It’s been roughly half a year since my last Kurosawa (High & Low), and I must be stupid to wait that long to watch another, especially with that impossible Mifune-Nakadai duo. In the opening scene we’re introduced with Mifune’s familiar ronin character from Yojimbo, and from there I was automatically hooked on, with his wittiness and his laidbackness and his co_0Lness, then out of no where we see sword fighting all within the first 15 minutes! I also love how certain scenes build up when the samurai plot to rescue their chamberlain with the music and suspense only to stop short with Mifune slamming a door in their faces or dismissing their ideas kicking them back into reality. There’s also shots of a riverstream with camellia trees and birds chirping with a mother and her daughter preciously lying by giving this holistic touch to the film. The last thing I liked was how smart-inducing it was with the technical aspects of tricking their opponent like releasing horses to make their enemy think they ran a certain way or Sanjuro’s sly way of outsmarting the bad guys when he’s in trouble which happens several times and it’s really entertaining. Near the ending when the final camellia flower dropped in the stream and faded out, I knew Kurosawa wouldn’t end the film there and do me like that cause of our history together. Kurosawa, let’s keep on going and continue to make history homeboy!!