The Magnificent Seven Samurai

In 1954, long before rap artists The Wu-Tang Clan(R.I.P. ODB) were working their love of Eastern cinema into their name and lyrics, Akira Kurosawa's epic Shichinin no samurai(Seven Samurai) was released. It was the gripping tale of a village of farmers plagued by marauding bandits, who seek the aid of samurai warriors to defend them. Three villagers are sent in to the outside world and when they witness an unorthodox rescue by Takashi Shimura's Kambei, they think they have found the answer to their problems. Kambei attracts a disciple early on, the young Katsushiro, and is also sought out by Toshiro Mifune's comical Kikuchiyo, an overcompensating blowhard with a five-foot blade and a penchant for drunkenness. Kambei finds an old friend to help him recruit other samurai to aid the village, and the quest begins. In their search, Kambei and Katsushiro witness a mock duel between the grim Kyuzo and another. The match is close but Kyuzo is confident he has won. When his opponent presses the issue and challenges him to duel with real blades, Kyuzo slays him easily. Eventually Kambei has four warriors besides himself, and reluctantly takes Katsushiro along despite objecting to his youth. Kikuchiyo follows the six and as the movie progresses, proves he has skills which will be an asset to them. Defending the village from the bandits proves more challenging in the face of the townspeople's distrust of the swordsman, and though the farmers endeavor to hide their daughters, the young Katsushiro inevitably finds romance. Whether that romance or their defense of the town succeeds, I will not say. But it was a masterfully filmed and beautifully scored three hours that I would certainly recommend.

In 1960, The Seven Samurai came to the American screen. An Eastern film with elements of an old Western, the basic premise was left intact. The Magnificent Seven were a group of Texas gunslingers who band together when a Mexican village seeks aid against a marauders led by Eli Wallach's Calvera. As in Kurosawa's original, a trio is sent in search of warriors, this time finding Yul Brynner's Chris. While Kambei rescues a child from an armed thief by posing as a monk, Chris' act of heroism is to drive a hearse with a dead “Injun” safely to a local burial ground, despite objections from some of the townsfolk. Steve McQueen literally rides shotgun as Vin and helps Chris carry out his mission of honor. Their demonstration of gunmanship and heroism impresses not only the Mexican farmers, but young Chico, played by Horst Buchholz. Chico here is an amalgam of Katsushiro and Kikuchiyo, and his youth and drunken antics are both deterrents to his inclusion in the group. Once Charles Bronson, Robert Vaughn, James Coburn, and Brad Dexter are recruited, the sextet journeys back with the villagers, followed by Chico who will soon be one of them and have a romance paralleling Katsushiro's. It's interesting to note among the many parallels between the two movies, Coburn's Britt is found under similar circumstances as Kyuzo. Coburn is challenges by a gunslinger to test the speed of his knife-throwing arm against his gun. When the challenger refuses to accept that Coburn hit his target first he demands a true duel, and soon has a knife buried in his chest before he can even pull the trigger. With such Hollywood starpower playing such skilled fighters, there is only one possible outcome. Whether the ending remains faithful to the original or makes some key changes is again something I will not spoil here.

Both films remain monuments in their own right. Each has spawned homages. The Magnificent Seven had several sequels as well as a spinoff series and was spoofed in 1986's ¡Three Amigos! Next year Seven Samurai will be remade as Seven Swords, and was the basis of the anime Samurai 7 which, since I haven't seen and from the description has worked in robots, is something I definitely plan to seek out on Netflix. Animated homages are nothing new--fans of either Justice League or Beast Wars might recognize a certain scene in The Magnificent Seven...

I'll close with a great quote from The Magnificent Seven from Steve McQueen(who crashed a car while working on ”Wanted: Dead or Alive” just to get time off from his TV series to star in the film): “We deal in lead, friend.” Too cool.

They really don't make them like this anymore.