Latest / Houselights: A Film Director Podcast / Yojimbo (1961) - Akira Kurosawa | Houselights #274

Transcript

Yojimbo (1961) - Akira Kurosawa | Houselights #274 · Houselights: A Film Director Podcast

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the net party.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: In nineteen sixty one's Yojimbo by Okira Kurosawa, a wandering
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: ronin walks into a town torn apart by two rival gangs,
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: realizes they're both garbage and decides to play them against
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: each other until everyone is dead and the dust settles.
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: I'm Tristan Rudel, and with me a man who has
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: already picked a side in this fight and is currently
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: trying to sell me a silk umbrella he found behind
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: the tavern. Darren Moser and playing the coffin maker across
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: the street, measuring us both for pine boxes because he
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: knows how this ends. John Mills, Yojimbo is the ultimate
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: blueprint for the man with no name. Let's toss a
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: stick in the air to see which way the wind
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: is blowing and talk about one of the cool this
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: bodyguards in cinema. This is house lights.
• 1:04
  Speaker 3: Yes, yes, yojimbo so okay, yes.
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: So for those of you who do not know what
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: yo jimbo means, just like I didn't, it means bodyguard.
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: And we're not talking about the Kevin Costner Whitney Houston one.
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: We're talking about Tishiro Mina fune.
• 1:22
  Speaker 3: Yes, which it would have been possibly an even bigger
• 1:27
  Speaker 3: hit if they'd had a song tied to this that
• 1:31
  Speaker 3: they could have had over the over the end credits.
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: I'm going to skip our usual I'm going to skip
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: our usual outline on how we go about things, and
• 1:40
  Speaker 2: I want to go straight into the music because thank
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: you about song. We need to talk about the music,
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: and that's the first thing we're going to talk about.
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: All right, Darren, you giggled a little bit, and so
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: you get to go first. Was this music at all
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: what you were expecting?
• 1:57
  Speaker 4: It wasn't what I was expecting because I feel in
• 2:01
  Speaker 4: a lot of ways this is the most Western, and
• 2:04
  Speaker 4: I don't mean like us Western as in like Western movie.
• 2:09
  Speaker 4: I mean you could put six shooters on all of them,
• 2:14
  Speaker 4: and this is shot by John Wayne. I mean with
• 2:17
  Speaker 4: John Wayne in it.
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: Instead.
• 2:19
  Speaker 4: This is so close to that. So with that going
• 2:23
  Speaker 4: into it, I was expecting a little more I don't know,
• 2:29
  Speaker 4: atmosphere in that regard. This one has a lot of
• 2:33
  Speaker 4: It has atmosphere, but not in the music as much.
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: And that's all. That's all I'm gonna say.
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: See, I enjoyed what happened with the music here, because
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: this actually felt even more like that blending of you know,
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: sort of like the Western that we've documented here that
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: Kurosawa loves. Right there are these little motifs through here
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: that repeat. There are these little you know, the silly
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: music comes in during the silly scenes. This is I
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: would argue with this, This is Kurosawa fully comfortable manipulating
• 3:09
  Speaker 3: the audience. And that's what the music says to me,
• 3:12
  Speaker 3: is he's willing to give audio signals to everybody to
• 3:14
  Speaker 3: let them know, Okay, this is the type. This is
• 3:16
  Speaker 3: what we're in in this movie right now. This is
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: I think very easily the movie with the broadest cross
• 3:24
  Speaker 3: cultural appeal of the ones that we've looked at so far,
• 3:28
  Speaker 3: because I think that this one, to your point, Darren, Yeah,
• 3:31
  Speaker 3: you can see John Wayne walking through that.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: There's even dust blowing through the town.
• 3:36
  Speaker 3: Off against each other. Yeah, I mean, yeah, they imported
• 3:39
  Speaker 3: dust from the other side of town. But like, but seriously, like,
• 3:43
  Speaker 3: there's so much layered into this. You have, you know,
• 3:46
  Speaker 3: you have the House of ill Repute and the two
• 3:50
  Speaker 3: crime overlords and they're fighting over territory, and then the
• 3:53
  Speaker 3: loan stranger comes into town and he's the best sword
• 3:56
  Speaker 3: in the West, and he can. He just happens in
• 3:59
  Speaker 3: the town and he decides he going to take everybody out.
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: Just for kicks.
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: And the money's not even an The money's a plus
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: to him. He's just doing this because he feels like
• 4:06
  Speaker 3: it's entertaining, what the heck, right, And he can take
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: a beating too, and you know, come back and stronger
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: than ever. So yeah, I mean, I love what the
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: music's doing here because I honestly heard in the music
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: stuff that was very recognizable for what the filmmaker expected
• 4:25
  Speaker 3: me to experience during it.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I was I was taking aback. I'm not saying
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: I didn't like it, but it was none at all
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: what I was expecting. And I tried not to hate it.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: And I'm not trying to sound cheeky there, like I'm
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: not trying to be a jerk, but I try to be.
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: Like, okay, all right, all right, here we go.
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: I was like I was trying to pump myself up.
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: It's like when you when you heard the enterprise theme
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: for the first time, you're like, okay, all right, yeah,
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: let's we're doing something different. Okay, Faith of the Heart.
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: But okay, now that we've gotten out out of the way.
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: We've talked about the music, John, have you heard Have
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: you seen this before?
• 5:04
  Speaker 3: I've seen so many things that were influenced by it
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: up to and including the Bruce Willis film Last Man Standing,
• 5:12
  Speaker 3: But I can, uh, you know, I haven't seen this before. No,
• 5:17
  Speaker 3: but this is definitely the one where I this is
• 5:22
  Speaker 3: the first time I've had the fully the full experience
• 5:25
  Speaker 3: that I did with Hidden Fortresses opening, where I was like, oh, oh,
• 5:29
  Speaker 3: you just lifted this gotcha, Like it's it's very recognizable.
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: Darren, What did you know about this movie before you
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: went into it?
• 5:37
  Speaker 4: I like misnew things about it. I think I thought
• 5:41
  Speaker 4: that this was the character with the big sword, but
• 5:43
  Speaker 4: that's the same actor in Seventh Samurai, So that's they're
• 5:48
  Speaker 4: all in black and white. It's really hard for me
• 5:50
  Speaker 4: to tell, No, but I did know that this was
• 5:54
  Speaker 4: the Western one, like I had heard that before that
• 5:58
  Speaker 4: this was heavily influential in many in many Westerns as
• 6:04
  Speaker 4: well as Yeah, just and I think they're right where
• 6:08
  Speaker 4: you could put a little grease on the lens and
• 6:12
  Speaker 4: pretend the swords are guns, and it's it's really culturally
• 6:17
  Speaker 4: it's a Western. It is so strong coming through, but
• 6:22
  Speaker 4: I like how it's also has a lot of humor.
