High and Low (1963 film) is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. Even so, if you can update or improve it, please do so.
	This article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on March 1, 2026.
Article milestones Date Process Result April 27, 2025 Good article nominee Listed May 27, 2025 Guild of Copy Editors Copyedited October 19, 2025 Peer review Reviewed December 16, 2025 Featured article candidate Promoted A fact from this article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "Did you know?" column on May 31, 2025. The text of the entry was: Did you know ... that after the release of High and Low, director Akira Kurosawa received telephone calls imitating his film that threatened to kidnap his daughter? Current status: Featured article

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In High and Low (Japanese title 天国と地獄 Tengoku to jigoku Akira Kurosawa made a political statement by having the main character work as a shoe industry executive who rose from humble origins as a simple leather worker, clearly implying (to Japanese audiences) the main character's burakumin status. The story has the main character selflessly sacrifice his fortune in order to save his driver's son, showing that burakumin are as heroic as anyone else.

--- from burakumin

Gondo himself, importantly, represents a member of the burakumin class ^{[citation needed]} who has risen above his caste and eventually validates himself in the eyes of the audience by his virtuous act, providing the ransom for a child that is not his own.

--- (uncited portion from High and Low)

• It is perhaps a little dangerous to use another Wikipedia article as a reference when it does not cite its sources. It gives the appearence in the burakumin article that it is using this article as a reference now and vice versa. Yomangani 09:34, 17 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• • I agree, it was probably a bit hasty of me to add the information, considering the political motivations some groups in Japan might have to retroactively associate themselves with a Japanese icon. I'm looking for a source, and will replace the language if I find one. Dhimelright 22:21, 20 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Burakumin are known as the underclass who work with dead animals. In this specific case - Gondo is a leather worker who makes shoes. In the “briefcase and color smoke pellet” scene - he talks of his days as an apprentice who also made such cases. It is clear to Japanese people that even though Gondo has a nice house AKA Heaven - it's still in the burakumin part of town near the Chinese section of Yokohama. This was a common theme in Kurasawa's films. The Kurasawa statement comes from a film class Donald Richie of UCLA gave in the late 1970s or early 1980s. Forgive me for beating people over the head with the obvious. The source is likely an interview done by Richie. - Sparky 02:09, 10 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The problem wasn't that we were disputing whether he was burakumin or not, it was that the statement was uncited in both this article and the burakumin article, and until we have a verifiable source we shouldn't put it back in. You've given me something to work on with regards to finding a source though, thanks. Yomangani 09:27, 10 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

And? - Sparky (talk) 16:03, 3 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

https://akirakurosawa.info/forums/topic/high-and-low-the-burakumin-issue

- I told you so. Sparky (talk) 09:50, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Petty. 167.61.47.143 (talk) 19:51, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Re: the notability of critics, there are voluminous instances of films far less notable than a great film by a great filmmaker with links to minor film blogs. This link is from a major blog site that Wikipedia has its own entry on: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blogcritics; it is written by a film critic that Wikipedia has its own entry on: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Schneider_(writer), about a film released by a DVD company with its own page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criterion_Collection; and about a version of the DVD that is newly released with new features that are detailed in a review that runs some 8 pages long. This is not just a thumbs up or down review. Given these four facts, to call the review non-notable, is absurd, since Wikipedia notes the company that released the dvd, the site that posted the review, and the writer. Given that there is slim linkage, this link provides a valuable resource for filmgoers and dvd collectors. Guffinmac (talk) 13:26, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Dan. I think what people have a problem with is you using Wikipedia to plug your own reviews. It's not helpful, in fact it's spam. (StevenEdmondson (talk) 19:12, 28 August 2008 (UTC)).[reply]

a few recent edits had changed some of the meaningful content of the article, please check the sources provided before rephrasing. Plifal (talk) 09:09, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

although this article is still waiting at GAN, i'd really like it to be at a featured article standard. the biggest concerns i have currently are:

• a lack of access to the sourcing for the film's budget (which led me to excise reference to it in the body since no other source mentions it) and audie bock's "the moralistic cinema of kurosawa"
• lack of awareness of american copyright law for the images (and maybe other fixed size px concerns)
• copyvio concerns for some of the quotations in 'themes' and 'reception' sections
• inconsistent capitalisation of sources
• are redlinks bad in featured articles? i've seen reviews where reviewers have pointed them out as requiring a fix, and other articles which have them with no issues
• the multiref source of the variety magazines (feels weird/incorrectly formatted but i don't know why)
• 'cast' section (everyone in it is credited in the title sequence, but it feels a little underdeveloped(?))
• general copyediting concerns

there are a few other things i'm aware of, perhaps where more sources are necessary to cite a claim in the article, referenced articles that need translated titles/general cleanup, but those are the main things. tagging @TechnoSquirrel69 per our conversation. any advice is welcome and appreciated!!--Plifal (talk) 10:24, 15 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

also tagging @Eiga-Kevin2 upon recalling our conversation a few months ago. any concerns or comments would be highly appreciated :)

--Plifal (talk) 12:21, 16 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the ping! I'm not necessarily the best person to answer all of these questions, but here's what I can say, in order as above:

