Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai

It is not just The Magnificent Seven. Just about any film the follows the recruitment of a rag-tag team for a daunting mission (like The Dirty Dozen) owes a debt of gratitude to the classic chanbara-jidaigeki film. It is also the film that converted so many fans to the samurai genre, thanks to its lofty rankings on so many critical polls. Seventy years after its initial release, it still holds up as a masterpiece. Anyone who has yet to see it should take advantage of the new 4K-restoration of Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai, which opens today in New York, at Film Forum.

As in The Magnificent Seven and scores of imitators, a peaceful village of farmers is beset by a nasty band of bandits, who cruelly leave the peasants just enough to carry on, so they can return a few months later to plunder them again. Rikichi is so fed up, he convinces the village, with the ancient headman’s blessing, to pool their resources to hire samurai. Most scorn their meager offer. However, crusty but commanding Kambei Shimada is sympathetic but reluctant to commit. Yet, when he hears the other crude hostel tenants mock the farmers’ misfortunes, it shames him into agreeing.

Slowly but surely, Shimada enlists six more samurai who are willing and able—or at least willing. His former lieutenant Shichiroji recruits Heihachi Hayashida, even though his skills are “barely mediocre,” because his sense of humor will raise their spirits, which Shimada appreciates. They are not even all samurai. Kikuchiyo (as they call him) is clearly a pretender, whom they reject several times, but he keeps following them like a stray dog anyway. Of course, technically none of them are samurai, except maybe the young and high-born Katsushiro Ojamoto. The other five are ronin, or masterless samurai, but definitely close enough for government work.

The first half hour, out of its epic three and a half, is a bit slow, but then Kurosawa methodical approach really starts to pay dividends. As Shimada tours the village and plans the defenses, the audience gets a preview of the battle that will come. We also meet many of the villagers, particularly, the virginal Shino, whom Katsushiro falls in love with, and her hotheaded protective father Manzo. However, unlike the classic John Sturges western, the bandits are never given much character development, so there is no strong equivalent to Eli Wallach. Instead, we are watching everything from the inside, according the perspective of the samurai and farmers.

The battle sequences remain quite spectacular. Even if it was not a direct source of inspiration, Kurosawa’s big climatic battle laid the foundation for that in Miike’s 13 Assassins and other such action films, from around the world.

Takashi Shimura (who was in the #1 and #3 top-grossing Japanese films of 1954, Seven Samurai and Godzilla) is a true joy playing Shimada. Arguably, he also establishes the template for the grizzled but wise senior action figure that stars like Lee Marvin and Clint Eastwood would embody for decades to come. Seiji Miyaguchi is also nearly iconic and influential as the stoic swordsman/gunslinger Kyuzo.

Toshiro Mifune at Film Forum: Red Sun

It is often referred to as a Spaghetti western, but since it was filmed in Spain by a British director, there must be some Manchego and Stilton in that pasta. Ramen too, thanks to Toshiro Mifune. He inadvertently helped establish spaghetti westerns, since he starred in Yojimbo, which was remade as A Fistful of Dollars (and sort of Django). Therefore, it was only fair that Mifune got to star in one. It is okay as western go, but the cast is stacked with legends. Mifune will have his vengeance while preserving his honor in Terence Young’s Red Sun, which screens Wednesday as part of Film Forum’s Mifune retrospective.

Link Stuart thought he was robbing an army payroll train with his shifty partner Gauche, but the former Frenchie gambler from New Orleans intends to keep the loot all for himself. Unwisely, he does not verify Stuart is completely 100% dead. On the other hand, he totally kills one of the samurai escorting the new Japanese ambassador to Washington on the train and steals the ceremonial sword meant as a gift for the president.

Honor demands his fellow samurai, Kuroda must recover the sword and return it to the ambassador in seven days. Kuroda also wants Gauche to taste his steel, for the sake of his late friend. Inconveniently, he will need the help of the uncooperative Stuart to track Gauche’s gang, but the samurai is persuasive.

Frankly, there is way too much bickering between Kuroda and Stuart during the first two acts. Just team up together already and get on with it. Nevertheless, Mifune and Charles Bronson (who co-starred in The Magnificent Seven, adapted from The Seven Samurai, starring Mifune) are perfect as the two East-West vengeance seekers. Bronson is an anti-hero with the emphasis on anti. In contrast, Kuroda is a model of rectitude, but Mifune molds him into a figure of tragic nobility. He really is the only one we root for.