• 6:25
  Speaker 4: I love him sitting in that little mid town tower
• 6:30
  Speaker 4: laughing at everybody. It's like the craziest and I coldly picture.
• 6:36
  Speaker 4: I guess John Wayne is going to be our standing
• 6:37
  Speaker 4: because we keep saying, I'm picturing him in the town
• 6:41
  Speaker 4: water tower doing the exact same thing, like climbing up
• 6:45
  Speaker 4: and just scoping it out.
• 6:47
  Speaker 3: I what I think is super interesting about it is
• 6:50
  Speaker 3: that the lens by which I've experienced this films, the
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: most number of remakes that I've seen, or the at
• 6:57
  Speaker 3: least or acknowledged, are from this spaghetti westerns. So that
• 7:01
  Speaker 3: in and of itself speaks of a wild, real, like
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: super cross cultural sort of thing going on, because it's
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: not just American film. It's also the ripoffs of American film.
• 7:12
  Speaker 3: We're consciously ripping this off too, So it's like it's
• 7:15
  Speaker 3: this wonderful stew of all of these different things going
• 7:20
  Speaker 3: on that you know, whether it's Clint Eastwood making it
• 7:24
  Speaker 3: his name as the Man with No Name, and we
• 7:27
  Speaker 3: have a man with no name here who takes his
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: name from what he's looking at when he's when he's
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: trying to decide what they can call him and everything
• 7:35
  Speaker 3: like it's it's so wild and like I've actually, you know,
• 7:39
  Speaker 3: read through a couple of other things that this this
• 7:41
  Speaker 3: directly influenced. I'm like, okay, I got to see those
• 7:44
  Speaker 3: now too, because having seen your Jimbo now, I'm like,
• 7:47
  Speaker 3: all right. It seems like when when a rock act
• 7:51
  Speaker 3: remakes a really you know, solid song, you're always interested.
• 7:55
  Speaker 3: It's like, all right, well, let's see what's your your
• 7:56
  Speaker 3: take on it? What instrument did you add here? That
• 7:59
  Speaker 3: sort of thing.
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: I like that.
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: I like that, Yeah, this is this is one of
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: those things where you know, like when you look at
• 8:06
  Speaker 2: seven Samurai and when you look at Rashamon, like it's
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: it's so much of our part of our culture and
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: a part of cinematic culture, that you know about it,
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: even if you don't know everything about it, you know
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: a little bit about it. Jimbo I nothing zero. I
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: had no knowledge. I don't even remember seeing a poster.
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: I didn't read the description, like, I did no research
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: prior to watching it. I went in completely cold, and
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: so it was interesting to see it, go about to
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: see this this rown and wander into town, and I
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: kept wondering. As I was watching it, I was like, Okay,
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: where's it going to go now? You know, like, what
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: does he have left to do? How is this going
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: to shake out? So like, it did keep me guessing.
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: There was a There was a few times when I
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: was kind of not checking my watch out of boredom,
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: but I was just like, okay, with the with the
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: time that we have left, I have no idea what's
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: going to happen next. And I think that's a sign
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: of a pretty good story where you think you know
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: how things are going to go, and you might be right,
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: but you're still not one hundred percent sure. And when
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: you guys were watching it, did you have an outcome
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: that you were hoping for or did you were you
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: just along for the ride?
• 9:23
  Speaker 3: I can say that overall I was along for the ride.
• 9:25
  Speaker 3: But I knew that it would end with, you know,
• 9:28
  Speaker 3: the nameless hero walking off and being like, all right,
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: catch you later next time, kid, So I got that part.
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: That part of it I knew was a given.
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: Also because slightly mentally cheating, I believe Sanjuro is a
• 9:41
  Speaker 3: sequel to this. So I went into it knowing, Okay, well,
• 9:45
  Speaker 3: I know that this is you know, this character has
• 9:48
  Speaker 3: to make it out at least. But outside of that,
• 9:52
  Speaker 3: the way it bounced around and who got involved and
• 9:55
  Speaker 3: who took what side, now it was I thought it
• 9:58
  Speaker 3: was a lot of fun because it was truly that.
• 10:02
  Speaker 3: This is not I'm not saying the craft was like this,
• 10:05
  Speaker 3: but I'm saying that it was very obviously constructed in
• 10:09
  Speaker 3: such a way to make it feel chaotic, and chaotic
• 10:14
  Speaker 3: in a good way. There's there's chaos here. The reason
• 10:17
  Speaker 3: you feel like you can't guess what's coming next is
• 10:19
  Speaker 3: because it is like life, you know. He says at
• 10:23
  Speaker 3: one point, oh, well, I wrote the first half, but
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: then they came out and they rewrote the other half.
• 10:28
  Speaker 3: You know, like the best laid plans, nothing goes according
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: to plan, and so.
• 10:32
  Speaker 4: You know, yeah, for me, I don't think I ever
• 10:38
  Speaker 4: really knew where it was going, except for I knew
• 10:41
  Speaker 4: this wasn't going to be one of those times that
• 10:43
  Speaker 4: our hero dies like I can't. I couldn't see that happening.
• 10:47
  Speaker 4: So when they gave which I think is one of
• 10:51
  Speaker 4: the best sequences, the escape through the bottom of the
• 10:55
  Speaker 4: house sequence, I was on the edge of my seat
• 10:59
  Speaker 4: because they were legitimately portraying our hero down for the count,
• 11:06
  Speaker 4: like he's really injured, he cannot move at speed, and
• 11:12
  Speaker 4: I think it's funny. We recently, I've been watching a
• 11:16
  Speaker 4: lot of Project Till Mary, and when I saw it
• 11:20
  Speaker 4: with my daughter. You know, I've said, one of the
• 11:23
  Speaker 4: best things about this is they made you care about
• 11:26
  Speaker 4: the characters. Like the region you're crying over a rock
• 11:29
  Speaker 4: is because you those filmmakers did their job and you
• 11:32
  Speaker 4: care about that character. So in this I am caring
• 11:36
  Speaker 4: about that character because I am tense because I see
• 11:42
  Speaker 4: the danger and they're because many times, you know, we
• 11:46
  Speaker 4: see our hero get beat up and he takes around
• 11:49
  Speaker 4: to the shoulder and we do not feel the weight
• 11:52
  Speaker 4: of it at all. He's got such plot armor that
• 11:55
  Speaker 4: we're not even worried in this, even though, like I
• 11:58
  Speaker 4: just said, I didn't expect him to die. But I'm like,
• 12:00
  Speaker 4: I don't know how he's getting out of this. And
• 12:03
  Speaker 4: then he crawls into the you know, the chest so
• 12:07
  Speaker 4: that they'll think he's gone for a moment, which is brilliant.
