Seven Samurai

My brother and I checked this film out from the library when I was still in elementary school I believe. Around that time we had checked a few Asian films out like, The Last Emperor, Ran, and a several others I can't recall. Out of all of them Seven Samurai was the most astonishing. Now that I think about it I absolutely love that film. Seven Samurai and Rashamon are my two favorite Akira Kurosawa works and those are two that I'll forever hold close to me. Seven Samurai is in all fact better than some samurai films that are made even 50 years after the making of it. On top of that it stars a young Toshiro Mifune, along with Takashi Shimura, who are no strangers acting along side one another. Toshiro and Takashi starred in Kurosawa's Drunken Angel a few years before Seven Samurai was filmed. Seven Samurai is the one film that will open anyone up to the samurai genre as it did me.

In 16th century Japan, A village of farmers are terrorized by a group of bandits that constantly return to take their on grown produce so that they may eat leaving the farmers village with nothing. One day the villagers turn to their elder for guidance and he suggests hiring a samurai to teach them how to fight. With nothing but food as payment several of the villagers journey into town to find a samurai willing to help them. When are found and the group seems to have given up hope they run across an older samurai named Kambei (Takashi Shimura) who they spot saving a boy taken hostage by a thief. Kambei listens to the villagers plea, having been turned down by all the rest of the samurai, and joins but, requires they find more ronin to assist them on the task. Kambei and the villagers come across each warrior one by one with different traits to each of them and ask them to join along and leave for the village. While traveling back to the village the group of ronin and villagers are followed by a samurai named, Kikuchiyo (Toshiro Mifune), who refuses to be ignored and despite the will of the others trying to run him off, follows like a lost dog. Upon arrival into village the people cower in fear and flee to their homes. The samurai are offended and demand an explanation. At that moment an alarm is sounded and the people are run to the safety of the six samurai that are there and beg for them to protect them. No attack occurs and we see Kikuchiyo stepping away from the alarm he has raised a false alarm. He rebukes the cowardly villagers for running to the samurai for aid after first failing to welcome them to the village. Soon thereafter the training begins and the village prepares to go under siege to fight against the bandits.

One of what I feel is one of the world's most important films. If you're wanting to get into samurai films this is the one to start with. The film is carried across because, of the compelling story and the brilliant character acting of the cast. It's just amazing how well this film plays out, you'd think these actors had been previous samurai. One of my favorite scenes and favortie aspects of the film is Toshiro Mifune's character. This is the start of where my fan craze of him began. He portrays so many emotions in this film it's incredible. A joking wanderer who pesters the other samurai at the start of the film who goes on only to prove he's a very well thought out individual and intelligent. To see him break down into tears over the fact that he was once a farmer like the villagers he was protecting. Kurosawa saw something so incredibly blistering in Mifune and I'm glad to see that he rode with it and had him in a number of his films to come.

trailer