19. Seven Samurai

It is beyond my reckoning how Seven Samurai (1954) has come in as a top IMDb film, it just was not a movie I connected with. Possibly because I had absolutely zero knowledge of 16th Century Japan, meaning that any historical, cultural, or political context was completely lost on me. The 3-and-a-half-hour epic is a good introduction to the era and after a bit of research some of the social structures and character dynamics made sense. Samurai are a form of Japanese military and were similar to European knights who were one rank above peasants in the social hierarchy.

In Seven Samurai, a poor peasant village is attacked by bandits and to protect themselves the village enlists the help of Seven Samurai to help them guard the village and their harvests. Seven Samurai was directed by the late Akira Kurosawa, who wrote the story and did the screenplay. This was his first Samurai film – it stars Toshiro Mifune, Takashi Shimura and Keiko Tsushima.

Others may consider this film to be good because, according to the BBC, for many it was the first Japanese film many had seen and consequently introduced audiences to a new culture that was enticing. Audiences are immediately plunged into the narrative as bandits pillage the village. The film is famed for its sequence of “assembling the team”, which has been honoured and replicated by many other action films. The budget for this film was initially $70,000, but inflated to $500,000, an extortionate sum at the time $2.3m in Japan and $833,533 in the US. An IMDb user passionate about the film believes repeated careful watching rewards the audience and praise’s the cinematography and meticulous set design.

I ranked this film a dismal 42 because it did not inspire me or reach me in any way – I was detached from the director’s intentions and could not read into the message he was trying to convey.

Judging Criteria

SCRIPTURAL INTEGRATION - 20 points: 7

STORY/SCREENPLAY - 10 points: 5

DIRECTOR - 10 points:4

CINEMATOGRAPHY - 10 points:5

EDITOR - 10 points:3

PRODUCTION DESIGN - 10 points:4

ORIGINAL MUSIC SCORE or SCORE EFFECTIVENESS (if not original) - 10 points: 4

SOUND DESIGN - 10 points:4

ACTING - 10 points: 5

TOTAL SCORE 100 POINTS. : 42