Cast: Takashi Shimura & Toshirô Mifune
Director: Akira Kurosawa
Rating:
Enetertainment Quotient: 90%
Genre: Action
Runtime: 207 min
Language: Japanese
MPAA rating: Unrated

Premise:
The making of Seven Samurai has an interesting tale. The director Akira Kurosawa was always interested in shooting a documentary for his research on the topic 'a day in the life of a Samurai'. During that time, he heard about an incident of a poor village hiring Samurais to protect them from Bandits. He shelves the documentary idea as he fails to collect enough information. Instead, he uses his research material and the idea of samurais protecting village for food and honor to make the film 'Seven Samurai'.

Synopsis:
During the time of civil war in 17th century in Japan, a group of bandits attack a poor village, rob their harvest and take away their women every year. The village head decides to employ a group of Samurais to guard their village from these bandits. The Samurais would be paid three square meals everyday. A few village men visit near by place and find an elderly samurai Shimada (Takashi Shimura) and explain him the situation. Being a noble Samurai, he accepts the job on humanitarian grounds. Then he recruits six more Samurais. These seven Samurais go to the village and chalk out their strategy. The rest of the story is all about how these Samurais save the village from the gang of bandits.

Story progression:

1. Problem identification and recruitment of Samurai: One hour of the runtime is dedicated to identify the problem and recruiting the Samurais.

2. Winning the confidence of farmers: Another one hour is dedicated to understand the complex fears of the farmers and doing a strategy for the battle.

3. Fighting the battle and winning it: The last one hour goes in to fighting the final battle and winning it.

The scenes I liked:

1. The introduction scene of Shimuda who tonsures his head to pretend as a priest to rescue a kid from a kidnapper. It is probably one of the very first scenes in the history of cinema where the hero disguises himself to do a rescue operation.

2. The technique of a man trying to hit at the entrance as a test to Samurais. And each of these Samurais react in different ways. One guy defends as the other Samurai predicts much before entering the house.

3. The second Samurai saying that he is doing it for the respect Shimada earned from him.

4. The scene in which the village man try to gather rice when the major part of rice is stolen. It shows the levels of poverty at that time.

5. An elder from village showing apprehension that young girls of the village might be seduced by Samurais. Ironically, his daughter loves one of the Seven Samurais.

6. Kikuchiyo sounding alarm so that all village men who were reluctant to welcome Samurais come out and beg for their help.

7 The scene in which Kikuchiyo explains how cowardly and foxy the farmers are and at the end he blames the Samurais for farmers becoming like that.

8. The old lady (suffered by bandits) coming forward to kill the captured bandit.

9. The scene in which Shimuda explains why he should leave a gap for bandits to enter the village. He also tells that offence is an easier task than defense.

10. The strategy of letting one bandit to enter the village and block the rest.

11. The scene in which Kikuchiyo cries looking at an orphaned baby and saying that he was like that.

12. Shimuda using a chart and map, striking the circles off whenever a bandit is killed.

13. Shimuda telling that danger always strikes when everything seems fine.

14. The scene in which a Samurai sees his wife with in the bandit's place.

15. The scene in which Kikuchiyo dupes a bandit to steal his Gun. This is probably one of the first kind which was copied in many films later.

16. The scene in which a Samurai gets the gun from the bandit and acts as if he has done nothing great.

17. The end scene in which Shimuda says that he lost the battle again by saying 'they won. We lost'. The farmers are shown as selfish and materialistic people who forget the sacrifices made by Samurais at the end.

Characterizations:
Characterizations are the best aspect of this film

Shimuda: This character is played by Takashi Shimura, who acted in another great film of Akira Kurosawa - IKIRU. Shimuda character brims with respect and confidence. He is the recruiter of the army and strategist in the war. He says that he fought lots of battles, but never won any of them. He has enough experience to be a strategist. His mannerism of rubbing back of his head frequently is good. If you look at him, you get some confidence that he would somehow make the Samurais win the battle.

Kikuchiyo: This is one of the most hilarious and emphatic character in the history of cinema. His character starts as an underdog and ends up like the best of Seven Samurais. His mannerism of rubbing his neck and walking style is pretty good. There is a lot of divide between farmers and Samurais in 17th century. In the period of civil wars and anarchy, lots of Samurais turned bad and became bandits. Hence farmers always looked suspiciously at Samurais. This guy is basically born to farmers, but his ambition is to become a Samurai. Hence this character acts as the bridge between farmers and Samurais. His desires and behavior in the film is raw and animalistic.

Farmers: The farmers in the village are shown as poverty-stricken. Hence you see them as lean, fearful and overly insecure people. And Kikuchiyo keeps making fun of a farmer who looks like he has a major problem all the time.

Interesting Trivia:

1. Mud and Rain: The entire final battle takes place in the mud and rain. It is very difficult to shoot with such an effect which involves not just men but also horses. Using of rain as a key character for an ultimate action scene has become a fashion in films now. Probably this film is the first one to use it for the first time.

2. Telescopic lenses and deep focus: Most of the film is shot with telescopic lenses to get the panoramic view of the village and the battle. For the first time in his career, Akira Kurosawa used multiple cameras and multiple units to shoot this film. The cinematography in this film is also famous for deep-focus (the same technique was used in Citizen Kane as well).

3. Suspecting producers: The producer of this film did not believe in the project and he was thinking that they were going to make a flop film. It resulted in stopping of shoot in many instances.

4. Usage of gunshots: Akira Kurosawa always made the bad guys use guns in his films. In this film also bandits use guns and kill Samurais. In Akira's Ran too the bad guys use guns. Usage of guns is said to be uncharacteristic of a Samurai.

5. No bloodshed: Though this film is about war and swords, you do not see any bloodshed. The entire killing process is shown in a natural and artistic way.

Inspirations:
Seven Samurai can be considered as the mother of all action films. And it inspired many other great films. The magnificent seven is a copy of this film. Sholay - The biggest blockbuster India ever produced – is also inspired by Seven Samurai. The recruitment process of Seven Samurai is the first of its kind and it was followed in many films like 12 Angry Men, China Gate (Hindi – Raj Kumar Santoshi) and Ocean's Eleven.

Structural similarities to Lagaan:
I can see a huge similarity between Seven Samurai and Lagaan.

Tailpiece:
A 3:30 hour Japanese film made in 1954 shouldn't have any relevance to the current movie lovers who want quick gratification and instant satisfaction from movies. Seven Samurai is a special film that engages you thoroughly throughout the 3 and half hour period even now. Seven Samurai is like a bible for the filmmakers and passionate movie lovers. If you didn't watch Seven Samurai in your life, you can't call yourself as a passionate movie lover.