Seven Samurai

I discovered 16 of Kurosawa's best known films before returning to the one which is commonly thought of as his masterpiece. Seven Samurai is unlike any other grand classic ever produced. It's basic plot can be summed up in a single easy sentence, yet its refinement and execution rival any movie you've ever seen.

The premise: in chaotic 16th century Japan, as marauders threaten raid villages, one village hires samurai to defend it from a group of bandits. Yet Kurosawa (also co-writer) developed these characters in a way unheard of for what might pass as an epic action film. To its astonishing credit, through all of its 207 minutes running time, Seven Samurai never falters or bores. And if the script is a marvel in itself, the acting and production design than derive from it are nothing short of superlative. It is said that Kurosawa forced the villagers (from supporting role to mere extra) to live together as a community during production and be their characters, each and every one of which he had drawn out specifically. This unusual technique gave Seven Samurai a feel of authenticity unparalleled in film history.

The samurai themselves are so richly given life to in the screenplay that little more would have been needed to make them memorable characters, yet the main cast pay off at every turn, and though every one of the seven main actors give in perfect performances (never as I had feared before watching it do you confuse them, even in the chaotic battle scenes), two immortal roles have a particularly resounding effect: Takashi Shimura (Kambei Shimada), who plays the leader of the ragged band of samurai, gives his sage and venerable warrior a god-like intensity that makes the magnetic charisma of his character unquestionable. One of the easiest leaders to root for in all the history of film-making. Stealing the show however, albeit by a very thin margin, is longtime Kurosawa favorite coworker Toshiro Mifune (Kikuchiyo) as the rogue seventh, the black sheep of the herd, giving the bravura ultimate performance of a lifetime paved throughout with great roles.

The story follows them and the villagers, equally nuanced and developed, through their encounter, training, eventual bonding and the big inevitable fight for survival. Unlike subsequent very successful remakes (i.e. Magnificent Seven), seven Samurai transcended excellency by having many layers (nothing or no one is white or black: everything exists in shades of gray) and thus being very real and human. Even without the menace, its interpersonal dynamics would have made it perfect human drama, subtle, balancing comedy, intensity, realism, drama and a deep philosophy with astonishing ease, yet the menace does materialize and thus Seven Samurai unleashes its violence in a series of action scenes crafted with such vision and ingenuity as has ever reached an action film (the frenetic battle scenes at the end rather evoke Saving Private Ryan in their relentlessness).

In the end, what made this into solid gold was, at the core, Akira Kurosawa, who would, despite directing many further masterpieces (Throne of Blood, Yojimbo, Red Beard, Dersu Uzala, Kagemusha, Ran), would never top this one. Throughout his life, Kurosawa kept confirming his status as perhaps the greatest director ever. If so, Seven Samurai is the ultimate proof of that truth. One of the very best films ever made and personal all-time favorite.

Donald Richie thought it was Kurosawa's finest, and suggested that it might the best Japanese film ever made.

It is a film that rewards casual viewing and careful viewing and repeated viewing and viewing over time. Isn't that rather like a wonderful book, that rewards you every time you pick it up? I suppose that is the definition of greatness.

How was this greatness achieved? (This is not a rhetorical question. It truly astonishes me how this film creates meaning...cutting across all boundaries of nationality, language, and culture to become a meaningful personal experience for those who view it). This creation of greatness may be a mystery, but we can point to the some features of the film's excellence:

The artistic achievement: The music, the cinematography, the extensive set design, the editing and the acting in the service of a moving story all conspire to create a world that becomes ours on a deeply personal level. It is a film which influences later films and filmmakers.

The narrative achievement: Based on an original concept of Kurosawa's which began as a "day in the life" documentary of a samurai's existence, Kurosawa developed the idea into this breathtaking film of samurai who save a village. This simple but complexly nuanced human story involves us in different social classes in an historical framework. We come to know individual peasants and samurai, and feel that we know significant things about them, their motivations, hopes and fears.

The achievements of the actors: These are characters you will love, people you need to have in your life: the characters of Kyuzo, Heihachi and the unforgettable Bokuzen Hidari as a bewildered peasant..! Takeshi Shimura, as the leader of the samurai, Gambei, is the embodiment of wisdom, and calm in the storm. And, saying that Toshiro Mifune has star power is like saying the noonday sun sheds a little warmth.

