Seven Samurai

UPC: 715515054911

Studio: Criterion

Summary: Akira Kurosawa's epic tale concerns honor and duty during a time when the old traditional order is breaking down. The film opens with master samurai Kambei (Takashi Shimura) posing as a monk to save a kidnapped farmer's child. Impressed by his selflessness and bravery, a group of farmers begs him to defend their terrorized village from bandits. Kambei agrees, although there is no material gain or honor to be had in the endeavor. Soon he attracts a pair of followers: a young samurai named Katsushiro (Isao Kimura), who quickly becomes Kambei's disciple, and boisterous Kikuchiyo (Toshiro Mifune), who poses as a samurai but is later revealed to be the son of a farmer. Kambei assembles four other samurais, including Kyuzo (Seiji Miyaguchi), a master swordsman, to round out the group. Together they consolidate the village's defenses and shape the villagers into a militia, while the bandits loom menacingly nearby. Soon raids and counter-raids build to a final bloody heart-wrenching battle. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi

Category: Drama

Awards: Best Film - Any Source – British Academy of Film and Television Arts Best Black and White Art Direction – Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Best Black and White Costume Design – Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Silver Lion – Venice International Film Festival

Features: Disc one:
Two audio commentaries, one featuring film scholars David Desser, Joan Mellen, Stephen Prince, Tony Rayns, and Donald Richie, and the other japanese film expert Michael Jeck
Disc two:
Fifty-minute documentary on the making of Seven Samurai, created as part of the toho masterworks series Akira Kurosawa: it is wonderful to create
My life cinema, a two-hour video conversation from 1993 between directors Akira Kurosawa and Nagisa Oshima
"Seven Samurai"; origins and influences, a documentary looking at the Samurai traditions and films that helped shape Kurosawa's masterpiece
Theatrical trailers and teaser
Gallery of rare posters, behind-the-scenes photos, and production stills

Seven Samurai

Format: Blu-ray

Release Date: 10/19/2010

Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 Pre-1954 Standard

Audio: DHMA null

Runtime: 207 Minutes

Sides: 2

Number of Discs: 2

Subtitles: English

Region: Blu-ray region A (North America, Central America, South America, Japan, Taiwan, North Korea, South Korea, Hong Kong, Southeast Asia)

Jonathan Crow

Widely considered one of the greatest films ever made, Seven Samurai was both the apex of Akira Kurosawa's long career and the high-water mark of the Japanese period drama. The film's action rivets the viewer in spite of the three-hour-plus running time: the battle sequences, among the best ever filmed, are immediate and visceral; and the characters are complex and so well-rendered that the viewer grieves when one dies. Like few other historical films, it captures not only the physical look of the time but also its essence. Like Jean Renoir's masterpieces Grand Illusion (1937) and The Rules of the Game (1939), Seven Samurai illustrates the collapse of social distinctions and the growing irrelevance of old traditions in dangerous and chaotic times. Kurosawa questions the division between samurai and bandit, between good and evil. In one scene, peasant-born Kikuchiyo heatedly argues that the samurai have been abusing and exploiting the peasants for centuries. In this framework, the samurais' acts of bravery, selflessness, and honor seem absurd, if not pointless. The peasants' choice of the samurai over the bandits is merely one of a lesser evil. Once the bandits are gone, the samurai will no longer be needed. This is underscored in the film's poignant end, when the surviving three samurai leave the village, receiving neither acclaim nor reward, as the villagers plant rice. American audiences were so impressed with Kurosawa's epic masterpiece that it was remade into John Sturges' Magnificent Seven (1960). ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi

Cast and Crew: Senkichi Omura  Actor 
Atsushi Watanabe  Actor 
Noriko Sengoku  Actor 
Toranosuke Ogawa  Actor 
Bokuzen Hidari  Actor 
Yoshio Tsuchiya  Actor 
Ichiro Chiba  Actor 
Yoshio Kosugi  Actor 
Gen Shimizu  Actor 
Sojin Jr.  Actor 
Keiji Sakakida  Actor 
Isao Yamagata  Actor 
Kamatari Fujiwara  Actor 
Eijiro Tono  Actor 
Fumiko Homma  Actor 
Haruo Nakajima  Actor 
Kichijiro Ueda  Actor 
Akira Kurosawa  Director 
Akira Kurosawa  Screenwriter 
Hideo Oguni  Screenwriter 
Shinobu Hashimoto  Screenwriter 
Fumio Hayasaka  Composer (Music Score) 
Shojiro Motoki  Producer 
Takashi Shimura  Actor 
Toshiro Mifune  Actor 
Yoshio Inaba  Actor 
Seiji Miyaguchi  Actor 
Minoru Chiaki  Actor 
Daisuke Kato  Actor 
Ko (Isao) Kimura  Actor 
Kuninori Kodo  Actor 

Country: Japan