I will keep this short as there are thousands more reviewers a thousand times more learned and eloquent than me, but;
Wow.
Wow, wow, wow.

Around the time the samurai are ridiculing Kukuchiyo's family tree, I noticed that my stomach was fluttering. I realized that this was due to the fact that Seven Samurai exists, and, more importantly, that it lives up the ludicrous (or so I previously thought) volume of praise heaped upon it. The movie was so excitingly 'as promised' that my body reacted physically. The remaining 2.5 hours flew by much too quickly. Direction, acting, plot - I cannot find a single aspect I dislike. It all works, works so well, and utterly absorbs you for the…

Seven Samurai is the second film I watch from Akira Kurosawa and it's another impressive work from the director responsible for Rashomon, one of my all time favorites. I really liked the whole process of picking the samurai to protect the farmers and how these warriors weren't moved by greed or rewards, but only by pride and sympathy.

There are some memorable characters such as Kambei Shimada, the fearless leader of the samurai, who carefully strategizes how the battle will pan out or Kyuzo, a true master of his craft. My absolute favorite of the bunch would have to be Kikuchiyo though. Toshirô Mifune provides an outstanding performance here and I find his character the most interesting one since he…

Toho (the studio) had estimated that Seven Samurai was to be completed during the course of eleven weeks. Kurosawa had very different ambitions and extended production to last for a whole year. Of course he then ran out of money several times, and had to require additional funding from the studio. And Toho gave in every time. From then on, Kurosawa became known as Tenno. The Emperor.

Minoru Chiaki, who plays Heihachi in the film, has told the following anecdote from the production: 1)

Location: A pond on the Tamagawa River. Kurosawa and Chiaki are fishing. Only half the film is completed, the whole budget spent and production stopped.

Chiaki: «So what’s going to happen?»
Kurosawa: «Well, the company isn't…

Seven Samurai is a monumental cinematic experience – A story woven together with a complete mastery of the medium of film by Akira Kurosawa.

The monochromatic fabric of this movie provides a tonal palette of shades of charcoal, silver and white that help accentuate a beautifully clear cinematography, including plenty of innovative camera work on display. Be in no doubt this is the art of film making.

The film has a richly populated cast and is set in and around a country village, home of farmers who have been regularly raided for their harvested crops by bandits.

Driven to the point of starvation life becomes an unbearable ritual of loss; their livelihood, dignity and now their right to even survive.…

There are too many ways to review a great movie like this. So I'm going to start at the stop and end at this flick's beginning. Does that sound okay?

To be honest, Seven Samurai's ending speaks more thematically than the rest of the film. Every important plot event happens prior to Kambei, Shichiroji, and the pupil Katsushiro staring at the distant harvest before them—but this solemn finale takes the formal precedents established in earlier parts of the movie and uses them to maximum effect. I recall how the very first shot of the village, as seen from the bandits' perspective atop a hill, puts a high-angle look at the settlement in contrast with a flat foreground. And that same…

Seven Samurai is the second film I watch from Akira Kurosawa and it's another impressive work from the director responsible for Rashomon, one of my all time favorites. I really liked the whole process of picking the samurai to protect the farmers and how these warriors weren't moved by greed or rewards, but only by pride and sympathy.

There are some memorable characters such as Kambei Shimada, the fearless leader of the samurai, who carefully strategizes how the battle will pan out or Kyuzo, a true master of his craft. My absolute favorite of the bunch would have to be Kikuchiyo though. Toshirô Mifune provides an outstanding performance here and I find his character the most interesting one since he…