Sanjuro Kuwabatake (Toshirô Mifune) is a samurai without a master, drifting without any specific destination. He arrives in a small village, dominated by two lords: Seibei, who produces silk, and Ushitora, who produces sake. Both of them explore gambling, and uses fugitive gangster for the protection of their business. They are constantly fighting against each other. Sanjuro offers his service of bodyguard for both of them and waits for the best offer. The end of the story recalls those Italian ('spaghetti') western movies, with the death of all 'bad guys'.
This movie is very different from other Akira Kurosawa's masterpieces. The plot has adventure, excellent choreography in the sword fights and lots of black humor. In accordance with the information on the cover of the DVD, Sergio Leone used parts of this screenplay in his wonderful 'Fistful of Dollars'. The negative point is the DVD released in Brazil by the Brazilian distributor Continental. The subtitles have many problems in translation, synchronization and concordance in Portuguese. In some parts, it is very difficult to follow the story, since I can not understand Japanese. Further, there is a bug and the DVD freezes at 75:51 min. I tried two DVDs and both presented the same problem. The solution is to go back to the 'Menu', select the next chapter and 'rewind' back to 75:52 min. Although presenting problems on the Brazilian DVD, the movie is excellent and worthwhile. My vote is nine.
Title (Brazil): 'Yojimbo'
05 January 2005: I have just received the following remark from an IMDb User: "Yojimbo doesn't "recall those Italian ('spaghetti') western movies, with the death of all 'bad guys'," considering that Yojimbo was released in 1961, and the entire GENRE of "Spaghetti Westerns" didn't really exist previous to Leone's Fistful of Dollars. You've made the classic mistake of mixing up cause and effect."
This movie is very different from other Akira Kurosawa's masterpieces. The plot has adventure, excellent choreography in the sword fights and lots of black humor. In accordance with the information on the cover of the DVD, Sergio Leone used parts of this screenplay in his wonderful 'Fistful of Dollars'. The negative point is the DVD released in Brazil by the Brazilian distributor Continental. The subtitles have many problems in translation, synchronization and concordance in Portuguese. In some parts, it is very difficult to follow the story, since I can not understand Japanese. Further, there is a bug and the DVD freezes at 75:51 min. I tried two DVDs and both presented the same problem. The solution is to go back to the 'Menu', select the next chapter and 'rewind' back to 75:52 min. Although presenting problems on the Brazilian DVD, the movie is excellent and worthwhile. My vote is nine.
Title (Brazil): 'Yojimbo'
05 January 2005: I have just received the following remark from an IMDb User: "Yojimbo doesn't "recall those Italian ('spaghetti') western movies, with the death of all 'bad guys'," considering that Yojimbo was released in 1961, and the entire GENRE of "Spaghetti Westerns" didn't really exist previous to Leone's Fistful of Dollars. You've made the classic mistake of mixing up cause and effect."