Alain Delon is smooth and slimy as the villainous Gauche, while Ursula Andress actually brings a bit of fieriness to Cristina, the femme fatale prostitute. However, Capucine might even be more seductive as her madam Pepita, who is also Stuart’s sometime squeeze. Plus, Tetsu Nakamura brings dignity as well as his super-employable English fluency to the film as the ambassador. So yes, that is a heck of a cast.

Mifune: The Last Samurai

It is a story of a film role that got away that rivals Tom Selleck’s nearly appearing as Indiana Jones in Raiders of the Lost Ark. While the regretful Selleck was forced out by contractual obligations beyond his control, Toshiro Mifune could only blame his agent’s bad advice for turning down what would be the iconic role of Obi-won Kenobi. Yet, even without the Star Wars franchise, Mifune has attained legendary status, in great part due to his acclaimed collaborations with Akira Kurosawa. Steven Okazaki surveys the towering actor’s life and work in Mifune: The Last Samurai (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Obviously, Okazaki had a wealth of historically significant films to draw from, including arguably the greatest death scene ever in Kurosawa’s loose Macbeth adaptation, Throne of Blood. He also found some tremendously illustrative photos, such as the montage of sports cars Mifune wrecked during hard-drinking benders. The working class Mifune essentially fell in acting almost accidentally, but he became the top Japanese box-office draw of his era and one of its most exportable movie stars.

Unfortunately, Mifune acted on a lot of dubious advice during his post-Kurosawa career, particularly a studio boss’s counsel to start his own production company. When times got tough, Mifune was forced into television work to keep his company afloat. None of the footage Okazaki shows from this period will look familiar to most American Mifune fans. It might be a huge step down from his Kurosawa classics, but it is Mifune we haven’t seen—and evidently there is a great deal of it.

Steven Spielberg would probably only talk about 1941 to pay tribute to Mifune, but he does indeed discuss directing the actor in one of his least regarded films. We also hear from Mr. Movie Documentary himself, Martin Scorsese, as well as Mifune’s son Shirô, and Haruo Nakajima, a contemporary now most closely associated with the Godzilla franchise. Kôji Yakusho, perhaps the closest contemporary heir to Mifune’s gruff leading man mantle also provides some context. However, the most endearing moments are spent with the great-in-her-own-right Kyôko Kagawa, who regrets not having the opportunity to play a late-in-life Marigold Hotel-style romance with her co-star from High and Low, The Bad Sleep Well, and Red Beard.

Last Samurai is a classy film that is so unflaggingly respectful, its interview subjects often speak in the hushed tones typically used in church pews and the like. Keanu Reeves’ narration is crystal clear, but sometimes borders on the reverent. Yet, Okazaki and his interview subjects deal forthrightly with Mifune’s conspicuous but readily forgivable character flaws. Most tellingly, the doc puts viewers in the mood to binge watch several dozen Mifune films, which suggests it is ultimately quite effective. Highly recommended for all fans of classic cinema, Mifune: The Last Samurai opens this Friday (11/25) in New York, at the IFC Center.

Zen and Its Opposite: The Sword of Doom

Swords do not kill people, ronin (masterless samurai) do—a whole lot of people, in fact. Yet, some believe it is the inherent qualities of the sword (or the fighting style) that makes the swordsman, for good or for bad, in Kihachi Okamoto’s The Sword of Doom, which screens this Friday as the conclusion of the Japan Society’s Zen & Its Opposite film series exploring the darker side of Zen Buddhism.

Stopping at a Buddhist shrine, an elderly pilgrim prays for death in a general “deliver me home” sort of way. Much to his surprise a stealthy ronin, answers his call, from behind and without mercy. Hardly compatible with the bushido code, it will lead to some bad karma for the killer, Ryunosuke Tsukue. While the old man’s murder has no apparent motive beyond Tsukue’s sociopathic tendencies, there will plenty of reason for his next killing. Tsukue has an exhibition bout, relatively meaningless for him but critical for his opponent, Bunnojo Utsuki, an aspiring master. However, Tsukue uses the circumstances to corrupt Utsuki’s wife, Ohama. In a fit of jealousy, Tsukue’s opponent turns their contest into a death match, giving Tsukue a perfectly valid excuse to kill.

Of course, Utsuki has many friends, whose bodies quickly litter the road out of town. Somehow though, Ohama becomes his common law wife, an arrangement that makes them both miserable. It is just an inkling of what fate has in store for Tsukue and those around him. Indeed, Tsukue is troubled by the matter of Utsuki’s younger brother, a student of Shimada, a master fencer so heavy he could only be played by Toshirō Mifune.

