Summer of 101 Movies #95: Seven Samurai (1954)

Today's movie was hard to get through, but well worth it. One of the most well known Asian movies in the U.S, it was so well known that it has an equally good remake called The Magnificent Seven. A movie that created and mastered what have become modern cliches. Today's film is...

Let's Begin

PLOT

In 1587, during the many civil wars of Japan, a village of farmers is being terrorized by a group of bandits, and they've had enough. They decide the only way to defend themselves is by hiring a samurai. They hire one old but very skilled samurai who helps them hire six more. Once back in the village, the samurai teach the villagers how to defend themselves and help to fortify the borders. This all leads up to a battle against 40 bandits.

PROS

You probably read the plot summary and thought "Yeah, yeah, I've heard it all before". But, what you don't understand is that while this movie is full of cliches, this film either invented or refined the cliches into what we know tham as today. While I was predicting a lot of the twists, they still had unexpected elements to them, and the film is full of surprises over all.

The characters are great and well defined. While I won't say they're three-dimensional, they all have enough development to have you care and sympathize with them.

The stand out character, and actor, is Toshiro Mifune who plays the cocky and crazy Kikuchiyo. The movie, while enjoyable, is slow until his character is introduced in a great, funny, and yet tense scene when he's drunk. He's bouncing all over the place, changing emotions every few minutes and never has a dull scene. But, he's still likable and has a mysterious yet never fully explained past. 

This is more of a pro for the DVD copy, but the subtitling is very good, and whether not the dialogue is a direct translation, it all makes sense and never looses you.

The movie is very slow and at a staggering 3hr and 28min running time, but it makes sense why it's slow. It gives the movie more than enough time to develop the characters and the village itself, and, surprisingly, it never lost my attention. While I do wish they had found a way to shave off at least 30 minutes, I just can't seem to find anything to cut from the film.

The tone is a near perfect blend of comedy, action, and drama. The first half is much more focused on the comedy and drama, but the battle, while not action packed, still keeps you on the edge of your seat while mixing in a bit of laughter or character development.

Speaking of the battle, I wasn't going to include this, until I started to think about it more. The battle is a big pay off for the whole 2 hours of preparation. The battle feels real and long, but it's nice to see the tactics and training in action.

CONS

They're are a few moments of bad or over the top acting, and strangely enough, it's mostly from the female actors. They're always yelling or screaming or crying. While I know it's probably because of the time period the film is set in or because of the time the movie was made, but it is a little hard to get over in modern times.

While I did praise the movie for it being slow, it is still a problem. The battle alone has to be more than and hour and a half of the whole thing. While it's not too big of an issue, this may turn some people off.

CONCLUSION

I really liked this movie. I'd always heard it was great, and was not disappointed. The fact that it's entirely in Japanese with just subtitles should not turn you away, this is a classic that still somewhat holds up. I really enjoyed it, but probably not see it again for a long time, or if I have 3 hours to spare.

RATING

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