Seven Samurai

Released 26th April 1954, Seven Samurai tells the story of a village who seek out samurai to protect them from bandits. Despite its setting, and culture, the film is reminiscent of Western films in its production design and the themes of honour that arise. That said, Seven Samurai is able to utilise its unique cultural setting to also explore heritage, comradery and loss. These strong themes also give way to a very sombre tone which is ever-present throughout the narrative; a tone which is still able to give way to comedic characters and subsequent moments of relief. Something to note is that, despite the expansive cast, every single character is distinct from one another and (more so than the acting) it is largely a credit to the script. Takashi Shimura gives life to Kambei, the aging ronin who leads the samurai through the narrative. He has a strong chemistry with his co-stars and imparts his character’s writing with poignant vocalisation.

Kikuchiyo is another notable samurai with his performance from Toshiro Mifune; a man who claims to be a samurai without possessing any discernible traits of one. Mifune gives what is the most diverse performance of the film: he is capable of entertainingly delivering comic relief while being able to switch to a well-founded, ill-tempered rage. Isao Kimura also manages to give a quirky performance as the inexperienced samurai Katsushirō. Similar to Kikuchiyo, Katsushirō possesses less samurai traits than his peers, however, his prowess is shown to develop across the narrative; this development runs parallel to a relationship with Shino, a farmer’s daughter. Keiko Tsushima gives a time-standard performance of Shino which helps to consolidate the template of interactions the villagers sought to avoid their girls having with the samurai.

You can easily argue that the bandits of the film receive absolutely no depth (you would be correct); however, the narrative’s strong focus on the village and the samurai means that it does not detract from the story by the antagonists being fairly shallow in their motivation and actions. While obviously somewhat dated, the film utilises some decent miniatures for the various action sequences in the third act. As well as this, Akiro Kurosawa edits the film in a way that enables every action to have flow and meaning. Fumio Hayasaka also succeeds in delivering an appropriate soundtrack that forges strong motifs that return across the extended runtime. Overall, Seven Samurai is a thoroughly mature and moving tale of comradery and strength in an era of cinema where such stories were rarely realised with such profound success.