Doom might be considered high art cinema, but there is enough hack-and-slash action to make a fanboy swoon. Even for more upscale Jidaigeki (Edo era costume drama) enthusiasts, watching Mifune (in a relatively small part) and Tatsuya Nakadai lining up on opposites sides of some grand conflict is a pretty foolproof premise (coming after Kurosawa’s Yojimbo and Sanjuro, but before Kobayashi’s Samurai Rebellion). Intended as the first (and ultimately only) installment in a projected series of films adapting Kaizan Nakazato’s serial novel, Doom is somewhat notorious for its inconclusive freeze-frame ending. Still, what it lacks in closure it makes up for in manic bloodlust. Hinting at the supernatural, Okamoto’s visually stylish climax bears comparison with that of Welles’ Lady from Shanghai.

Nakadai plays Tsukue so stone-cold, he is practically the anti-Christ. Likewise, Mifune is all business as Shimada. In a welcome contrast, Yôko Naitô is believably sweet and endearing as Omatsu, the orphaned granddaughter of the ill-fated pilgrim. Adding memorable color and ambiguity, Kô Nishimura keeps viewers consistently off-balance as Omatsu’s mysterious “Uncle” Shichibei.

Frankly, Doom offers the best of both movie worlds, carrying the Janus Films/Criterion Collection seal of approval, while delivering several scenes of lone swordsmen standing amid mountains of their vanquished foes. What’s not to like? Thoroughly entertaining, Doom screens in all its black-and-white glory this Friday (2/18) at the Japan Society.

Kurosawa Centennial: Yojimbo

As he did in Rashomon, Akira Kurosawa created an influential cinematic template with the first film appearance of Toshirō Mifune’s nameless ronin, which has since been copied in dozens of films around the globe. Yojimbo’s story of a mysterious drifter who cleans up a corrupt small town by playing two rival gangs against each other clearly inspired Sergio Leone’s A Fistful of Dollars, Walter Hill’s Last Man Standing, and Takashi Miike’s Sukiyaki Western Django, as well as a host of lesser known imitators. Yojimbo’s influence even extended to jazz when Jason Moran covered its theme on his first trio CD, Facing Left. Indeed, Mifune’s slacker samurai would prove so popular, he would soon return in Kurosawa’s follow-up, Sanjuro, which screens together with Yojimbo (trailer here) as a double feature during Film Forum’s retrospective celebration of the Kurosawa centennial.

A master-less samurai walks into the crummiest town in Edo Japan. How bad is it? Stray dogs walk down the street with severed hands clenched in their jaws. Rival crime lords have waged a prolonged war that has depressed all local commercial activity, except the casket-maker’s business, where orders are booming. Getting the lay of the land from the local tavern-keeper, the crafty swordsman decides to clean-up the town by manipulating the two gangs into killing wiping each other out. Fortunately, sake helps him think.

When pressed for his name, the nameless one replies, “Kuwabatake Sanjuro,” which roughly translates as “Mulberry field, thirty years old.” Being one big, bad customer, both gang leaders want to hire him, ostensibly as a “yojimbo” or bodyguard. Of course, neither side deserves much sympathy, but Ushi-Tora’s faction backed by the local sake merchant is arguably much worse, having kidnapped the wife of an unlucky gambler to settle his debts. They also turn out to be more dangerous, thanks to the return of Unosake, Ushi-Tora’s pistol packing younger brother, (played by Tatsuya Nakadai, who would return as a different foil for the ronin in the sequel, Sanjuro).

If Mifune’s cynical mercenary who still lives by his bushido code sounds like a familiar character type, it is because Yojimbo set the standard for all the mysterious drifter films that followed. Of his many collaborations Kurosawa, “Sanjuro” might be Mifune’s most enduring, quintessential screen role. Often humorous, sometimes deadly furious, but always larger than life, it is a true movie star performance.

Though considered a jidaigeki or Edo period drama, Yojimbo also shares a certain kinship with some of Kurosawa’s film noirs. Inspired by American westerns and perhaps the novels of Dashiell Hammett, it would in turn inspire the spaghetti westerns of Leone and Corbucci, which Takashi Miike would eventually re-import back into Edo Japan with Sukiyaki. Yet, no subsequent film has approached the mastery of Yojimbo. Though acknowledged as one of Kurosawa’s masterworks, it should not be considered stuffy, pretentious art-house cinema. Yojimbo is too much fun to be missed due to reverse cinematic snobbery. It screens during Film Forum’s outstanding Kurosawa retrospective on Wednesday (2/3).