Toshiro: It's the cut of his jawline when he asks the village patriarch, "Got a problem, grandad?", and the most charming look of confusion and embarrassment playing over his face when he is told by Heihachi that he is the triangle on the samurai flag. It's his energy, speed and agility and power and intelligence. Mifune sniffing out the fuse of a gun in the woods, bouncing through the brush half-naked in an abbreviated set of armor, or carrying his ridiculously oversize sword on one shoulder, Mifune crying over a baby, and the incomparable scene of his embarrassment that turns to rage when Mifune accuses the samurai of creating the farmer's condition.

Toshiro Mifune represents with extraordinary physicality the spirit of a man desperate to prove his worth: Mifune's got the animal sexuality, the physical response to emotional situations, the expressive face, the humorous and varied vocalisms to make us feel deeply what his character experiences: his struggles, his growth.(His drunken burblings as the last "samurai" to audition are nothing short of hilarious, and his "fish singing" is eerie and funny, too...also the grunted "eh?" that he often uses to show confusion, and the "heh" of disgust..such wonderful sounds, and so expressive!) Mifune's acting is wild and alive, even more than 50 years after the film's original release.

Takashi Shimura: You will trust him with your life. His great, open heart, his mature calm, his honesty and compassion make him one of the greatest of all samurai on film.

Fumio Hayasaka's music: Kuroasawa was lucky to have such a brilliant composer as collaborator. Themes introduce characters, and the samurai theme is surprising and memorable. If you have viewed the film, chances are, the samurai theme is playing in your mind with just a mention of the music. Hayasaka's music is muscular and nuanced: creating humor, or a counterpoint to the action, or deepening our sympathy for and understanding of the characters.

Muraki's scenography: There is no doubt that the places shown in the film are real. The achievement of Kurosawa's longtime collaborator provide a real world for the action.

The filmography is ground-breaking: the multiple cameras, slow-motion and attention to light and composition make each frame worthy of an 8X10 glossy. How can individual moments of such beauty be sustained throughout the movement of the film? It is an astonishing feat. And, best of all, no image degenerates into interior design or vacuous prettiness...everything forwards the movement of the cinematic experience. When the film ends, we feel as if we have lived it!

It is with great respect and humility that I offer my thanks to the memory of Mr. Kurosawa. His great work leads us to treasure humanity and its struggles, to develop our own abilities to feel compassion, encourages us to try to make good choices, to be socially and morally responsible, to embrace life.

Well, if you haven't seen Seven Samurai then you're not really qualified to call yourself a film fan, basically. One of the most influential movies of all time, that still holds up extremely well nearly 50 years later. Akira Kurosawa's epic tale of heroism and barbarism set the standard in so many ways it's hard to imagine that any modern film does not show its influence in some way or other. A great script, great characters, mostly great acting, splendid cinematography and action sequences that wrote the book about how these things should be filmed. Even now, after so many have tried to imitate or beat it, Seven Samurai remains a totally gripping 3.5 hour experience. Akira Kurosawa is one of the gods of Cinema - men who seem to have been born to make films, who have it in their blood. People like Alfred Hitchcock, Stanley Kubrick, King Hu and Steven Spielberg, who make it look easy... who so obviously "get it". In this pantheon, Kurosawa is perhaps the daddy of them all, however, and Seven Samurai is one of his finest moments. The scale of the production is remarkable - to undertake making such an epic in post-war Japan was a feat in itself. The cast of dozens of inhabitants of a village specially built for the movie, the 40 bandits and their horses, all the costumes, the armour, the weapons. Few directors could have brought all of this together and still paid such attention to the smallest of details in script and scene. Credit must go to the team Kurosawa worked with too, I presume The movie's setup became the template for many movies to follow, the most recentl example that comes to mind being the excellent Korean period movie MUSA (The Warrior), for example. A motley band of characters is assembled and placed in a situation where the odds are seemingly stacked against them, and each gets there chance to really shine, prove themselves and become something more than a normal man. Kurosawa's Samurai movies all share a little bit in common, which is the depiction of the Samurai as some noble beast, different from the common and pathetic rabble of ordinary man. In Seven Samurai the farmers are a base lot, cowardly, selfish, vain, pathetic and treacherous. How he found actors with such miserable looking faces is a mystery in itself. In contrast, the Samurai embody all the qualities that humanity would generally like to believe define it (us). Brave, righteous, honest, strong and heroic. Toshiro Mifune's character stands in the middle and represents this difference - perhaps meant to suggest that mankind can strive to rise above his flaws, but mostly suggesting to me that the common man is basically a mess and we should learn to respect our betters. Kurosawa was definitely not a socialist, unless I'm mis-reading him wildly. I'm sure many out there wonder, does a 50 year old black and white movie about Samurai really have any interest or relevance to us in the 21st century? The answer is a definite "Yes!". Seven Samurai shows us what cinema can be, what cinema is *meant* to be. It is moving picture as art in a way that the multiplex-fillers of today cannot possibly claim to be. It's a film that satisfies on many different levels, and still provides a bench mark which today's film makers could and should use to evaluate their own contributions. True, few out there will ever be able to claim they've made a film that rivals Seven Samurai in scope or beauty, but this *is* what every director should aspire to! The sad thing is, I just can't see a project like this ever coming out of the Hollywood studio system, where art is just another commodity and marketing is the new god

