Shanty dwellers in a Tokyo rubbish dump serve as a microcosm for Kurosawa’s Gorky-style celebration of the human condition, an inspired vision that underscores the triumph of loyalty and the imagination. The film’s characters live among their fantasies: an old man and a boy build an imaginary dream house, a silent man is obsessed by the idea of his wife’s infidelity, and a mentally retarded adolescent thinks he is a tram, repeating the sound "dodes’ka-den, dodes’ka-den." Kurosawa’s first film in color is an interesting mix of realism, social comment, melodrama, and fantasy. In his inimitable way, Kurosawa knits the characters together into a cyclical narrative that encompasses moments of quiet poignancy.