The Seven Samurai

Back in film school a professor handed all of us a list of movies they expected every film student to have seen and be familiar with. I suppose I should have been embarrassed at having seen about 10% of them, more than half of which I had only seen because we watched them in other classes. Of all the movies I had never seen from that very extensive list, there was only one I really wanted to see someday, and that was The Seven Samurai.

For over fifty years now people who are a lot smarter than me and who know a lot more about movies than I do have scrutinized The Seven Samurai, and can tell you all sorts of amazing things about it. The kind of things I could never even dream of thinking up on my own. This review is not any of those things.

The Seven Samurai is a foreign film, so if you can't handle over three hours of subtitles, don't bother. It's also an old movie, which unfortunately means that its black-and-white, and the scenery often needed color... if you can't take ancient Japan looking nothing like you hope ancient Japan should, this movie will probably frustrate you. The acting is often over-the-top, so if exaggeration bothers you, this is not a movie for you. If, however, you have no problem with an old, long, stage-acted foreign film, and are looking for an interesting story, you'll probably enjoy The Seven Samurai.