Yojimbo

Categories: Entertainment | Movies

  • Yojimbo (Bodyguard) is a 1961 action movie by Academy Award-winning Japanese film director Akira Kurosawa It tells a story, set in feudal Japan, of Sanjuro Kuwabatake, a ronin played by Toshiro Mifune, a masterless samurai who makes a living as a hired sword. The film is marked for its dark, sardonic humor, intertwined with Yojimbo's existentialist reflections over a bottle of sake.

    Yojimbo is one of the most influential movies of its time, in particular, a generation of Italian film makers was inspired by Kurosawa's classic. It served as a template for, among others, Sergio Leone's A Fistful of Dollars (1963), a prototype spaghetti western, starring Clint Eastwood as the Man with No Name, and for Sergio Corbucci's 1966 western Django, with Franco Nero in the lead role.

    In 1996, Walter Hill directed an officially authorized remake of Yojimbo titled Last Man Standing, starring Bruce Willis.

    In 1962, Kurosawa directed a sequel to Yojimbo, entitled Sanjuro, with Toshiro Mifune once again in the role of ronin.

  • Plot Synopsis

    Sanjuro Kuwabatake (Toshiro Mifune) is a wandering samurai, arriving in a small town torn apart by rival gangs led by Tazaemon (Kamatari Fujiwara), a silk merchant, and Tokuemon (Takashi Shimura), a sake brewer.

    Sanjuro's reputation as a swordsman is quickly established following a street fight soon upon his arrival, and he gets hired as a bodyguard by Tazaemon. However, as soon as Tazaemon's faction gains advantage, Sanjuro switches sides, tipping the balance of power again. His true intention is to bring an end to the warring gangs' terror by pitching them against one another, thus leading them to mutual destruction.

    Sanjuro's game is eventually seen through, and he gets captured and imprisoned. His superior fighting skills are further challenged by Unosuke (Tatsuya Nakadai), equipped with a gun - a brand new invention, a sign of approaching modernity that threatens traditional values embodied by the samurai.

    In an epic showdown that follows, Sanjuro escapes from captivity, defeats Unosuke, and sees to it that the rival gangs destroy each other just as planned, before leaving the town for further exploits.

  • Cast

  • Reviews

    "Since so many regard this as a lightweight comedy, it will never receive the critical acclaim of the Kurosawa's more 'serious' work, yet it equals the cinematography of Kurosawa's finest films and engages viewers with its larger than life protagonist and easy to follow narrative. And going by Kurosawa's definition, that makes Yojimbo a 'truly good movie.'"—John A. Nesbit, Old School Reviews [1]

    "Yojimbo is at once a dark comedy and a morality play. Sanjuro might at first seem shiftless and unprincipled, but before long, he proves to be quite the opposite. Although the bad guys don’t figure it out until it’s almost too late, he’s a friend of the downtrodden non-combatants."—Brian Webster, Apollo Guide [2]

    "Akira Kurosawa's Yojimbo is of that peculiar strain of great film that is not merely a summing up of particular styles and genres but one that encapsulates generic strains (in this case, the western and the samurai film) and then proceeds to explode the elements sky high, leaving a new type of film in its wake."—Paul Brenner, Fimcritic.com [3]

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