A different way of telling a story

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

This is a funny little film from Kurosawa. It's designated as a sequel to the excellent Yojimbo, yet if there was ever a film that did not or even should not receive a sequel, it would be Yojimbo. Even though Mifune had the final victory, it was a bitter-sweet farewell to the age of the samurai...the gun replacing the blade. Here his character is once again whole, which goes against everything that Yojimbo's ending had stood for. It would not quite work as a prequel either...we sense that by the film's end the sword may never leave its scabbard again. It works best if you distance yourself from that storyline entirely and merely see this as another wandering samurai's tale. He is still the aged, weathered relic, but not of the past. He has the same trademark twitch in his shoulder and the arm resting in the sling that whips out with deadly force at a moment's notice. The action, like much of Kurosawa's samurai films, is theatrical and overly-dramatic, so much so in Sanjuro that it almost seems like he is parodying his own style. The score pipes up appropriately to highlight these little comic flourishes; the dozen young samurai emerging from the floorboards like frightened mice, them later cheering and celebrating before quieting down appropriately, the cornered officials scurrying around and collapsing into a surrender (very reminiscent of the police chief from Yojimbo), or the humorous way in which Sanjuro tricks them into frantically hacking off white camellias and scattering them into the stream. Actually it doesn't so much as build to a dramatic climax as it cuts straight into it. It is a heart-stopping final duel. One swift blows sees the villainous Hanbei felled, without any of the dancing theatrics of the previous kills. His chest erupts with a fountain of blood like a geyser, and the pose is held for an eternity. Almost as if Sanjuro was willing for the moment to last that long, for that rush and thrill of killing a man to fill him up all over again...but the film has taught him otherwise. The fun and games are over. At the beginning he would kill dozens for just a small meal. In the end he almost would rather starve.

Originally its own thing, but due to the success of Kurosawa's "Yojimbo" (1961) the script was reworked to feature the return of "Kuwabatake Sanjuro" (Toshiro Mifune). With that in mind, "Sanjuro" is a pleasant follow up to his adventures and contains enough substance to also stand as its own thing.Nine young Samurai believe that their lord has fallen under corruption, after one of his superintendents claim to have caught him tearing up a petition against organised crime. Out of the dark corner of the room appears a resting Ronin (Toshiro Mifune), who overheard the story and suggests something otherwise. Though insulted, it appears the wandering Ronin was correct as he decides to aid them in finding their missing lord, while they still have doubts about their new companion who gives them his name "Tsubaki Sanjūrō" (Camellia thirty-year-old man).Given its origins, it holds up surprisingly well. Toshiro Mifune is up against Tatsuya Nakadi (Again), and Nakadai disappears into his stern henchmen effortlessly whilst Mifune returns with all the quirks of this gruff character. The absence of harsh weather from other Kurosawa pictures in noticeable, yet hiding around the compound and the many streams of water present is all captured beautifully.Final Verdict: The style had already been done (The main title music is the exact same theme of "Yojimbo" with different instruments), but "Sanjuro" easily entertains throughout its 1 hour 30 minutes. 9/10.

I do love Akira Kurasawa's movies, especially Seven Samurai, Ran, Ikiru, Rashomon, Yojimbo, The Hidden Fortress and Throne of Blood. Sanjuro(sequel to Yojimbo) is not quite on the same level, but it is a fine film regardless and perhaps alongside The Hidden Fortress Kurasawa's most accessible film. It is very well made, with beautiful and sometimes epic scenery and superb camera work. Kurasawa directs with his usual flair, not as delicate as Ikiru, haunting as Yojimbo or as ambitious as Ran, but still highly impressive. The score is lively, the story is engaging, crisply-paced and always fun and the script is witty and tongue-in-cheek yet with a subtle edge. The characters are somewhat one-dimensional and not quite as identifiable as the titular character in Ikiru but still likable nonetheless, and Toshiro Mifune's lead performance is a very subtly fun one indeed. Overall, a great film but not my favourite from Kurasawa. 9/10 Bethany Cox

The conception of the eternal weakness of the human nature characterized all the adventure films by Akira Kurosawa: The Hidden Fortress (1958), Yojimbo (1961) and Sanjuro (1962). But they were also filled with humor and light irony. In these films, there was never good and evil; just two equally evil groups, and the noble samurais talked about nothing but money. From Sanjuro, Japanese people developed a new genre in Japan, called "zankoku eiga" which means "cruel film". Unfortunately, not all understood the combination of entertainment and deep thematics like Kurosawa. Because, even though Sanjuro is, at its heart, an action film, it also draws a wider -- timeless -- picture of the human condition. Those of you, who have seen Yojimbo, remember its mighty samurai who was able to kill over twenty bandits by himself. In Sanjuro he's back and the story line bears a striking resemblance to Yojimbo: two families are against each other, fighting bloody fights day after day and to this situation a hit man of some kind arrives and offers his services to the other family. Violence seemed to truly fascinate the humanist Kurosawa but against violence he places subtlety and consideration.All the common features of Kurosawa's style (which, in my opinion, is a combination of Mizoguchi's lyricism and John Ford's warm human depiction) are there in Sanjuro: the beauty of construction, the perfect rhythm of sequences, lyric flashes of nature, primitivism and fierce simplicity of the characters. The simple but powerful protagonist, named Sanjuro (= Camille), is once again played by Toshiro Mifune. He is an existentialist individual who leads his life without illusions in a world where life and death depend on how well you swing your sword, and power on how well you scheme. Eventually, Sanjuro is able to see the black-and-white madness of his life: "The old lady was right. I am like a drawn sword. Sharp, naked without a sheath. But good swords are kept in their sheaths." So, because of his violent behavior, Sanjuro does have agony of conscience. This brings a little tragedy to his character, although, not enough to make the film any deeper. Besides, first of all, Sanjuro is an entertainment film and an exquisite one, if you ask me. At his heart, Kurosawa was a brilliant story teller but to this story he also adds dramatic intensity, sensitivity and visual wealth which are, of course, also common elements of great art.Kurosawa used to place his stories far away to history where his anti-feudalism couldn't be directly linked to the modern day -- so the studio managers wouldn't get upset. Like all of Kurosawa's samurai-films so does Sanjuro happen in the Wild East; in the violent history of Japan: The Edo period (1603-1868) which ended to the removal of the samurai class (before 1868 it was a class of its own, even though samurais were servants). Kurosawa's presentation of this era is both, brutal and humorist, and his historical accuracy is concrete but, to my mind, he was much more interested in associating the Edo period with present day.Compared to its production year, the story of Sanjuro happens exactly 100 years earlier: in the 1860's, the end of the Edo period, when Japan was being westernized. Surely, this connotation is allegorical because in the 1960's Japan was, in turn, under Americanization and cultural transition: new value-relativism (what the "new" world should be like) and alienation from the Japanese tradition. After Sanjuro, Kurosawa abandoned this kind of adventure films set in this age until the 1980's when he returned to it with Kagemusha (1980) and Ran (1985).The simple story and closed milieu of Sanjuro are, paradoxically, widely associative. The narrative of this allegorical samurai-film is surprisingly touching and the film is overall extremely spellbinding and captivating. Kurosawa paints his picture of the human condition in the modern society with care and consciousness: people are cruel, selfish and treacherous. He presented a world where a man is a wolf to his fellow man which gave the direct inspiration for Sergio Leone's dollar trilogy. However, all the monstrosities of man are hidden beneath the surface, under lightness, humor and irony.