Yojimbo Review
Image by p373 via Flickr
To be honest I was actually surprised how much I liked Yojimbo. Usually I am somewhat averse to older movies (black and white) not just because of their propensity to be visually unstunning, but also because I find the acting to be over the top and lacking precision. However, my opinion is beginning to change. I’ve seen several older movies like The Third Man, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Twelve Angry Men film and I noticed that while watching them that I still believe what the movie is telling me.
A little about the movie.
The movie is about a ronin, or lordless samurai, played by Toshiro Mifune, who happens upon a village in which two rival factions are battling for control. Since he quickly makes it known how much of a bad ass he is, the leaders of both factions seek out his assistance and are willing to pay very well for the service.
The movie was adapted for American audiences and made into a spaghetti western called A Fistful of Dollars released in 1964 starring Clint Eastwood, if you didn’t already know.
But on to the review. Yojimbo is, in a word, smart. The story progresses slowly, but surely and is quite engrossing. You can’t help but like nameless protagonist because he does everything as though he is in complete control of the situation. He seems cold and calculating, but he actually sticks his neck out in order to save the people of this town. He manages to play the two sides against each other perfectly which helps to arouse quite a bit of humor throughout the movie.
The movie is not perfect, however. Though the plot is slow it is still fairly difficult to understand when they begin to throw names around. Someone not having any familiarity with Japanese names may have difficulty in following along so watching it with the ability to rewind might be helpful, though I don’t think completely necessary.
The humor in the movie sometimes borders on silly and at times I was afraid the ronin would be portrayed as a little too powerful. These occurrences, however, are rare and the movie sticks to being fairly elevated in both categories for the most part.
Yojimbo is a classic in Japanese cinema and behind Seven Samurai is probably the most well known from Japan’s golden era of film. I highly recommend this movie to anyone who isn’t opposed to old movies.
I gave this movie a 4 out of 5 stars on Netflix.
Nicholas' Nonsense 