lolo341
15Oct11
I neglected to mention how awesome Sato's music is in this!
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Displaying wall posts 1 - 30 of 40 in total
AntioneOscar69
17Jan12
Not as deep as Ikiru, Kagemusha, or Rashomon, but it is tighter and more consistent than Seven Samurai. It plays as a zesty mix of a western, samurai flick, and French New Wave movie. It's fast paced, funny, and expertly acted, but also has something to say about class, greed, and and the lack of regard for the sanctity of human life.
Chris Jones
13Jan12
Holy fuck, do my senses deceive me or did Toshiro Mifune just do a better Clint Eastwood than Clint Eastwood? If this were the Badass Olympics, and who's to say it isn't, I would give this movie a perfect 10.
Cinesthesia (aka Duncan) likes this
Hisham Teymour
5Jan12
Is this movie as cynical/nihilistic as I think it is? Something about turns me off; can't quite pinpoint what it is.
lolo341
14Oct11
I wasn't expecting Yojimbo to be as funny as it was. Mifune's samurai gestures are great physical comedy (that little shoulder shimmy every time he'd stalk off), and the giant and the idiotic brother are hilarious. I also really loved Eijirô Tôno as Gonji, the tavern keeper. I can't wait to compare it to Leone's A Fistful of Dollars and to see Kurosawa's own sequel, Sanjuro.
Cinesthesia (aka Duncan) likes this
Edward Copeland
13Sep11
The great acting-directing team of Kurosawa and Mifune have a joyous romp transferring American genres to Japanese settings in this classic darkly comic action mix. http://eddieonfilm.blogspot.com/2010/09/i-get-paid-for-killing-and-this-town-is.html
Mr.Wolf
7Sep11
What infact love of this film, is not only the way it bonds the elements of film and the japanese culture, the way of survival for a samurai, enduring moral and ethical values to what is right, wrong and who is worthy of life to his eyes. But the praying drummer man at the end, GREAT!!! Fantastic!
actingoutpolitics
23Aug11
“Yojimbo” by Akira Kurosawa can stylistically be considered as a “study” for his “Sanjuro” made a year after “Yojimbo” (with the same main character played by a unique actor in the history of cinema Toshiro Mifune). But thematically it is quite an independent film that concentrates on the specificity economically determined fight between rivaling groups of entrepreneurs with taste for semi-legal or just outright illegal strategies of self-enrichment (the types we are today in the 21st century know only too well). Kurosawa uses a tiny provincial city in Japan of 19th century as a setting for metaphorizing up-to-date behavior of international cast of predatory money-makers. Like we today (after invented wars and financial collapses) Kurosawa in “Yojimbo” thinks what to do in a situation when pathological greed of the financial decision-makers endangers the life of human populations. Again, as we are today, Kurosawa was disappointed with the traditional idea of “revolutionary transformation” of a corrupt society – the experience of Soviet Union and Eastern Europe is enough to discourage us from this way. Instead, Kurosawa offers in his two films Sanjuro as, in essence, a role model for our hope. Instead of “revolution” as a strategy for social-psychological transformation of life Kurosawa offers “non-participation”. Sanjuro is an outsider by moral reasons. This status (under-status) “of not belonging” colors his personality as a moral alternative to those who while being horrified by the cruelty of the system are doomed to participate in its everyday rituals because they share many of its conventions and prejudices. The intensity of “Yojimbo’s” critical energies joins the elaborateness of its analysis of today’s formal democracy’s vices and sins hidden under the beautiful make-up of its proudly humane ideological pronouncements. “Yojimbo” is full of wit and humor, but also of human emotions, suffering and joy, and real problems everybody can relate to. Please, visit: www.actingoutpolitics.com to read essay about “Yojimbo” (with analysis of stills from the film), and articles about Kurosawa’s other films and the films by Godard, Resnais, Bergman, Bunuel, Bresson, Pasolini, Antonioni, Cavani, Bertolucci, Fassbinder, Alain Tanner, Herzog, Wim Wenders, Jerzy Skolimowski, Rossellini, Maurice Pialat, Moshe Mizrahi and Ronald Neame. Victor Enyutin
SanjurodeValmont likes this
Ryan Browder
22May11
This film alluded me long enough as I finally saw it for the first time as a gorgeous transfer on blu-ray from Criterion, next stop Sanjuro.
Jared Sanders
21May11
A western, but not. A samurai film, but not. Bends genres, twists comedy, and is beautifully shot. One of Kurosawa's best.
trolley freak
26Mar11
Kurosawa has 30 films in his Directorial Filmography - and in my opinion at least 15 of them are masterpieces! This is one of them. A film influenced by Ford's westerns was shamelessly ripped off by Leone for his own Spaghetti Western, A Fistful Of Dollars. My advice?! Stick with the original!!.....
Lorna Singh
18Nov10
Another memorable character for Toshiro Mifune in perhaps Kurosawa's most influential film.His brilliant performance,with that physical presence and revealing expressions,carries the film. Dark humour and stunning black and white photography make certain scenes less gory.
All Is Grace
30May10
The memorable scene in the beginning with the dog carrying a human hand in its mouth says it all: There's no royalty in this jungle. "Now it'll be quiet in this town." 5 stars out of 5.
Chuck Myers
29Apr10
Yojimbo, inspiration for A Fistful of Dollars shows Kurosawa's true genius. Here we have a story that has been redone in one form or another but it seems no one can quite pull it off like he does. From the over the shoulder shot of the opening credits, to the dog with a hand in his mouth, the quiet building tensions that snowball to an avalanche of agression and violence. Kurosawa is definetly in a league of his own.
