The Bad Sleep Well · reception & legacy

How The Bad Sleep Well has been received, argued over, and remembered.

The arc

A modest performer in Japan on release — and Kurosawa himself later admitted he'd pulled his punches, saying he couldn't expose corruption at the very top — it's since been reappraised as one of his great modern-day films, the corporate-noir sibling to High and Low.

What's debated

The perennial fight is whether this is 'minor Kurosawa' or his most underrated film — with the famously bleak ending splitting viewers between devastating and deflating.

Its footprint

Its 20-odd-minute opening wedding reception is legendary among cinephiles — routinely cited as one of the great opening sequences in cinema, a whole conspiracy thriller set up over cake and toasts.

Where it stands

The classic 'underrated Kurosawa' pick — the deep cut Letterboxd users love to champion over the samurai staples.