siberian wilderness (unlike anything Kurosawa could have encountered anywhere in Japan), Dersu Uzala treats us to hypnotic images and a gorgeous portrait of nature. You become a part of this remote, hostile environment. Watching this film, you will feel the icy wind cutting across your shoulders and snuggle a little deeper into your comforter. Few stories have been more beautifully filmed.

The performances by Yuri Solomin and Maksim Munzuk are both outstanding, although Murzuk’s character and his portrayal of it are inherently more memorable than that of his counterpart. The chemistry between the two is strong and credible. Kurosawa has fleshed out these characters in great detail, which is requisite, since the entire film hangs on the quality of the character of these two and their friendship.

Kurosawa confronted several obstacles, in making this film, that were different from those he had previously encountered. He had to work in a language other than his familiar Japanese (which he had used in masterful ways to link film segments in previous works). He had to abandon his favored practice of editing each film segment immediately after shooting it, since the 70 mm film used for Dersu Uzala required processing in remote laboratories. The environment in which he was working was less familiar for him, more expansive, and offered fewer opportunities for his famous framing techniques used to establish depth in his favored deep-focus camera shots. This was not an easy film for Kurosawa to make. That the result is as gorgeous as it is speaks volumes about Kurosawa’s genius and adaptability.

Bottom-Line: Dersu Uzala deservedly won the 1975 Oscar in the Best Foreign Film category. This film serves as an apt reminder of the pleasures of living in harmony with nature rather than always seeking to mold and dominate it. Beyond that, it is a testament to the spirit of the wild men of the frontier and the wonder of friendship. Dersu Uzala was filmed in Russian and is distributed in America with English subtitles. It has a running time of 137 minutes. Although unrated, I see no reason why it would not be appropriate for children.


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You might want to check out these other excellent films from Russia and the U.S.S.R.:

Alexander Nevsky
Andrei Rublev
Anna Karenina
Ballad of a Soldier
Burnt By the Sun
Come and See
The Cranes Are Flying
Don Quixote
Freeze Die
Ivan the Terrible
Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears
Nostalghia
Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors
Solaris
Strike
War and Peace

Recommended:
Yes

Video Occasion: Fit for Friday Evening
Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 9 - 12