182 - Sanjuro, 1962, Japan. Dir. Akira Kurosawa.

Saturday, July 1, 2017

182 - Sanjuro, 1962, Japan.  Dir. Akira Kurosawa.

See if you can follow.

Mutsuta is the chamberlain.

He has a wife, who is unnamed, and a daughter, Chidori.

He is accused of being corrupt.

He is not corrupt.  The superintendent is corrupt.

Kikui is the superintendent.

He has a right-hand man named Muroto Hanbei.  Sometimes he is called Muroto.  Sometimes he is called Hanbei.  He is one person.

Iori Izaka is the nephew of the chamberlain.  The nephew of Mutsuta.

He is one of nine young men who are conspiring to overthrow the corrupt government.

Only he has misunderstood his uncle, and he thinks that his uncle is the corrupt one.

The nine young men look the same--down to their hair cuts--dress the same, and act the same.

They move in unison almost as if they had been choreographed by Busby Berkeley.

At any moment we expect them to form a circle and do high kicks.

Izaka and his fellow conspirators discuss how they are going to overthrow his uncle.

But it just so happens that a Samurai, our man Mifune, was resting in the next room and overheard their plot to conspire.

Good news for them.

They are incompetent but he is wise.

Have you ever seen a deus ex machina at the beginning of a story?

He opens the door and reveals himself.  He tells them that they got it all wrong and that he will help them.  Now we know that for the rest of the film they are going to be okay.

He explains his theory.

The chamberlain is probably good.  The superintendent is probably corrupt.  The chamberlain was probably trying to warn you.  The superintendent probably tricked you into coming here.

The Samurai turns out to be correct.  Not only did the superintendent trick them into coming here, but also he just so happens to have a retinue of men outside right now ready to attack the place.

The Samurai will join and protect them.

You are not nine.  We are ten.

Or quite frankly, he is one.

They are so incompetent that he considers them worthless in battle.

He hides them under the floor.

And we wonder if perhaps George Lucas borrowed from here as well.  When they come up from beneath the floorboards it looks like Han Solo and gang coming out of hiding in the Millennium Falcon.

The Samurai would do better to fight the surrounding horde singlehandedly.

It would be preferable to getting a friendly sword in the back.

Sure enough, the Samurai fends off the attacking group, and their leader, Mutsuta, impressed, offers the Samurai to join them.

The Samurai will in turn play Mutsuta for the rest of the film.

But in the meantime, he takes the nine young conspirators to their new hideout.

Where?

Next door to the superintendent's house.

After all, they will never suspect their neighbors.

The superintendent has kidnapped the chamberlain and his wife and daughter and brought them to his house.  So the Samurai and the nine men are able to watch over the wall from the yard next door.

They get the guards drunk.  The Samurai distracts them.  And they rescue the mother and daughter and bring them next door.

The mother asks the Samurai his name, and just as he did yesterday, in the previous film Yojimbo, today he also makes up a name by looking out the window and identifying the first thing he sees.

(Wait, is he Keyser Soze?)

The Samurai says his name is Sanjuro Tsubaki, the thirty-year old camellia.  Yesterday he was Sanjuro Kuwabatake, the thirty-year old mulberry field.

He sees camellia trees, so he names himself the Camellia.

He is thirty, going on forty.

The mother decides that it is her duty to educate Sanjuro, to teach him some manners.

She informs him, "Killing people is a bad habit."

Good advice.

Then she gives him some more advice which proves to be the theme of the film.

You are a good sword.  But you are always "naked," unsheathed.  Swinging about causing damage.

A good sword should be in its sheath.

By the end of the film he will believe her.

And agree.

But in the mean time they have to defeat the superintendent and rescue the chamberlain.

Sanjuro will continue to play the other side, making Muroto believe he is working for him.  But he will be so good at it that his own people will begin to wonder if he is playing them too.

He is not.  He is loyal.

And he sets up everything perfectly for the final showdown, even when things take turns that he had not planned.

Sanjuro follows Yojimbo somewhat subversively.

Yojimbo is dramatic and takes the role of the Samurai seriously.

Sanjuro is comedic and pokes fun at the Samurai and his idiosyncrasies.

Watch for those camellias.

They will be either crimson or white.

Either color means victory.