Akira Kurosawa was and is considered the master of east-western film-making (in that he made his Japanese films accessible for fans of American westerns while still making the movies his country found popular), and out of the few Kurosawa movies I've had the pleasure of viewing (Hidden Fortress, Rashomon, and this) I'd have to say that while Rashomon is still my favorite, I nevertheless had a blast during this one. The story has become quite influential to filmmakers from the likes of John Sturges (The Magnificent Seven) to John Lasseter (A Bug's Life): a small village has been terrorized by bandits for far too long, amid times of civil war in the nation, and so on the advice of Grand-Dad, they decide to hire four - which soon becomes seven - samurai for the job. There's no money, just food and honor, even though the village isn't exactly pleased to have samurai back in their village. Each character is drawn and executed compellingly, though for my money Toshiro Mifune proves why he became one of Japan's most notorious film actors. His work as the brave, bold outcast of the seven is awe-inspiring practically all the way through, like the hero of a western that anyone can root for since he's a true rebel at heart within a group of men with a task at hand.

Kurosawa directs his tale and main and supporting players like a grand composer, orchestrating a vivid story and extracting from great actors like Takashi Shimura (the old, wise Samurai), Ko Kimura (the disciple Samurai), Daisuke Kato (Schichiroji), and Mifune (Kikuchiyo, which isn't his real name) just the right touches of humanity, humor, tragedy, romance, and intensity. The overall intensity, by the way, isn't over-estimated; its long length (almost 3 1/2 hours) isn't distracting in the slightest since Kurosawa's editing and photography (the later helmed by Asakazu Nakai) are extraordinary. Not to compare the two films, but one thing I saw in common with Seven Samurai and a Lord of the Rings film is that, if anything else, it definitely isn't a boring experience. Along with a score by Fumio Hayasaka that gives the film just a bit more of a pulse, and a showdown that is relentless with excitement, this is one of the must-see action films for film buffs, or anyone with an serious interest in having fun with an epic.

Story-telling at its finest, "Seven Samurai" is a terrific film not because of a handful of memorable scenes or lines, but rather because scene-by-scene, frame-by-frame, it tells an interesting story as well as it is possible to tell it. The story and characters are developed carefully, and everything about the movie, from the settings and props to the musical score, is done carefully and expertly.

Mifune grabs the attention in most of his scenes, and Shimura's more restrained character is a nice balance. Those two have the best parts, but all seven of the samurai are memorable characters. The sequence of events that collects the seven together occupies the first part of the movie, and forms a perfect foundation for the rest. A few of the villagers are also portrayed nicely, although they are naturally overshadowed when the samurai are around.

The story always moves along nicely, with many ups and downs. It has enough unpredictability to keep you interested the whole time, without ever losing its credibility. There is plenty of action, but there is also substance behind the action to give it more significance. The only possible drawback is the long running time (you can always split it up into two installments, but it's more satisfying if you can watch the whole story through at once), but there is little that you could cut out, even if you wanted to. It holds your attention the entire time with a good story and great technique, not by resorting to sensational or sordid details.

This movie well deserves its reputation for excellence, and is one that everyone who appreciates classic cinema will want to see and enjoy.