• 12:11
  Speaker 4: Just all of that and the thumping of feet running
• 12:16
  Speaker 4: on the floorboards above him, just that whole sequence. My
• 12:20
  Speaker 4: favorite part of the whole movie because you and I'll
• 12:24
  Speaker 4: tip my hat at those moments to the director and
• 12:27
  Speaker 4: being like, look, you made me care about this character
• 12:32
  Speaker 4: right now, and that doesn't always happen in movies. I
• 12:35
  Speaker 4: think that is kind of rare, actually, So he did
• 12:39
  Speaker 4: a great job in that sequence.
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: So one thing that I kind of harped on last
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: week with Hidden Fortress was the use of tohoscope, and
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: I do want to say that this film I did
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: not have that gripe at all. I felt like this
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: perfectly utilized Toho scope, the wide aspect ratio, and it
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: was pretty amazing what they could do with the left,
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: the right, the center, and the Z space. And when
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: he was in the restaurant and the restauranteur was giving
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: exposition basically so that the audience would get caught up
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: on you know, who was who and what was what,
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: moving around like a tracking left trucking left, panning left
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: and right as he's opening windows, going back and forth
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: and seeing it from his perspective. That was perfectly done.
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: And then when you have when you have the bodyguard
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: sitting there and the like, it starts up up top
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: where he's standing and everything is perfect in the frame
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: there's no wasted space, like even though he's the only
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: one in the room, there's no wasted space like you
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: see you see a mantle, you see that, the tables,
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: everything's framed perfectly. And then he sits down and the
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: camera follows him in his seat. It's almost Finchi esque
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: in the way that it happened, and you think like, oh, well,
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: now there's going to be Sympty space. But then as
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: he's sitting down, you reveal a fireplace in the lower right,
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: and you hear somebody say mommy, and the camera pans
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: just a little bit more to the right, and boom,
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: a kid runs into frame, and it's just it's perfect execution.
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: And so it's not only really great framing, it's perfect
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: execution within the movement and this whole movie. I think
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: this movie has to be his best shot film. Personally.
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: I feel like seven Samurai had better shots in it,
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: but this film was the most consistently good and well
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: executed film cinematically.
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: Isn't this the first?
• 14:48
  Speaker 3: It didn't he get the isn't it the DP from
• 14:51
  Speaker 3: Rashaman rejoins him for this one, But I think that
• 14:55
  Speaker 3: I think that switch happened with this so maybe what
• 14:58
  Speaker 3: you're recognizing is that you know somebody else sitting behind
• 15:01
  Speaker 3: that sort of like I did not have the problems
• 15:05
  Speaker 3: last week that you did when we were talking about
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: Hidden Fortress, you heartless, heartless person. But I can say
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: that I track exactly with what you are talking about here,
• 15:16
  Speaker 3: and you get a sense very much of It's like
• 15:20
  Speaker 3: having Roger Deacons come in. When you find out Deacons
• 15:24
  Speaker 3: is attached to a film, you're like, Oh, this one,
• 15:26
  Speaker 3: all right, this is going to be like next level good.
• 15:29
  Speaker 3: I think that you might be seeing that here where
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: it's like it. I think Hidden Fortress looks great, but
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: I can readily acknowledge everything that you're talking about here
• 15:39
  Speaker 3: where it's like, oh, but this this actually just looks
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: even better in terms of, you know, the staging, in
• 15:45
  Speaker 3: terms of the camera movement, in terms of everything. I
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: think that it is even really super interesting because it
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: does pop out at you in that scene that you're
• 15:56
  Speaker 3: talking about where they're walking around the R space and
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: it's like this side of the road is this this
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: side of the road is that? Giving you that sense
• 16:05
  Speaker 3: of place that it never violates throughout the rest of
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: the film. They lay it out for you descriptively, and
• 16:13
  Speaker 3: then when you're going around, you're like, oh, okay, well
• 16:15
  Speaker 3: there's the shop. Okay, and they said it was over here. Okay,
• 16:18
  Speaker 3: I get where I am right now.
• 16:21
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm I mean, I just wax poetically about you know,
• 16:25
  Speaker 4: the escape in the house scene. This this was my
• 16:28
  Speaker 4: second favorite. Was everything in the restaurant. Every time they
• 16:32
  Speaker 4: opened the slats and there was something else there, And
• 16:35
  Speaker 4: it was just like you said, interested in. Not only
• 16:38
  Speaker 4: everything in the restaurant was framed well, but every time
• 16:41
  Speaker 4: they opened the window, it was perfectly framed. And that's
• 16:44
  Speaker 4: what blew my mind because those are other actors ten
• 16:48
  Speaker 4: feet farther back through slats that have to line up
• 16:52
  Speaker 4: and not have their eye be like in the slat
• 16:54
  Speaker 4: or something dumb like that, and it looked yeah, And
• 16:58
  Speaker 4: I felt like I was an observer sitting there with
• 17:02
  Speaker 4: him as he's kind of clandescin oh man, that's a
• 17:07
  Speaker 4: word with secrecy in the style of the ninja watching.
• 17:14
  Speaker 4: But as he's watching them, Yeah, you felt him sizing
• 17:19
  Speaker 4: up the town, which was really really cool. And yeah,
• 17:23
  Speaker 4: I mean, you know, you guys know me, I'm a
• 17:25
  Speaker 4: sucker for placement and where am I in space?
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: I really like that.
• 17:30
  Speaker 4: And like you said, John, you knew, Oh, the brewery
• 17:33
  Speaker 4: is over there, and the house is over there, and
• 17:35
  Speaker 4: they're at this end of the street and there's the
• 17:38
  Speaker 4: I'm not water tower, but the climbing pole next to
• 17:42
  Speaker 4: the bell. I guess.
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: Crosy there you go.
• 17:46
  Speaker 4: So yeah, I love that sequence. I could. I mean,
• 17:50
  Speaker 4: if I was making a film, I would probably want
• 17:52
  Speaker 4: to incorporate that and put my person, you know in
• 17:57
  Speaker 4: put him in the middle of like a diner, on
• 17:59
  Speaker 4: the owner of something with like the wrap around windows.
• 18:02
  Speaker 4: Like I could totally see that in like a forties
• 18:05
  Speaker 4: or fifties style, Like that'd be glorious.
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I definitely agree.
• 18:10
  Speaker 3: And the thing is, so long as we're talking about
• 18:11
  Speaker 3: the sense of place, I do want to say that
• 18:15
  Speaker 3: Sake brewery scene with everything just like pouring out and
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: all of that. I'm sitting there, I'm like, well, you
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: actually absorb liquid through your hands and your feet. So
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: everybody there is just drunk out of their minds right
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: now because they're absorbing the alcohol straight through. And ssake
• 18:31
  Speaker 3: is pretty strong, you know. So I'm writing that part in.
