grantss A rookie police detective has his service pistol stolen. He sets off to find the thief, unravelling a complex web of criminals in the process.A earlyish-career movie from the famed Akira Kurosawa, and it shows, to an extent. Long-winded, with scenes that seem to exist only to take up space. The soldier scenes and baseball scenes are good examples - seem to go on forever and don't add much. The plot seems complex just for complexity's sake - the case was simpler than the movie made out. This said, there is a decent amount of intrigue and Kurosawa does build the tension well. Just a pity editing and dynamism weren't priorities.

dee.reid Akira Kurosawa co-wrote and directed his black & white detective-noir "Stray Dog" in 1949 - one year before the international break-out success of "Rashomon" (1950). In post-World War II Tokyo, Japan is still in the midst of recovering from its defeat in that devastating conflict. (While the country is obviously in shambles, incredibly enough, we never really see any of that, but still, its psychological impact is felt everywhere you look. But then again, this film is not about Japan's post-war-era of reconstruction.) During a sweltering summer heatwave, a pistol belonging to young Detective Murakami (a young Toshiro Mifune, one of Kurosawa's cinematic regulars) is stolen by a pickpocket while riding on a crowded city bus one day. The weapon changes many hands over the next few days, eventually winding up in the hands of a disgruntled World War II vet, later identified as a young man named Yusa (Isao Kimura). Murakami, also a war veteran, becomes obsessed with retrieving his gun, since it is used in a series of escalating, violent incidents around the city. During this time, he is also partnered up with an older, more experienced homicide detective, Sato (Takashi Shimura, another Kurosawa regular, most famous for "Ikiru" and "Seven Samurai," perhaps), to nab Yusa, the so-called "stray dog" of the title. "Stray Dog" is yet another classic from Akira Kurosawa. The film is nicely and beautifully shot; Kurosawa was a favorite of using the natural weather conditions to symbolize things happening on-screen, and here he uses the heat to great effect. Like how Spike Lee would do on "Do the Right Thing" 40 years later in 1989, we can feel the heat and how the tension, and Murakami's increasing anxiety and desperation, at solving his case before more people are hurt, affect him on a deeply personal and psychological level. Rain, which you would think would cool things down a bit, here, represents yet another escalation in things to come later on in the film. Perhaps one thing that "Stray Dog" illustrates best is that Murakami, in a way, is just like Yusa. As someone else also pointed out, both fell on hard times after their war service and were angry and frustrated at their circumstances, but Murakami picked himself up afterward. Also as someone pointed out, that means that, sometimes, the only thing that separates the two men from each other is the notion of choice - since Murakami explains that he could just as easily have become just like Yusa at some point.This movie is not to be missed if you're a true fan of the cinematic master craftsman, Akira Kurosawa.10/10

George Roots (GeorgeRoots) Only a year after "Drunken Angel" (1948), Kurosawa continues his collaborations with Toshiro Mifune and Takashi Shimura, for what could arguably be the first "buddy cop" movie. Though Kurosawa himself considered the film "too technical", in his autobiography he warmly remembers "no shooting ever went as smoothly".Right after the opening credits of a dog panting due to the blistering heat wave our story begins. Whilst riding a tram a detective's gun is stolen and after giving chase he loses the thief, setting in motion a hunt into bombed-out post-war Tokyo and various sinister trades.As the story progresses, the situation becomes dire. While there is plenty to enjoy from the movies bustling crowds, locations and banter between Mifune and Shimura, I believe that the film is too lengthy for its narrative. The acting is consistently strong and the payoff in the final act was worth the wait, even though I found it rushed within the final 10 minutes or so. The characters get by on a vague optimism that things can get better or worse now or in the given future, which is a seldom point that I took from my experience with this movie.Final Verdict: The suspense is a little lacking, but definitely come for the dialogue and acting. 8/10.

Charles Herold (cherold) This police procedural has the interesting premise of a cop obsessed with finding his stolen gun, and his sense of responsibility for everything that happens because of the theft. It's an interesting idea, a sort of cop version of Bicycle Thieves, but it's a bit slow and static. For all the comments here that call it a film noir, it lacks that sort of intensity, although it does have interesting anti-noir qualities - much of it takes place in daylight among people wearing light colored clothes.Even at its weakest, there are interesting Kurosawa touches throughout, most notably the use of the oppressive summer heat as a character in the film. And while some moments feel overlong, such as the cop's undercover work, there are nice bits like his dogging a suspect or that suspect's later interrogation by an older and wiser cop.The movie hits high Kurosawa in its fantastic forth. From a stunning image of a girl twirling in a dress just as a thunderstorm breaks,the film is everything you expect from the great director, as though a more experienced Kurosawa had jumped into a time machine to do the last part, and the final confrontation is brilliant, even if the movie's last short scene is as flat and dry as the first ones.Kurosawa has made much better movies, but there is enough of interest in this one that fans of the director should check it out at some point.