Seven Samurai was Akira Kurosawa's first samurai movie, and unsurprisingly the Japanese master ended up delivering the finest entry the genre had ever seen, one that has still not been topped 60 years on. As much an action movie as a character piece, Seven Samurai is one of the most influential and innovative movies ever made, inspiring everyone from Sergio Leone and Star Wars to Quentin Tarantino and everything in between. There are several elements introduced in Seven Samurai that have now become so commonplace in movies that we take them for granted; the reluctant hero assembling a team to complete their task was the progenitor for the 'men-on-a-mission' movie, multi-camera setups and the dramatic use of slow motion for action scenes, and the now-cliched shot of attackers coming into view over the crest of a hill were all utilized here long before they became tropes. Arguably the first modern action epic, Kurosawa wanted the movie to be 'entertaining enough to eat' and he definitely succeeded, with the climactic rain-soaked battle still one of the finest set-pieces ever committed to film. At its core, the movie is a Hollywood-style adventure wrapped inside a 200 minute arthouse epic. Stylish action scenes and kinetic camerawork mesh perfectly with the careful characterization and themes of heroism and sacrifice, as Kurosawa essentially takes the genre archetypes of the Western and infuses them with a distinctly Eastern flavor. It comes as no surprise that the movie was so easily Westernized as The Magnificent Seven just a few years later. Do you agree with the choices in the article? Have you seen all of these movies? What entries not mentioned would you have included? As always, sound off in the comments below.
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