High and Low (1963) Review: Kurosawa’s Class Thriller in a Yokohama House

Is High and Low worth watching?

Yes — a Top 250 film that earns the ranking. It earns a 83% Celluloid Score from editorial rating (86), Metascore (80), Letterboxd (4/5), and IMDb (8.4/10). The 88% audience snapshot is display-only and is not in the composite.

Akira Kurosawa’s Japanese original runs 142 minutes. On Celluloid it sits on the Japan hub with Ikiru as the other Kurosawa that is not a samurai film — and the one Spike Lee and every cop-show director still steal from.

The house on the hill

The first hour is almost a chamber play: heat, binoculars, a kidnapper who took the chauffeur’s son by mistake. Mifune’s Gondo can pay and ruin a business coup, or refuse and remain a man who let a child die. The second hour leaves the air-conditioning for Yokohama’s streets. Tatsuya Nakadai’s detective work is the film’s second protagonist.

Why it still ranks

Editorial 86, Metascore 80, Letterboxd 4.0, IMDb 8.4: 83% composite. The IMDb Top 250 tag in our consensus is not marketing; it is a crowd that, for once, agrees with the art house.

Verdict

Watch it before any modern kidnapping thriller. Then watch Ikiru if you want Kurosawa’s other great non-sword film. Movie page.