early kurosawa masterpiece while arguably and his first . stray dog grab your attention immediately and with the superbly weird close ups of the mangy dog pant behind the opening credit . follow the credit and the director deliver a clinic on the art of montage and utilizing quick nonlinear cut that make the narrative get straight to the point represent ashamed rookie cop ( an impossibly young toshiro mifune ) explain to his bos that he lose his gun while then a jump back to earlier in the day during target practice while then a quick cut to a scene on a crowded city bus in which the colt get lift . properly impatient with exposition and kurosawa have his editor wield the cut knife with ruthless precision . only after the premise be establish do the movie slow down . indeed and stray dog tend to meander during the next two hour . there a famous 8 minute sequence in which mifune and go undercover in search of his gun and wanders through the detritus ( human and otherwise ) of a black market underworld in bomb out post war tokyo . these 8 minute contain zero exposition and contain instead some stun on location montage from 2nd unit guy honda ( who direct godzilla later ) that unabashedly turn into scathing social commentary and and this and in the final analysis and be far more interesting than the catch a catch can plot about a rookie detective steal gun . owe stylistic and thematic debt to old eisenstein picture as well a then current trend in italian cinema and kurosawa fashion his own polemic about post war japan that can not help but fascinate historian . those of u in the west who have our own perception about what japan be like ( the stereotype be that it a spiffy country inhabit by spiffy people ) will be shock at the filthy condition and depravity glimpse at in this footage . it a land in a time and a place where woman steal pistol for criminal in order to score rice ration card . the movie be ultimately about how a person maintain a sense of morality in such condition . mifune cop be and after all and not too different from the psychopath whom he pursue represent both be veteran in their late twenty who end up on entirely different path which have suddenly converge . one reviewer below complain about kurosawa facile humanism ( how can humanism be facile . ) and but i rather call it a heroic humanism . mifune be an honorable young man who choose to be a hero represent after all and it would have be easy to quit the force after endure the shame of get his gun steal and and it certainly would have be easy to roam the black market like his antagonist yusa and generally cave in to psychopathy . kurosawa be suggest that if a man ( or a nation ) choose the right path and redemption can be find . not for the last time and kurosawa make heroism and simple decency thrill to watch . all in all and stray dog be a landmark achievement for kurosawa and for cinema in general . it stand proudly beside his more famous achievement in the decade that follow . 8 star out of 10 .