• 18:35
  Speaker 3: But I love the fact that when they're taking their
• 18:40
  Speaker 3: revenge on each other for this this wrong that has
• 18:44
  Speaker 3: been invented, and they're smoking each other out, they're destroying
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: the brewery where they're doing all of this sort of stuff.
• 18:51
  Speaker 3: I love the fact that this idea of accumulated damage
• 18:55
  Speaker 3: pays off by the end of the film as well,
• 18:57
  Speaker 3: where the space doesn't look like a pristine version of
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: a messed up town. It looks like the actual town
• 19:07
  Speaker 3: got destroyed at the end. Which, you know, as we're
• 19:12
  Speaker 3: talking about influences and everything, if there's something that some
• 19:15
  Speaker 3: of the Western you know, films that were influenced by
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: this can be faulted for, it's that the payoff of
• 19:23
  Speaker 3: the destruction never really carries not never, but a lot
• 19:27
  Speaker 3: of times doesn't carry through the way that you're visually
• 19:29
  Speaker 3: looking at it.
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: You're like, I feel like that town should look a
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: little more messed up. This actually looks like.
• 19:34
  Speaker 3: The town had a bomb dropped on it and just
• 19:37
  Speaker 3: absolutely at the end of the movie, I'm like it,
• 19:40
  Speaker 3: That's why it's funny to me. At the end when
• 19:42
  Speaker 3: he says, well, the town will be quiet for now,
• 19:44
  Speaker 3: I'm like, well, everybody's dead and all the buildings are
• 19:47
  Speaker 3: going background. Oh well, but that, but but that gets
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: to another thing where I think this has a great
• 19:56
  Speaker 3: sense of humor about it, like this is all told
• 19:59
  Speaker 3: with the wink toward the audience. I think I think
• 20:02
  Speaker 3: that Kurrasawa was having I could be way off base.
• 20:05
  Speaker 3: I'm gonna read some sort of back end article that
• 20:08
  Speaker 3: talks about how he was like really sad during the
• 20:09
  Speaker 3: making of this or whatever, but like this is this
• 20:12
  Speaker 3: has the biggest sense of fun of the movies that
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: we've watched so far. This feels like Carasawa just having
• 20:19
  Speaker 3: a time and just you know, going at it and
• 20:22
  Speaker 3: having fun with it.
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: I want to talk about the scene where the kid
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: comes in and he says, mommy, and then all of
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: a sudden, you know, the restaurantur comes by and says like, oh,
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: she's out there, take a look, and then we see
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: her get captured as we see her like you know,
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: being pulled by rope and then she's desperately trying to
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: get to her husband and kid, and then they try
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: to do some sort of exchange. When you guys were
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: watching that, did you feel like you missed something or
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: did you did you know that it was going to
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: be revealed later? Like because to me, I was so
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: absolutely confused. I felt like, did I skip a chapter?
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: Like did I hit my remote? I didn't know what
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: was going on. I had no idea why we needed
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: to care about this person or what her story was.
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: In my way off base? Was I trying to jump
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: the gun? What did you guys feel in that moment?
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: No, it's jarring.
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: I just think that in modern films they would have
• 21:22
  Speaker 3: had a scene describing it, so that when the kids
• 21:26
  Speaker 3: showed up, you'd have been like, Oh, there's the kid
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: they were talking about earlier.
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: Oh, oh yeah, she's a mom.
• 21:31
  Speaker 3: I I'll weigh in and just say that I get that,
• 21:35
  Speaker 3: and I agree with you. Like when he first started
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: like clamoring at the window, I was like, wait what,
• 21:40
  Speaker 3: But then I realized that was actually a pretty cool
• 21:42
  Speaker 3: way to.
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: Peel back a layer.
• 21:45
  Speaker 3: Suddenly, because Senjuro doesn't know it, or yo jim but
• 21:49
  Speaker 3: or the samurai with no name doesn't know it at
• 21:53
  Speaker 3: that point, and so he learns it when we learn it,
• 21:56
  Speaker 3: and vice versa, and so I think that's I think
• 21:59
  Speaker 3: that was a very effective way to sort of slap
• 22:02
  Speaker 3: you in the face and make sure you were you
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: were still with them.
• 22:05
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think you're you are right, trusted. It was
• 22:09
  Speaker 4: a little jarring, but maybe it's along the lines of
• 22:13
  Speaker 4: instead of having a scene before, like John was saying,
• 22:17
  Speaker 4: which kind of preps us, there was no prep So
• 22:20
  Speaker 4: we got the inciting incident for that family at the
• 22:23
  Speaker 4: same time as our hero is learning who they are,
• 22:27
  Speaker 4: and it just didn't quite gel. You know, it got there.
• 22:31
  Speaker 4: I mean, I think the payoff with the fake fight.
• 22:36
  Speaker 4: You know, a bunch of people jumped jumped me, you know,
• 22:39
  Speaker 4: that is the payoff far later. But yeah, we we
• 22:46
  Speaker 4: didn't have enough time invested in this family of idiots
• 22:50
  Speaker 4: who don't leave town when he says, you know.
• 22:52
  Speaker 3: But yeah, anyway, yeah that yeah, I think that the
• 23:00
  Speaker 3: the scene where he says, oh, yeah, all six guys
• 23:03
  Speaker 3: were killed and they got away, you better go tell
• 23:05
  Speaker 3: your brother, and the guy runs off and he looks
• 23:09
  Speaker 3: and you know, basically he goes in the room. He's like, well, sorry, guys,
• 23:12
  Speaker 3: got to sell the story here, and he just murders
• 23:14
  Speaker 3: everybody's a cap.
• 23:15
  Speaker 4: In the elevator. Yeah, well we're doing this.
• 23:19
  Speaker 3: Sorry, I told him you were dead. Don't want to
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: be a liar.
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: Like it's just I loves it that moment because you
• 23:26
  Speaker 2: could see it in his face even before he got
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: into the room, like as he was running towards it,
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: like we all as an audience, we all knew what
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: was going to happen, just like, oh, well, now he's
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: going to have to make that happen. It's it's right.
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: I thought it was. I thought it was really well done.
• 23:41
  Speaker 2: And I loved the the Citizen Kane moment when he's
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: destroying everything like you can just you could practically hear
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: Kirosawa behind the camera saying, Okay, man, we got one
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: take of this.
• 23:56
  Speaker 4: Yeah, good point.
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: We're not doing this again the trip.
• 24:01
  Speaker 4: Don't dub your toe.
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah yeah.
• 24:04
  Speaker 4: Although the one thing that came to my mind in
• 24:08
  Speaker 4: that sequence, which I love that whole sequence is, and
• 24:11
  Speaker 4: this is maybe me throwing logic at it, but if
• 24:14
  Speaker 4: I was the crime boss or whatever, I'd be like, Okay,
• 24:18
  Speaker 4: so here's my six guys dead. So they didn't take
• 24:21
  Speaker 4: out any of the other guys like they're so incompetent
• 24:26
  Speaker 4: that ah, they are literally slaughtered like I expected to
• 24:31
  Speaker 4: really sell it. I have one other person of your men,
• 24:35
  Speaker 4: you know, or the other guy's men dead along with them.
