Throne of Blood

I actually kind of liked this film, more than that I enjoyed this film, it had an interesting take on the traditionally Shakespearean Macbeth mythos. I have had a decent exposure to Japanese cinema (even though I didn't know it) since I was a small child when I saw the first Godzilla film from 1954, but this was my first experience with Akira Kurosawa. Perhaps that film has at least some form of serendipity, as this film (Throne of Blood) was also created by Toho Company Ltd and was released around the same time as Godzilla(Throne of Blood was released in 1957).
But I'm getting off track. I really enjoyed this film mostly because while it felt like it followed the basic story of Macbeth while supplanting the Scottish elements for Feudal Japanese, it didn't feel like it was eternally bound to the standards of Macbeth in terms of fidelity. Several character traits for example being edited to more easily gel with the world of the film such as the benevolent King Duncan (I suppose, we never truly get anything else of his character other than "Oh how wonderful a king he was!") being replaced by the more logically minded Lord Tsuzuki, who in my honest opinion, made for the more realistic ruler. If there would be one thing I found odd about the film, it would be the hand washing scene near the end with Lady Asaji; Whilst I understand the theories brought on by the class as to why this scene was included, it still felt somewhat out of left field, almost as if it were kept in for the sole purpose of keeping some form of fidelity to the original source material. Other than that I didn't really find anything more to gripe about. As a film on its own, it held up well enough, as an adaptation of Macbeth, I feel that it did what any adaptation of Shakespeare (or any other adaptation of this type in general) should do. Make the story its own, whilst simultaneously building upon what has been previously established.