I also agree that it doesn't make much sense to watch Ran if you're unfamiliar with Kurosawa's earlier work. I would start with his 40s movies such as The Men Who Tread On The Tiger's Tail and No Regrets For Our Youth and work your way up. As Daniel indicated re: Ran, you can't truly appreciate Old Man movies if you don't know what the director did as a younger man.
Like Daniel I'm not a big Kurosawa fan -- talented but ludicrously overrated, I think of him as a Japanese Robert Parrish. And like John Huston, his very last film is his first truly great film, the extraordinary Madadayo (talk about an Old Man's movie!).
"Y'know, that's one of the things I like about Mitt Romney. He's been consistent since he changed his mind." -- Christine O'Donnell
Genius Products now owns Ran, along with the entire Wellspring catalog. They're reportedly in very bad financial shape, and may be holding out trying to get more money out of Criterion to re-license. I'd guess Ran ends up back in the Collection eventually, mainly because Genius Products can barely afford to release their own films (TWC films, etc.) now.
There's a rights issue with regard to Ran. Criterion was all set to bring it out on Blu-ray but whoever holds the rights now stopped them. I suspect it will be re-issued by another company within the year.
At the same time, maybe you should go ahead an watch Ran because the Criterion DVD is out of print now, and Netflix will probably begin phasing it out of their rental rotations soon. YOu can always come back to it down the road.
I just picked Kurosawa films, I didn't really put them in any order. Ran and Rashomon were just the first two that came to me.
The rest are all fairly far down my list of films (Ikiru, Dreams, Dersu Uzala, Hidden Fortress, Kagemusha and Yojimbo seem to have gotten pushed together in the list.)
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Don't know how many Kurosawa films you've seen, but no one should make Ran one of their first Kurosawa films, just like they shouldn't make Seven Women one of their first Ford's, and shouldn't make Gran Torino one of their first Eastwood's.
Rashomon would make a fine introduction to Kurosawa, though. I'm not a big fan of Kurosawa, but Rashomon is a good one.
I assume you're asking me why hold off on Ran. For the simple reason that it's a difficult film to sit through. An appreciation of Kurosawa's earlier work would give you a frame of reference so at least watch Rashomon first.
I mention King Lear because Ran is basically the Shakespeare play moved to feudal Japan. The best version of that is the 1971 film with Paul Scofield and Irene Worth.