Word: yojimbo
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...Yojimbo...
SATURDAY: Yojimbo (1961). Akira Kurosawa's masterful samurai drama about an unemployed mercenary facing evil on its own terms. Toshiro Mifune won best actor honors at the Venice Film Festival...
...begins Yojimbo plot source of A Fistful of Dollars and one of the world's classic "westerns." It's a Japanese movie but contains many elements familiar to the fan of the American horse opera. There is the wandering, homeless hero, the isolated town being destroyed by rival factions, a beautiful woman in distress and finally, a showdown--Japanese style. However, Yojimbo goes beyond all this and so avoids the mediocrity of a morass of cliches. Akira Kurosawa, the director, who focused world attention on Japanese cinema with Rashoman and Seven Samurai, succeeds in Yojimbo without resorting to either didacticism...
MUCH OF THE HUMOR in Yojimbo is based on Kurosawa's sense of irony. For instance, when the samurai enters the town, the first sight that greets him is of a small dog. Rinky-dink music accompanies the dog as he trots towards the foreground. Finally, the animal is in perfect focus and one can discern that in its mouth is--a human hand...
...Yojimbo offers no humor. The bad-guys are dead and no room is left for irony. Only the good townspeople, the samurai and the constant dust-laden winds remain...