Yojimbo

 

        Continuing on with my addiction to Ghost of Yotei as well as the Ghost of Tsushima, I decided to explore another Samurai film from old school Japanese cinema, Yojimbo a classic Samurai film directed by legendary filmmaker, Akira Kurosawa who helped influence ton of filmmakers with his legendary Samurai film, such great directors like George Lucas who later created the greatest movie franchise of all time Star Wars. Now if you remember my May Recommendation: A Fistful of Dollars, Sergio Leone unofficially remade Yojimbo who Kurosawa later sued for copying the same movie. Though in the end, Kurosawa did compliment Leone and complimented him in A Fistful of Dollars as well as telling him he loved the movie.

        A nameless Ronin, or Samurai with no master, enters a small village in feudal Japan where two rival businessmen are struggling for control of the local gambling trade. Taking the name of Sanjuro Kuwabatake, the Ronin convinces both silk merchant Tokuemon to hire him as a personal bodyguard, then artfully sets in motion a full-scale gang war between the two ambitious and unscrupulous men. 

        Looking through my reviews through the years I slowly realized that I never written a review on Kurosawa's Yojimbo, for which is a big shock on my part, for good reasons is that this is for certain one of the greatest Samurai movies ever made and really paved the way for other filmmakers to use this film as inspiration. I haven't watched a whole lot of Kurosawa's films in which I need to make a point, in doing so, but for any newbie whose never seen any of Kurosawa's work, Yojimbo would for certain be one of those films I would highly recommend watching from its great cinematography to limited resources in terms of the action sequences as well as showing very little blood and limbs flying, this movie still stands the test of time as one of Kurosawa's greatest films. Moreover, the writing of Yojimbo came from numerous inspirations from classic film noir books from Dashiell Hammett and even the films too. Getting back to the whole debate on the unofficial remake between Kurosawa and Sergio Leone, whatever happened between these guys and granted the lawsuit was settled outside of court, I believe Kurosawa did the right thing in suing, though as great as A Fistful of Dollars was, if I was an up and coming filmmaker I would at least tweaked the idea a little bit to draw differences but then maybe would of been complicated, hell I don't know, though if you put these movies their both the same movie just one is a Samurai/Ronin and the other is a gunfighter. And even though these movies together, share the same plot Leone wasn't the only one, there were numerous filmmakers that used the same plot hell, apparently a Bruce Willis film in the mid-90's used the same premise only it was set in the prohibition era, for which again a little on the laziness, but at least they credited Yojimbo as being the basis for the story. For anyone who loved movies like, Tom Cruise's The Last Samurai or the latest TV series Shogun, Yojimbo is one of the greatest Samurai film I would highly recommend watching from start to finish, with the combination of great cinematography and great acting this film has everything, moreover if you’re not big in watching a movie with foreign language and English subtitles I completely understand though the interesting thing is if you work on a foreign movie like this one you can read the subtitles long before the actors are done speaking to which you can understand what their talking about, but then again if you don't want too that's completely fine on your end but old school Japanese films I've been able to get a good understanding in terms of being able to read the subtitles fast. Moreover, if you have an HBO Max subscription then you're all set in terms of watching the whole movie as well as being able to find other hidden gems like this, the same way Tubi has some great hidden gems as well.