• 24:38
  Speaker 4: But maybe that's just me.
• 24:40
  Speaker 3: I attribute it to earlier in the movie, they sort
• 24:44
  Speaker 3: of address the quality of the guys because when he
• 24:47
  Speaker 3: first gets to town, the guy who's supposed to be
• 24:50
  Speaker 3: the constable is like, oh, no, no, no, those guys
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: are no good. All you have to do is like
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: cut off one guy's arm and they're all they're all
• 24:57
  Speaker 3: going to run for the hills.
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: Sort of thing. So I think that's sort of like
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: a carry forward moment.
• 25:01
  Speaker 4: So he's not surprised that his guys just got whooped.
• 25:05
  Speaker 3: These guys that I'm paying like a bowl of rice
• 25:07
  Speaker 3: and a penny a day, weren't that good after all?
• 25:10
  Speaker 4: Well, and you know, Jimbo also was manipulating in even
• 25:16
  Speaker 4: just getting out there of like, oh, you only sent six,
• 25:19
  Speaker 4: like you need to send more like, so he had
• 25:21
  Speaker 4: sown the seeds of mediocrity well in advance.
• 25:26
  Speaker 3: Yes, though, I do like the fact that you know,
• 25:30
  Speaker 3: as you say, the family of idiots, the guy with
• 25:34
  Speaker 3: the gun is reasonably intelligent, but everybody else in the
• 25:38
  Speaker 3: family man that is, Oh the cream did not.
• 25:42
  Speaker 4: I love the guy with the gun. I know I
• 25:44
  Speaker 4: should know his name, but he's the guy with the
• 25:45
  Speaker 4: gun because it I loved it because it added an
• 25:50
  Speaker 4: element of risk, because a gun changes the game, completely
• 25:55
  Speaker 4: changes the game when everyone else has swords and you're
• 25:58
  Speaker 4: the guy who brought a gun to a sword fight, like,
• 26:00
  Speaker 4: you're not invincible, but he could shoot you from across
• 26:04
  Speaker 4: the way. He could do lots of things, So I'm
• 26:06
  Speaker 4: glad they kind of singled him out as kind of
• 26:08
  Speaker 4: the mini boss of this video game that we were fighting.
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: All I could think of, and I'm sure Tristan did
• 26:16
  Speaker 3: at some point too, was Zoidberg getting the gun in
• 26:19
  Speaker 3: Futurama and going no world, you put your hands up
• 26:23
  Speaker 3: like that was basically that guy walking through the whole
• 26:25
  Speaker 3: movie like.
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: The gun I seek out.
• 26:28
  Speaker 2: What I was thinking about was another cartoon was American Dad,
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: where Steve the son goes to stand the father and says, hey, hey, Dad,
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: can you teach man to fight? I was thinking about
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: maybe learning some karate. He takes out his gun, just
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: throws it on the kitchen table and goes gun beats
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: karate every time.
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: Fair, very fair, But.
• 26:52
  Speaker 4: I'll again just also the method of him kind of
• 26:55
  Speaker 4: keeping it inside his robes and it was kind of
• 26:58
  Speaker 4: like always peek out, where the fact that you never
• 27:02
  Speaker 4: knew if he was aiming it at you or if
• 27:04
  Speaker 4: it was ready to go. But he totally also gave
• 27:08
  Speaker 4: vibes of if a real fighter came up to him
• 27:11
  Speaker 4: and got the drop of him and like beat him
• 27:13
  Speaker 4: in the head, you know, like took the butt of
• 27:17
  Speaker 4: his sword and just broke his nose, he would be
• 27:19
  Speaker 4: crying for mom, Like, hands down.
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: That kind of a person.
• 27:24
  Speaker 3: I gotta say, because you mentioned him, you know, peeking
• 27:26
  Speaker 3: the gun out from between the folds of his robe
• 27:28
  Speaker 3: and everything, and the fact that this won the Academy
• 27:31
  Speaker 3: Award for Best Costume Design at the thirty fourth Academy Awards,
• 27:36
  Speaker 3: I just want to say that I feel like we've
• 27:38
  Speaker 3: all taken a great misstep in fashion because those.
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: Robes look so comfortable.
• 27:45
  Speaker 3: You just pull your hand in like scratch your neck
• 27:47
  Speaker 3: if you need to, you know, Oh my gosh, here
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: I am using sleeves like a chump.
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: What's going on here?
• 27:52
  Speaker 3: Like, I'm I really think we got to start a
• 27:55
  Speaker 3: trend here based on this film, because that just looks
• 27:58
  Speaker 3: Really I think everybody would be far less dressed if
• 28:00
  Speaker 3: we dressed more comfortably. And this this could be the
• 28:03
  Speaker 3: moment where we go through. But yeah, it won the
• 28:05
  Speaker 3: Academy Award for Best Costume design. So yeah, I mean,
• 28:11
  Speaker 3: did that surprise anybody else? Because I'm like, is was
• 28:14
  Speaker 3: there really? Was there anything in the costume design that
• 28:17
  Speaker 3: really jumped out where it was like, oh my gosh,
• 28:20
  Speaker 3: what Well?
• 28:22
  Speaker 4: I will just say because for things like that with
• 28:26
  Speaker 4: the Academy, My next question, and really my first question
• 28:30
  Speaker 4: is who is it up against? Because for a category
• 28:33
  Speaker 4: like that, like nothing against the this movie, but it
• 28:38
  Speaker 4: really is, who were you? What were the other four
• 28:41
  Speaker 4: that you were up against that year? That is going
• 28:43
  Speaker 4: to tell me way more than anything I could say.
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: Okay, let's see here best costume design. It was up
• 28:53
  Speaker 3: against a bunch of movies I've not seen, so.
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: I can't speak one. I can't. I can't this week?
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: Did it?
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: No?
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: I'm sorry. It was nominated, it didn't win. My bad,
• 29:04
  Speaker 3: My bad, it was it was nominated.
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: It lost to.
• 29:09
  Speaker 3: Hold on a second here, Oh, for peat's sake, La
• 29:12
  Speaker 3: dulce Vita by Piero Girardi. So anybody else seen that
• 29:18
  Speaker 3: it's a Fellini movie?
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: No? No, Well maybe House of Fellini is is coming
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: up in the future, who knows.
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: So I really enjoyed the vast array of characters in
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: this film. I feel like that's a pretty solid let
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: me say, let me rephrase that. I think that's a
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: pretty standard Kirosaw affair where you're gonna have a lot
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: of interesting characters surrounding the main person, or it might
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: just be a straight up ensemble, you know, like Daren,
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: would you say that the guy with the gun is
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: the one that stuck out to you the most? Or
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: was there somebody else that you really enjoyed? And John
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: same you.
