taehyungsfatnose
This review may contain spoilers
A piece of epic film history.
Dark sky, gray shadows moving across the ridge. Akira Kurosawa could get top marks for Seven Samurai just because he created the legendary war scene where a troop of soldiers ride over a hill on their way to the battlefield, or because he wrote side-long backstories about each leading character and made an intricate family tree over the 101 villagers. This is an epic mammoth film, but today perhaps best suited for cineastes.
The plot is simple: Japan, 16th century, feudal society - It's sweaty, dusty and bloody, especially if you're a peasant. The population of the small mountain village is constantly subjected to bandit attacks, especially in the fall after the year's harvest. The men in the village therefore decide to hire 7 samurais to protect them from the horrible miscreants. The first man to stand up is the wise Kambei, who later hires 6 more ronin. Is this incredibly exciting? Absolutely, if you're willing to spend 3.5 hours watching dramatic Donald Duck-clad men laughing at jokes no one else understands. But if you want to see who combined it first: Slow motion + young woman falls in love with young fighter + group of heroes helping each other + men on a hill, this is where you should turn.
Just the intro is a 3-minute long explanatory text passage accompanied by pompous taikos. But hold on. From the first scene you are struck by the astonishing photo. Akira knew how to use the black/white format to the max. Small details such as the characters' patterned kimonos increase the nuances and make each frame attractive. The director recorded each scene with dual cameras in order to have a larger selection of images when editing. It's noticeable, because it's a fantastic variety of angles and perspectives. Some images are so beautiful that you could frame them as individual photographs. I especially fell for the contrast of the white daisies against the dark tree trunks. The sound effects and music are also interesting. I laughed out loud towards the end when the young woman whistled for a full hall. There are creaking hinges and humming men, but it never becomes blaringly loud, instead the music and sound effects stay in the background and act as a mood setter.
Although the film is, according to some, the first drama-action film, Akira has had his heart in the right place. Unlike now, the heroes aren't nerve-smooth and pumped with anabolic steroids. Here, the men have lovely round bellies, wrinkles and they actually cry when their pals die. The masculine lies in their enormously pent-up sexual frustration and that around every corner there seems to be a woman in distress with a crying child in her arms. The young woman who has a fling with the young wanna-be samurai is the only girl who has lines. I have full respect for that because the movie is from 1954. What scares me is rather the realization of how little the genre has developed since then: Braveheart, Gladiator, Kingdom of Heaven.
Just the comparison between this and more recent drama-action films makes me understand how big an influence it must have had. Not only because it is innovative but also because the story is emotionally driven. The atmosphere breathes gloom. The only thing I miss are characters that develop this way despite Akira's solid preparatory work with the portraits. It's only the funnyman Kikuchio who undergoes a major change. Despite the massive playtime, I never get a chance to go deep with a select few. Therefore, I don't really get emotionally involved in how the villagers and samurais are doing. This also applies to the dark forces that move around the village, the bandits, they have no face. They are more like a brutal, black shadow that thunders forward and devours everything in its path.
Despite its few flaws, it is still incredibly well made and interesting from a film historical perspective, but I think it takes a cineaste to really appreciate it. If you like to Google everything about the film after you've seen it, to create an overall picture and be able to put it into context, then you're the right audience.
The plot is simple: Japan, 16th century, feudal society - It's sweaty, dusty and bloody, especially if you're a peasant. The population of the small mountain village is constantly subjected to bandit attacks, especially in the fall after the year's harvest. The men in the village therefore decide to hire 7 samurais to protect them from the horrible miscreants. The first man to stand up is the wise Kambei, who later hires 6 more ronin. Is this incredibly exciting? Absolutely, if you're willing to spend 3.5 hours watching dramatic Donald Duck-clad men laughing at jokes no one else understands. But if you want to see who combined it first: Slow motion + young woman falls in love with young fighter + group of heroes helping each other + men on a hill, this is where you should turn.
Just the intro is a 3-minute long explanatory text passage accompanied by pompous taikos. But hold on. From the first scene you are struck by the astonishing photo. Akira knew how to use the black/white format to the max. Small details such as the characters' patterned kimonos increase the nuances and make each frame attractive. The director recorded each scene with dual cameras in order to have a larger selection of images when editing. It's noticeable, because it's a fantastic variety of angles and perspectives. Some images are so beautiful that you could frame them as individual photographs. I especially fell for the contrast of the white daisies against the dark tree trunks. The sound effects and music are also interesting. I laughed out loud towards the end when the young woman whistled for a full hall. There are creaking hinges and humming men, but it never becomes blaringly loud, instead the music and sound effects stay in the background and act as a mood setter.
Although the film is, according to some, the first drama-action film, Akira has had his heart in the right place. Unlike now, the heroes aren't nerve-smooth and pumped with anabolic steroids. Here, the men have lovely round bellies, wrinkles and they actually cry when their pals die. The masculine lies in their enormously pent-up sexual frustration and that around every corner there seems to be a woman in distress with a crying child in her arms. The young woman who has a fling with the young wanna-be samurai is the only girl who has lines. I have full respect for that because the movie is from 1954. What scares me is rather the realization of how little the genre has developed since then: Braveheart, Gladiator, Kingdom of Heaven.
Just the comparison between this and more recent drama-action films makes me understand how big an influence it must have had. Not only because it is innovative but also because the story is emotionally driven. The atmosphere breathes gloom. The only thing I miss are characters that develop this way despite Akira's solid preparatory work with the portraits. It's only the funnyman Kikuchio who undergoes a major change. Despite the massive playtime, I never get a chance to go deep with a select few. Therefore, I don't really get emotionally involved in how the villagers and samurais are doing. This also applies to the dark forces that move around the village, the bandits, they have no face. They are more like a brutal, black shadow that thunders forward and devours everything in its path.
Despite its few flaws, it is still incredibly well made and interesting from a film historical perspective, but I think it takes a cineaste to really appreciate it. If you like to Google everything about the film after you've seen it, to create an overall picture and be able to put it into context, then you're the right audience.
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