The Seven Samurai

viewed August 31, 2000 on VHS   Full Details

This has long been one of my favorite films, ever since I first watched it the summer after 8th grade.  The image of Toshiro Mifune running across the rice paddies and up the barricade has long been etched in my memory.  Mifune mixes action, comedy and pathos in whirlwind succession.  It is simply one of the most vigorous performances in film history.  And it is only one of many jewels in this crowning achievement by the late legend Akira Kurosawa.

Seeing it this time, I really sensed for the first time how long it takes for the action to get going: essentially, two-thirds of the film is set-up.  The way it is now, this film wouldn't get made by any studio anywhere in the world: an ambitious action picture with no real action until the third hour.  Previously, I had always been caught up in the sweeping narrative, how it eased from one scene to the next with those patented wipe transitions that George Lucas appropriated (along with the samurai ethos) for Star Wars.  This time, I think I was more attentive to the details: just the way the story carefully follows the recruitment of the samurai, and most importantly, the anxieties of the farmers as they sacrifice their village's rice supply to entice a few hungry warriors to their aid.  Indeed, this film offers a lot of subtexts that give a fresh (though somewhat exhausting) viewing experience every time.  

This viewing made me realize just how different it is from conventional action movies today.  There always has to be an opening action sequence to grab our attention (I think it's been this way ever since Peckinpah's The Wild Bunch).  It actually seemed awkward this time to have story lead to action, and not the other way around. But The Seven Samurai is more than an action movie; it is a novel in cinematic form, a narrative meditation on a Japan in transition, an attempt to reconcile Japan's military identity with its domestic reality.  Moreover, with an equal parts mix of action, comedy, romance and searing social observation, it is as complete an entertainment and as fully realized a film as you'll ever see.  Like the samurai it depicts, it is a dying breed of movie.

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