• 30:01
  Speaker 4: You know, I'm not going to necessarily say the guy
• 30:04
  Speaker 4: with the gun because he comes in rather late, like
• 30:08
  Speaker 4: he's definitely the second act like this, he is the
• 30:12
  Speaker 4: strongest part. But in the beginning, I mean, you say characters,
• 30:16
  Speaker 4: it's almost characteratures because the you know, the constable, Oh
• 30:21
  Speaker 4: my gosh, like I'm like Buddy fall out of Rock
• 30:23
  Speaker 4: or something. Geez, you are worthless beyond all measure to
• 30:27
  Speaker 4: this town. You are not contributing anything but him. I
• 30:31
  Speaker 4: really liked the say cabinet maker, but the coffin maker,
• 30:36
  Speaker 4: you know, even when he's also helping carry the body
• 30:41
  Speaker 4: or not the body, the jimbo inside and all of that.
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: So it's just.
• 30:48
  Speaker 4: I think, I don't know, I think the the cabinet maker,
• 30:53
  Speaker 4: you know, the mortician, as it were of that time.
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: He was. I enjoyed him.
• 30:58
  Speaker 4: Nothing against gun guy whose name I can't remember, but
• 31:02
  Speaker 4: he does come a bit later in the movie. He's
• 31:07
  Speaker 4: like reintroducing ourselves to secondary characters.
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: I think that the characters are distinct. I think that
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: they are strong. But I'll detour and I'll just say
• 31:20
  Speaker 3: that one of the great things about the film is
• 31:23
  Speaker 3: that there's never any question as to who we're following.
• 31:27
  Speaker 3: I think that there it's so clearly our main character,
• 31:32
  Speaker 3: like because there are movies where I can lose focus
• 31:34
  Speaker 3: a little bit, but I'll go back to the revelation
• 31:37
  Speaker 3: of you know, she has a son and a husband.
• 31:41
  Speaker 3: We're learning things with the character. He does not possess,
• 31:45
  Speaker 3: you know, omniscience, and therefore we don't either. And I
• 31:49
  Speaker 3: think that's the great thing is that all of these characters,
• 31:52
  Speaker 3: as I'm thinking through, Oh, who was my favorite supporting character,
• 31:56
  Speaker 3: I'm thinking of them all in relation to the main character.
• 32:00
  Speaker 3: There's no standout that takes away from and I think
• 32:03
  Speaker 3: of them individually. Everybody is related to the main character.
• 32:08
  Speaker 3: And but I do have an affinity honestly for and
• 32:12
  Speaker 3: I don't know they I can't remember the character's name,
• 32:16
  Speaker 3: but the very large gentleman who man handles him like
• 32:19
  Speaker 3: a rag doll obviously makes an impression because you're like, whoa,
• 32:24
  Speaker 3: that guy is.
• 32:25
  Speaker 4: Enormous and it's like the hammer hammerman.
• 32:28
  Speaker 3: Yes, the guy who picks him up by his face
• 32:30
  Speaker 3: and throws him around a few times, like you're like, yeah,
• 32:34
  Speaker 3: that's that guy walks in a room and you're just like, oh, yeah,
• 32:37
  Speaker 3: I'm not getting out of this one. This is this
• 32:39
  Speaker 3: is for good, isn't it. So you know, I really, uh,
• 32:43
  Speaker 3: that character really stuck with me.
• 32:46
  Speaker 4: What about you interesting? Did you have a secondary character
• 32:48
  Speaker 4: that was interesting?
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: I really enjoyed the madam who was in charge of
• 32:57
  Speaker 2: the brothel aspect of the business. I thought she was
• 33:02
  Speaker 2: super fascinating, just the way that she presented herself, the
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: way that she just like smacked her son around, and
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: you know, like was clearly an equal to her husband.
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: And I would have been intrigued, Not saying that they
• 33:17
  Speaker 2: should have done this, but I would have been intrigued
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: if she was the main antagonist of the film. And
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: I feel like this kind of movie easily could have
• 33:26
  Speaker 2: geared more towards that, where like, oh, they clearly bought
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: these women. These women are slaves. They're in a brothel,
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: and this man with no name is here to shut
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: the place down and get the women out. And only
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: thing between them and freedom is this madam. I think
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: that would have been I'm not saying that that's where
• 33:48
  Speaker 2: it should have gone, but that would have been an
• 33:50
  Speaker 2: interesting movie with these actors and with these characters. But
• 33:55
  Speaker 2: one thing, you know, John, you talked about, you know,
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: the town being wrecked and him joking about like, oh,
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: it's going to be quieter now. I had a little
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: confusion as to who this town was for, because once
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: you take out the gangs that are now gone or dead,
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: does the town belong to the coffin maker and the restauranteur?
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: And is that it?
• 34:20
  Speaker 3: I think they're the only people left alive except for
• 34:23
  Speaker 3: Cosabel Zuvio. Yes, I said that on purpose, and I
• 34:27
  Speaker 3: know I get what you're saying, but I think that
• 34:30
  Speaker 3: that is Maybe that in and of itself is a
• 34:33
  Speaker 3: thing that curs I was trying to say, is like,
• 34:36
  Speaker 3: once the town becomes so corrupt, you know, it's almost like,
• 34:41
  Speaker 3: you know, a league of shadows, a cleansing fire is
• 34:43
  Speaker 3: the only thing that's going to take care of it.
• 34:45
  Speaker 3: You got to burn it to the ground. The town
• 34:47
  Speaker 3: can be killed.
• 34:48
  Speaker 2: I feel like the messaging would have been improved a
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: little bit more if you if it was the kind
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: of town that had a lot going on, or there
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: was a lot of farmers that traded there or went
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: through there. We saw towns like we saw other people
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: from other towns going through. Maybe it was a trading post,
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: and like people felt like they couldn't even get their
• 35:09
  Speaker 2: business done there because it's just gambling and you know,
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: gangs and things like that. Because at this point, this
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: movie just kind of shows like, oh, maybe these three
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: people that are left, maybe they should just move, like.
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: Right, just go to a different times somewhere else.
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: I feel like that would have been simpler than you know,
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: killing everybody and then leaving a burnt downtown to these
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: three guys.
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: Now, that's a fair point.
• 35:35
  Speaker 3: That's a kind of a The movie got so caught
• 35:38
  Speaker 3: up in that part of the story that was trying
• 35:41
  Speaker 3: to tell that instead of writing one hundred and one
• 35:44
  Speaker 3: villagers backstories on this one curse, I was like, Eh,
• 35:48
  Speaker 3: people were here for the gunfight or a sword fight.