• This chapter in Kurosawa: Perceptions on Life appears to be available for in-library use at the Seattle Central Library. There may be someone in Seattle willing to scan the relevant pages and send them over. Pinging some Seattle-based Wikipedians — SounderBruce, Peaceray, Buidhe: do y'all have any more information about this?
• Are there any specific copyright questions you have? Glancing through the article, I don't see anything that should be a problem. I know there are folks in the #commons channel of the Wikimedia Discord server who probably know a lot more about this than I do. You might consider reading MOS:UPRIGHT for more information about image sizing markup.
• I would agree that these sections have far too many quotes, both from a standpoint of copyright infringement and of prose cohesion. In general, I like to use quotes when it would be impossible to paraphrase or summarize the source's ideas without losing significant meaning or detail baked into its particular phrasing. For a few examples, "the specter of miscegenation" is something I would keep, "emergence of a new urban topography ..." can be easily written different terms, and "a masterpiece" that is "full of fantastic ideas" and "great moments" is way overboard. This one might be enough for a reviewer to fail the GA nomination, so I would take a look at that as soon as possible.
• There's actually an ongoing RfC discussing capitalization. At this stage, I wouldn't worry about it too much, and it isn't the end of the world to make these kinds of formatting changes if someone asks for it at FAC.
• The relevant guideline supports intentional redlinks if the subject is plausibly notable and an article could be created at that title in the future. It's no different with FAs, in my opinion.
• I take less issue with the {{multiref}} than the fact that they're shortened footnotes with no corresponding full citations. It also seems like citation overkill for the claim they're ostensibly supporting.
• Nothing seems off about the cast on a quick glance through. Maybe consider making the column widths of the two subsections uniform.

Please let me know if there's anything else I can help with, Plifal! Always a pleasure to read through some of your work. :) —TechnoSquirrel69 (sigh) 21:36, 16 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I am out of the area until early next week. I live in Port Townsend, WA, but I should be in Seattle for the 2025 Seattle International Film Festival Member Preview Night next Wednesday, & I will see if I can get a hold of it beforehand. Peaceray (talk) 21:59, 16 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

much appreciated! theres no pressure but i would be so grateful, thank you!!--Plifal (talk) 23:00, 16 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

this is a big help, thank you! i will begin to work on this soon. re. copyright, my major concern is for the image files that appear to not have american copyright licensing. i'm not confident in my ability to ascertain their licenses, but that's a rabbit hole i can go down if i must! thanks again--Plifal (talk) 22:59, 16 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I am not always active in the GOCE, but I saw this request for c/e and took it on. I have already went through the entire article and agree with having it maintain GA status. My biggest concern is that the Theme section reads like an acedemic paper starting around the second paragraph. While most of the information there is relevant, there is a lot of 'highbrow' words that get in the way of an average reader. I did the edits in a single sitting, but when I got to this section I strongly wanted to take a break to refresh my brain before continuing. In my opinion, the average reader would be turned off by the language in that section and it should be heavily reworded to make it easier to read - maintaining the same information. BigChrisKenney (talk) 08:12, 23 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@BigChrisKenney, thank you kindly for taking this on! i understand your point and do agree to some extent, but my issue is that by doing so you lose a lot of the substance of what's actually being said, since i'm essentially summarising twenty plus pages in a sentence or two sometimes. i may not be the right person to do this as one person's 'highbrow' isn't necessarily another's, but as an idea, e.g. a form of remediation: a critique of nascent financialisation through the subsumption of television and consumer culture. might be rephrased a form of remediation: which acts as a criticism of early financialisation in the absorption of popular and consumer culture in society. is this the sort of thing you were thinking, or does it not go far enough?--Plifal (talk) 08:39, 23 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

"i may not be the right person to do this" (to be clear, i will do this, and within five days, pending your response). thanks again!--Plifal (talk) 08:43, 23 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Plifal In terms of mediation, it does just that, and that is a good way to put it. It is not always easy to take technical, professional, or academic language and make it easy to understand.

Personally, I would go a bit further and break it down into more easily digestible words, but I'm having a hard time doing that, myself...

Something like "which acts as a criticism of the then contemporary (new?) process of placing media into categories (genres?) to 'help sell more copies of that work' - or - 'better facilitate sales'".

Here, I believe, the rendered sentence contains the essences of 'financialisation', 'nescent', and 'subsuption' without having the average reader stop and think about what the sentence means.

I think what you proposed earlier is better than what was originally mentioned. However, there might be better ways to break it down. My proposed edits are suggestions. It already has GA status, and rightfully so.

I hope this helps? BigChrisKenney (talk) 09:49, 23 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@BigChrisKenney, yes, it does thank you! i'm looking to take this to featured article status, in which case i should imagine this is something that might be brought up. i'll go through the section again and try to reconfigure it, tagging you again when completed for comment. i will be largely unavailable this weekend but will see if i can get through it today.--Plifal (talk) 09:58, 23 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@BigChrisKenney, hi, i've sinced glossaried and rephrased much of the section. while i think the themes section of any article has the disadvantage of being the most scholarly, i think it's easier now to understand for the average reader. of course i'm open to further revisions, but i'd have to ask for more actionable comments or phrases that you consider particularly difficult to parse. i didn't use your wording as above, since upon re-reading the article it didn't really fit the analysis given but i'd like to know how you see it at this point. many thanks!--Plifal (talk) 10:58, 23 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I think those changes do a lot to add to the article's readability! Good luck on your way to acheiving FA status! BigChrisKenney (talk) 00:06, 27 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

• High and Low (1963) - US Trailer.webm

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 06:51, 1 March 2026 (UTC)[reply]