The Cinematic Spotlight: The Cinematic Spotlight: Entry #1

Akira Kurosawa is quite possibly the most influential director of all time. His breakout effort Rashomon is a contender for most influential film ever because of how it experiments with non-linear structure. And then we have his magnum opus Seven Samurai, which has inspired every single samurai film that came after it, and the story is still one of the most reworked in cinema history.

But the Kurosawa film that has been reworked the most is Yojimbo, which is about a nameless samurai that walks right into a gang war. Few films have had such an impact on the samurai and western genres. Three years after the release of Yojimbo, Sergio Leone (another great cinematic master) released A Fistful Of Dollars, which is about a nameless gunslinger who walks right into a gang war. Sounds similar? And two years after that Sergio Corbucci released Django, which follows a nameless gunslinger who walks right into a gang war. Sounds similar? And after that, the story of Yojimbo has been reworked into dozens of films.

It is kinda funny that Kurosawa was inspired by classic westerns from the likes of John Ford, and then his films inspired Leone's and Corbucci's iconic spaghetti westerns.

But now let's take a look at why the film is so iconic.

First of all, let's look at the direction. Kurosawa's main weapon here is once again movement. If Kurosawa was a samurai, I guess you could say that movement was his sword. Kurosawa's framing here is also immaculate. He uses the framing to tell the story, which is something only great directors can do.

Yojimbo is very inspired by westerns and has inspired many westerns itself. Kurosawa took the classic western gun duels, replaced the guns with swords, and then pushed the style to 100. Then Leone and Corbucci took Kurosawa's duels, replaced the swords with guns again, and then pushed the style to 110.

There is this amazing YouTube channel called Renegade Cut who did an essay on Yojimbo and pointed out the political commentary of the film. Kurosawa's characters were very inspired by classic western heroes, but they were never servants of the goverment. He always put a lot of depth into his characters, but his characters were never morally ambiguous, but individualists.

After World War 2, you can notice a change in how the samurai were portrayed in Japanese cinema. After World War 2, the samurai in Japanese culture was portrayed more human and flawed. This is probably a result of the citizens of Japan finding out that the goverment had lied to them.

In the beginning, Sanjuro, our main character, chooses randomly which path he will take, because he is sure that either will satisfy him. And then he starts playing the gangs against each other to earn money. You can say that this suggests Sanjuro is a bad person because he has no moral standards and the only cause he fights for is his own. But there is a lot more depth here. You could say that this film is about not bowing to any force, especially if that force is corrupt.

The question is: Is Sanjuro a bad person for not choosing sides and collecting money from both sides, or is that the gangs are bad and don't deserve a good person working for them?

Sanjuro is certainly one of cinema's greatest characters, and one person we should thank for that is Toshiro Mifune. How isn't this guy discussed alongside Brando, De Niro and others? If he isn't one of the greatest actors of all time, I don't know who is. He makes Sanjuro into an extremely cool character, but also puts a lot of depth into him. It is an amazing performance.

Conclusion:

Yojimbo is an action-packed masterpiece from one of cinema's great directors. It's cool, funny and incredibly kick-ass, but also has some amazing depth if you go looking for it. Mifune gives a performance for the ages that makes this film a must-see.