The document discusses the views of Errol Morris and Roger Ebert on truth and reality as they relate to the film Rashomon. It summarizes the four different stories told in the film about a murder. The author agrees more with Morris's view that there can be multiple subjective truths due to differing perceptions, and that evidence is more important than motives in determining the facts of a situation, though motives matter more when evidence contradicts. However, the author believes both Ebert's view about human bias and Morris's view on selective perception provide useful lenses for understanding the film. Overall, the author finds Morris's perspective on the limitations of human senses and the possibility of multiple truths to align more closely with analyzing the truth of what

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Michaela Schnier
Mr. Clover
Senior Seminar Pd. 1
6 March, 2012
Ebert or Morris: Truth or Reality
In the movie Rashomon, there are 4 stories told each saying that they are the
murder. Rashomon is a Japanese film based on two stories by Ryunosuke Akutagawa
(Berardinelli). Tajomaru, a bandit, said that he tricked the Samurai, who was killed, to go
off the mountain path to see some swords. Tajomaru then tied up the Samurai. After which
he seduced the wife and the wife begged for him to have a duel with her husband. He
killed the Samurai but the wife ran away. The wife however tells a completely different
story. She said that the bandit left after rapping her and when she asked for forgiveness
from her husband he would not give it to her. After she fainted she woke to find that the
dagger had been plunged into his chest. The story of the Samurai was told through a
medium. He said that after Tajomaru rapped his wife, she asked him to kill her husband,
and Tajomaru got angered at this request. The wife then ran away and the bandit let the
samurai go. The Samurai then killed himself with the dagger with was said to be removed
by someone else. The last story was by the woodcutter. He stated that he saw Tajomaru kill
the Samurai after fighting over the girl and that she ran away from the scene. Errol Morris
and Roger Ebert both have different views on the truth and reality. I agree to a large extent
with Morris due to his idea about there being more than one way of viewing something and
that our senses limit and change what we perceive. However, I do believe to a lesser extent

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that, in relation to Rashomon, Ebert views that “Human beings are unable to be honest
with themselves about themselves.” (Ebert) and that we only see what we want to see.
In the movie, the court has a hard time figuring out which story was correct. This is
where, to a small extent, where Eberts ideas about truth and reality come in nicely. He
believes that just because someone is telling their experience of something that happened,
does not make it truth because it is just a perception of a person. He also believes that we
see what we want to see. Take the woodcutter's story; according to this idea, the
woodcutter might think that because Tajomaru is a bandit, than he killed the Samurai
because he is perceived as a killer. It is quite possible that the woodcutter did not even
really see as much as he states. He did not come forward at the beginning of the trial and
state what he saw as the eye witness or there is the possibility he is telling the truth through
luck, which is not knowledge after all. However I disagree with him when he states that
there is only one truth. I believe that there can be multiple truths because of the point of
view. That although our view is not correct with that is actually there, that what we believe
we see is truth for us.
To a larger extent, Morris's view fits in better with trying to find out who killed the
Samurai in Rashomon. Morris belies that although the picture that we see will not change
and remain true, the way the we perceive it is the faulty part of it and that although we
believe that our perception is true, the picture will not change to match our beliefs. Going
off of this, all four stories are true for each person, however all may have some faulty part
when trying to connect it with what actually happened. He also firmly thinks that we work
not to see the truth and sometimes even avoid it. I believe this strongly as well in this

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selective perception because everyone works to only see what will make them happy, and
what will improve their own life or well being. Like when someone goes to school feeling
very bad but fakes a smile, people will ignore the fact that they are sad and focus on them
being happy because they might not want to deal with that persons problems. This idea
relates to Rashomon in the fact that each story missed key important facts. For example, in
some of the stories, there was no explantion for the missing dagger and for others the
sword just disappeared. Each story was focusing on the murder soley, because that is all
they wanted to know about subconsciously. They were focused on the 'who killed who and
how?' question rather than looking at the smaller details.
Morris also believes in the fact that there can be multiple truths. As mentioned
before, we both believe that what we think we see, is truth to us even though it does not fit
with what actually happened. He even states that there is no objective truth, just subjective
truth and that “A truth for you, a truth for me.” (Poppy). Morris believes that evidence is
the key to justifying truth, not motive. I also believe in this because evidence is physical
and a motive could change and the only person who knows the absolute true motive, is the
person who came up with it. Everyone else is just guessing at what the motive is and even
if told what the motive is by the person, one is never fully sure if it is absolutely true or
not. However the amount of evidence given effects the amount that the motive should be
taken in account for. The less evidence the more the motive would be valuable. This is
where I disagree with with Morris. I believe that although evidence is vital for finding out
what happened, in Rashomon, motive is just as important due to the evidence contradicting
in each story. Morris believes that Rashomon is “about how everyone sees the world

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differently.” This means that because the Psychology of Perception, the limitations of our
senses, the perception that we see is ours and ours alone. Its like searching something on
Google.com. Even if two people search the same thing, the links that pop up will be
different, however some of the sites that pop up will be similar but it will never be exactly
the same.
Although some of Ebert's views do relate to Rashomon and I do believe in his idea
that not everything we believe is correct because of our perception, I agree more with
Morris because he believes in multiple truths and that we purposely see only what we
want. I also agree that evidence is more important than motive because it is hard core and
can not lie or change. But as the amount of evidence gets smaller, than the motive of the
people involved becomes more important. So that although both Ebert and Morris's views
do relate to Rashomon, I personally believe the ideas of Morris's more than I do Ebert's
views.

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Works Cited
Berardinelli, James. "Rashomon." Movie Reviews. Top All-Time 100, 1998. Web. 06 Mar.
2012.
Ebert, Roger. "Rashomon (1950)." Rogerebert.com. 26 May 2002. Web. 06 Mar. 2012.
Poppy, Nick. "Errol Morris." The Believer. Apr. 2004. Web. 06 Mar. 2012.