• 35:50
  Speaker 4: Sorry, no, you're you're not wrong. The town is basically
• 35:54
  Speaker 4: deserted when he gets there, and then they kill ninety
• 35:58
  Speaker 4: percent of the remaining population of the town. I have
• 36:02
  Speaker 4: to assume if I gave two seconds of thought about it. Yeah,
• 36:06
  Speaker 4: it's a farmer town, like and none of the farmers
• 36:10
  Speaker 4: have been going into town for the last several weeks
• 36:12
  Speaker 4: because it's just too dangerous. You're gonna get cornered by
• 36:15
  Speaker 4: someone and they're gonna kill you because it's just being
• 36:18
  Speaker 4: run by the gangs. Because but we could have used
• 36:22
  Speaker 4: some scenes like in seven Samurai when they're hunting for
• 36:25
  Speaker 4: the Samurai and there's a million people there walking by,
• 36:29
  Speaker 4: getting doing stuff, getting things. But I think just unfortunately
• 36:35
  Speaker 4: how this story unfolded, we're already months deep into the
• 36:41
  Speaker 4: town basically being deserted, and I think that's fitting for
• 36:45
  Speaker 4: the story we were told. But it does also raise
• 36:48
  Speaker 4: the question that you asked Tristan, who is the town for.
• 36:52
  Speaker 3: I know there was some dialogue earlier where they're talking about, well,
• 36:56
  Speaker 3: who's he going to sell the silk to or something
• 36:58
  Speaker 3: like that. I think this might be another one where
• 37:01
  Speaker 3: some of the nuance of the actual dialogue is lost
• 37:04
  Speaker 3: in the translation. We talked about that previously. I think
• 37:07
  Speaker 3: probably if we understood Japanese and could watch it in
• 37:10
  Speaker 3: the you know, in the native tongue without having to
• 37:13
  Speaker 3: read the screen or rely on somebody putting those captions
• 37:16
  Speaker 3: up there, there might be something in there that we
• 37:19
  Speaker 3: are missing that there's a little bit more, uh, you know,
• 37:22
  Speaker 3: fleshed out to that. But I got I gotta know,
• 37:26
  Speaker 3: like violence wise, I'm setting up something. Here's a little
• 37:30
  Speaker 3: bit of a shaggy dog question, but like, did you
• 37:32
  Speaker 3: guys see it is there? Would you guys keep your
• 37:35
  Speaker 3: kids from watching this if they walked into the room,
• 37:37
  Speaker 3: Like is the violence across a.
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: Line for you? Or anything like that? And I because
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: I'm building to a point.
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: I mean, I like how I mean, I think we're
• 37:49
  Speaker 2: so used to Tarantino right with the sword that it's
• 37:54
  Speaker 2: refreshing to see it a realistic three where like when
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: the bodyguard is just mowing those six people down, he
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: does it with such precision. There's no blood splatter, there's
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: like there's no one's you know, like there's not guys
• 38:11
  Speaker 2: that are coming out of a dude's head. It happened
• 38:13
  Speaker 2: so quickly, and the sound effects felt so real because
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: they weren't really there, like We're so used to over
• 38:21
  Speaker 2: the top sound effects and over the d visuals and
• 38:24
  Speaker 2: fast cutting. It was so refreshing to see what a
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: master swordsman would look like taking out six people in
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: real time.
• 38:34
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean I wasn't watching it through the lens
• 38:38
  Speaker 4: of boy. I wonder if my kids are gonna want
• 38:40
  Speaker 4: to see this, Like that wasn't even on my radar.
• 38:43
  Speaker 4: But I will say the most impactful death, as far
• 38:47
  Speaker 4: as I don't know, intensity is not the right word,
• 38:50
  Speaker 4: but impact is is gun guy when all of a sudden,
• 38:54
  Speaker 4: like he's in a puddle under him, like you see
• 38:57
  Speaker 4: it seep out and it's a lot of blood. Like
• 39:01
  Speaker 4: that's the most blood we really see, and it's like covered.
• 39:03
  Speaker 4: We don't see a gaping wound. But that was the
• 39:06
  Speaker 4: most where I was like, oh, like that was a
• 39:08
  Speaker 4: really intense kill. Like he is bleeding out as he's
• 39:14
  Speaker 4: asking for his gun that's just out of reach, like
• 39:16
  Speaker 4: oh man.
• 39:18
  Speaker 3: Well, the reason I ask is because there's a town
• 39:22
  Speaker 3: planned community Columbia, Maryland.
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: Grew up near there.
• 39:25
  Speaker 3: As a matter of fact, and if I recall correctly,
• 39:26
  Speaker 3: I think it was the actor Edward Norton's grandfather had
• 39:30
  Speaker 3: something to do with it. But in nineteen sixty eight
• 39:33
  Speaker 3: they held a screening and the viewers considered it so
• 39:37
  Speaker 3: violent that the hosts had to hide in a bathroom
• 39:40
  Speaker 3: to avoid the audience. And I just it's one of
• 39:44
  Speaker 3: those things where it's like I watched this and I'm like,
• 39:47
  Speaker 3: there's a lot of blood under him at the end there.
• 39:49
  Speaker 3: But like, if my kid walks in, you know, hey, dad,
• 39:52
  Speaker 3: what do you watch? That's old black and white movie.
• 39:54
  Speaker 3: I'm not like sweating my kids seeing this sort of thing.
• 39:57
  Speaker 3: And I'm like, is it just to your point and
• 40:00
  Speaker 3: where it's like we're we're so used to, you know,
• 40:03
  Speaker 3: Kill Bill levels of violence that we see this and
• 40:07
  Speaker 3: we're like that there is some blood whatever.
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: I don't know.
• 40:10
  Speaker 3: I just I just thought it was it was cute
• 40:12
  Speaker 3: to see someplace I knew wanted to lynch.
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: People at the end of it because it was so violent.
• 40:18
  Speaker 4: I'm like, early on there is the arm chop off,
• 40:21
  Speaker 4: which I could see that. That's my guess is a
• 40:24
  Speaker 4: parent saw that in the first act of the movie
• 40:27
  Speaker 4: and that colored them for the rest of the movie.
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: That's good point, That's what happened.
• 40:32
  Speaker 2: And conversely, when I saw the dog come out with
• 40:35
  Speaker 2: the hand in its mouth. I was like, I'm gonna this,
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: this is gonna be a good movie.
• 40:41
  Speaker 3: Like, well, what I really liked was there wasn't well,
• 40:46
  Speaker 3: there wasn't an over the top reaction. It was like
• 40:49
  Speaker 3: it was played as you know, the the you know,
• 40:52
  Speaker 3: as Yo Jimbo like sees the dog in his six
• 40:55
  Speaker 3: you know. Miss Fune's expression is like, all right, okay.
• 40:59
  Speaker 4: That's the kind of place, that's what's going on.
