Sanjuro | 椿三十郎 (1962)
Hm. Kurosawa? Check. Toshiro Mifune? Check. Samurai action? Check. Humor? Check. Hm. Must be the sequel to Yojimbo, Sanjuro.
Yeah, but I didn’t get a lot out of this one. Once again Mifune returns as the nameless ronin, this time taking the name of “Tsubaki Sanjuro”…. And pretty much does the same thing here that he did there. That is, get involved in a local village conflict to his own benefit. I think.
OK, so its sort of funny, the way he leads these 9 inept fools around against the bad guys. Yeah there are a few moments of slapstick, and its *always* fun to see Toshiro take on this role that he’s played so many times before….. But I must be missing something.
In the end, I suppose, the message is clear. “The best sword should remain in its scabbard.” But…. that kind of ruins any comedic qualities there may have been. It’s like pouring a bucket of water on the fire.
I’m chalking this up to “sequelitis” from a different era. Maybe I need to go back and watch again. I don’t know. I just don’t know. Maybe I wasn’t in the right frame of mind, too tired, not paying close enough attention. A little help here?!
June 26th, 2010 at 11:33 am
I agree.
Yojimbo is one of my favorite films but I never could embrace Sanjuro. It’s sort of like Toshiro Mifune guest-starred on Donny and Marie and they did a Yojimbo skit because they figured the audience would want to see him in the outfit again.
Donald Richie and the other Kurosawa writers (to the extent that I have read them) have generally been pretty soft on “Sanjuro”.
Early in his career, Kurosawa was pressured (or forced) to make a sequel to his first successful film “Sanshiro Sugata” cleverly entitled “Sanshiro Sugata Part II”. In his autobiography, he claimed that he was against the idea from the beginning and thought it was a terrible film. Reportedly the critics at the time agreed.
This seems like a similar situation but it must have been one of Kurosawa’s choice the second time around. However, if it was successful enough to fund “Red Beard”, it was worth it.
January 31st, 2011 at 12:44 pm
I have to admit that I agree that this film was missing something. It just didn’t seem like…well a Kurowasa film. Easily my least favorite of his works.