A Fistful Of Dollars' Yojimbo Roots Convinced Clint Eastwood It Could Never Be Made In America

In Stuart Galbraith IV's invaluable and exhaustive 2001 book "The Emperor and the Wolf: The Lives and Films of Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune," the famed Japanese director talks briefly about Sergio Leone's classic 1964 Western "A Fistful of Dollars." Kurosawa admired the film saying that it was "a fine movie," and hastened to add, "but it was my movie."
"A Fistful of Dollars" was, of course, a remake of Kurosawa's own 1961 film "Yojimbo." Both films are about stalwart and detached loners who find themselves wandering through a remote frontier villages that have been overtaken by two warring gangs. In both films, the stranger -- Mifune in the original, Clint Eastwood in the remake -- use their wits to pit the two gangs against one another. Notably, Leone's film didn't bother to credit Kurosawa or his "Yojimbo" co-screenwriter Ryuzo Kikushima, nor did he approach Toho about the possibility of licensing the rights.
"A Fistful of Dollars" was, of course, a remake of Kurosawa's own 1961 film "Yojimbo." Both films are about stalwart and detached loners who find themselves wandering through a remote frontier villages that have been overtaken by two warring gangs. In both films, the stranger -- Mifune in the original, Clint Eastwood in the remake -- use their wits to pit the two gangs against one another. Notably, Leone's film didn't bother to credit Kurosawa or his "Yojimbo" co-screenwriter Ryuzo Kikushima, nor did he approach Toho about the possibility of licensing the rights.
- 12/8/2022
- by Witney Seibold
- Slash Film
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