Reviews of The Hidden Fortress

Katia Baghai

10Aug10

Akira Kurosawa’s “Hidden Fortress” (1958) – a duel episode between two generals. Only one of the generals is fighting to kill – the other one is using the fight not in order to kill or wound or humiliate the opponent but to cure him from the militancy complex (from believing that combat is a way to settle human problems). The duel is the biggest episode in “Hidden Fortress” because Kurosawa is staging the fight with a lot of psychological information about what fighters feel and think during the fight. Kurosawa transforms the psychology of the fighter we see analyzed inside the psychology of the fight into the psychology of a peaceful conflict negotiation, and elaborates a concept how to use military force for anti-war purposes. See the article “Akira Kurosawa’s Instructions to Heads of States” and the analysis of screen shots from “Hidden Fortress” (posted on Sept. 5, 2009) at: www.actingoutpolitics.com http://www.actingoutpolitics.com/ By Victor

Lopezz

3Jun10

An amazing film, one of Kurosawa’s best. Despite some minor plot flaws, “The Hidden Fortress” is a great film, filled with great acting, great characters, a great story and great cinematography/direction. I consider the pacing of this film pretty much perfect (I’ve read some reviews stating it was slow and boring, and I must disagree). There’s a perfect mix of action, drama and comedy in this film. Its analysis of the human condition, with all its beauty and ugliness, is at the level of great works of Cinema such as Huston’s “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre” and De Sica’s “Bicycle Thieves” (although Kurosawa’s film is far more optimistic than those two films). It’s also a very entertaining film – two hours seemed like 10 minutes while watching this. Highly recommended.

Currently 5.0/5 Stars.

asuraf

5Dec08

The closest Akira Kurosawa ever came to pure comedy, this blockbuster samurai adventure starring Toshiro Mifune escorting his clan’s disguised princess through enemy lines, is made all the more memorable for its peasant sidekicks, played with greedy comedic gusto by Kurosawa stalwarts Minoru Chiaki and Kamatari Fujiwara, who not only steal the film from Mifune and his swagger, but nearly upstage their visionary director and his studied use of wide-screen photography for the first time. Of course that’s impossible; utilizing the studio’s newfangled “Toho-scope”, Kurosawa was able to fill his stretched frame with planes of action and nature’s natural clutter, reserving close-ups, apart from his usual picky telephoto decisions, for the more dramatic moments between Mifune, the princess (Misa Uehara), and rival general/friend Susumu Fujita. But for all the brilliant film making theatrics, the conventional plot wouldn’t be as entertaining without our entry into the action, through Chiaki and Fujiwara’s bickering peasants, who are separated by a slave trade just long enough to learn of a stash of gold pieces hidden throughout the land in tree branches, a wonderful device to represent the film’s themes of nobility and heroism over self and greed. With this Kurosawa bridged the gap between sweeping action symbolism (“Seven Samurai”), heady literary action (“Throne of Blood”), and westernized ironic action (“Yojimbo”), proving yet again to be one of the most malleable cinematic craftsmen in the world.

Currently 4.0/5 Stars.

MUBI