Review of Seven Samurai (1954) by Brian K — 12 Jul 2012

Last night, I had the absolute pleasure of watching Akira Kurosawa's 1954 masterpiece, 'Seven Samurai.' What can I say about the film? There's essays upon essay's that have been written on this subject and how important the film is.

I will start off saying one thing, I really regret waiting to see the film for this long. The narrative is so simple, yet it provides a tremendous amount of depth at the same time. Bandits steal from and pillage a poor farming village, what are they to do? Enter the seven samurai, Kambei, Heihachi, Kyuzo, Katsushiro, Gorobei, Shichiroji, and Kikuchiyo.

In exchange for protecting the village, they will be given all the rice that the village can offer. At an epic length of 3hrs 27mins, Kurosawa's direction never bores and offers an immense amount of characterization.

This was my first viewing and as such I wasn't able to fully appreciate the nuance of each character, but without a doubt Kikuchiyo is one of the greatest characters that has ever been written for the screen.

Legendary actor Toshir? Mifune gives a genuine, intense, loveable, tragic and extremely compelling performance. At once his character is a joker and a clown of sorts, but as the film goes on layers of depth are peeled away for the audience to savor.

Mifune just brings an extreme likeability to the character, you feel his pain and Mifune is able to expertly convey that his character is someone you would be honored to call a true friend. Kikuchiyo is at once brave, caring, selfless, reckless, funny, longing and most of all someone that the audience can truly relate to.

I can go on and on about this character, but needless to say, he was definitely my favorite. It's not just the samurai who are written well, you really feel for the farmers and their plight. These are hard working people who just want to live their life the best possible way and in peace.

Scenes like the one where a bowl of rice is dropped and each grain is being picked up one-by-one really goes a long way to show the desperation these people have. Not only does the film have tremendous performances from its cast, but everything behind the camera is done with smooth expertise.

Kurosawa is a masterclass director, slow motion, tracking shots, wide-shots, quick cuts, abstract angles, multiple cameras, intimate framing, you name it and it's there. The film was shot in a way that was completely ahead of its time and GREATLY influenced all contemporary cinema directors with how they approach filming.

The black/white cinematography is lush and really goes a long way of bringing you into the 16th century time period the film is based in. Even in black/white, nature is filmed in all its beautiful wonder, dangerous forests, fields of flowers, big battlefields, towering waterfalls, caves, etc.

no detail is compromised. Likewise, the set design was beautiful, nothing can ever replace hundreds of actual people fighting a battle, or really going through a cave that has a waterfall, or samurai riding thunderously across a field atop horses.

The lack of CGI was a very welcome change of pace for what is essentially the grandfather epic action movie. Fumio Hayasaka's score for the film was extremely memorable, the samurai theme was at once heroic while still sounding very grounded.

And, the opening beating of drums gave the foreboding sense of what was to come. Overall, this is a film that I could write about for awhile, it's massively influential. It's a film that shows the power of kindness, the strength of will, the bond of friendship, the pain of loss and even the irony of victory with its extremely bittersweet ending.

I cannot stress enough what a finely crafted masterpiece this is, please take the time and go see it with serious intentions. 3hrs 27mins is quite an investment, but this is one film that deserves to live on forever.