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 41:02
  Speaker 3: He's not like fretting, he's not suddenly scared. It's just
• 41:05
  Speaker 3: sort of like, all right, okay, this is where we're
• 41:07
  Speaker 3: going with it. Cool, cool, cool, Like I loved mffuone's
• 41:10
  Speaker 3: performance throughout the whole thing. I thought he is so
• 41:14
  Speaker 3: effortlessly magnetic from beginning to finish. I loved watching him
• 41:19
  Speaker 3: in this.
• 41:20
  Speaker 4: Yeah, no, Maffune. Maffune was really good. I'm not I
• 41:25
  Speaker 4: don't I'm not saying he's slower, but it's way more
• 41:29
  Speaker 4: tempered in his earlier work. And that's probably partially just
• 41:32
  Speaker 4: the character because in the beginning, I'm thinking he's the
• 41:36
  Speaker 4: laughing guy, like he's laughing all the time, he's jovial
• 41:41
  Speaker 4: in his killing. That is not this character at all
• 41:44
  Speaker 4: but I think it's like when when you see an
• 41:47
  Speaker 4: actor who's played more of a lighter role finally get
• 41:52
  Speaker 4: the dramatic role and you're like, oh man, this person
• 41:55
  Speaker 4: can act. Now. We all knew that going in that
• 41:58
  Speaker 4: was that is not a shock, but he's given the
• 42:02
  Speaker 4: material here to really be an interesting character that we that,
• 42:08
  Speaker 4: like I said, we care about, we care about when
• 42:09
  Speaker 4: he's hiding out of the floorboards.
• 42:12
  Speaker 3: Again, and I'll take that moment right there with what
• 42:15
  Speaker 3: you're saying to once again urge everybody. We're not going
• 42:17
  Speaker 3: to be watching it here, but go and catch High
• 42:19
  Speaker 3: and Low, which is another Maffune starring vehicle directed by Kurrasawa,
• 42:24
  Speaker 3: came out a few years after this.
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: All Right, Well, I feel like we're rounding third and
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: I think it's time to give some quick final thoughts
• 42:32
  Speaker 2: as well as our ratings. And I'm going to switch
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: things up even though I'm hosting. I'm going to make
• 42:36
  Speaker 2: John go first.
• 42:37
  Speaker 3: Oh you jerk, you awful, awful jerk. Okay, I love this.
• 42:43
  Speaker 3: This was a great first viewing. I loved actually even
• 42:48
  Speaker 3: the way the wipes were done felt better in this one.
• 42:52
  Speaker 3: Felt that like, I really think that as we've gone along.
• 42:55
  Speaker 3: It's almost like watching Nolan work, where you see how
• 43:00
  Speaker 3: he refines himself as he goes through. So I think
• 43:03
  Speaker 3: everything has been a very good sequence for analyzing Currosawa
• 43:07
  Speaker 3: in that regard. And I did really enjoy the music.
• 43:11
  Speaker 3: I thought there was a good sense of humor. There
• 43:13
  Speaker 3: was strangely enough to put it this way, there was
• 43:16
  Speaker 3: some fun in this, like I had a good time,
• 43:20
  Speaker 3: Like this is the type of thing that's like a
• 43:22
  Speaker 3: This is.
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: Like a popcorn movie, even though.
• 43:24
  Speaker 3: That's a sort of like a pejorative nowadays, but this
• 43:27
  Speaker 3: is the type of movie where if I if I
• 43:29
  Speaker 3: spent my money to go see it, I'm walking out.
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: I'm like, yeah, that was a good couple hours, not
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: a good time, you know. That said, that's sort of
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: the limit for it.
• 43:38
  Speaker 3: It's not got any super deep moments like seven Samurai
• 43:42
  Speaker 3: to it. It doesn't have like a philosophical thing that
• 43:45
  Speaker 3: really challenges me like Rashamon, And it doesn't have this
• 43:49
  Speaker 3: sort of like big, you know, you know, really unique
• 43:53
  Speaker 3: take on the epic the way that Hidden Fortress does.
• 43:56
  Speaker 3: So I really enjoy it, but there's a limit to it.
• 44:00
  Speaker 3: So I'm coming in at four out of five severed
• 44:02
  Speaker 3: hands in the dog's mouths.
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: Darren, your turn.
• 44:07
  Speaker 4: Yeah, this one I really enjoyed. It was I'll watch
• 44:12
  Speaker 4: it again. It was fun to just see him manipulate everybody,
• 44:19
  Speaker 4: Like when he overhears that they're gonna kill him and
• 44:21
  Speaker 4: take the money back, I'm just like, oh, here we go,
• 44:24
  Speaker 4: here we go. And it's just he plays it so well.
• 44:28
  Speaker 4: Although it doesn't help that I have zero context for
• 44:31
  Speaker 4: the currency. He's like, oh, ten of that. I'm like,
• 44:35
  Speaker 4: is that good? Is that like a month's wages for
• 44:40
  Speaker 4: a peasant? I don't know, So that kind of took
• 44:43
  Speaker 4: a little bit, but yeah, I mean the fact that
• 44:45
  Speaker 4: we can describe, you know, it's interesting.
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 44:49
  Speaker 4: I'll often say one of the marks of a good
• 44:52
  Speaker 4: movie is quote quote ability, and I feel like that's
• 44:55
  Speaker 4: been a difficult metric to translate to Kirasala because it
• 45:01
  Speaker 4: is not my native language. So I am not remembering quotes,
• 45:06
  Speaker 4: but I am remembering sequences. The sequence in you know,
• 45:10
  Speaker 4: where he's killing the six and then you know, dirting
• 45:14
  Speaker 4: it up where he's hiding underneath the floorboards and trying
• 45:18
  Speaker 4: to escape where he's sitting, you know, with in the
• 45:22
  Speaker 4: restaurant with everyone moving around those are ingrained, and I
• 45:27
  Speaker 4: think that is a good mark. So I'm agreeing with John.
• 45:31
  Speaker 4: I'm giving it for four hands cut off to prove
• 45:37
  Speaker 4: that you mean Siria's business.
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: I don't think there's too much more that I could add.
• 45:42
  Speaker 2: I like this was a fun film. I think this
• 45:45
  Speaker 2: is probably one of the more enjoyable ones I think
• 45:49
  Speaker 2: we've seen so far. In my opinion, I'm giving this
• 45:51
  Speaker 2: four out of five as well, because this is not
• 45:53
  Speaker 2: a perfect film. This is not something where I'm just like,
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: oh my gosh, this is amazing. I need to see
• 45:57
  Speaker 2: this again. But it's so well made, so well executed,
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: and has so many good parts that this is a
• 46:04
  Speaker 2: strong for even if I have some things that are
• 46:07
  Speaker 2: just like I kind of wish they did this, I
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: kind of wish they went down that road. But John,
• 46:11
  Speaker 2: you are completely right. It is really fun to do
• 46:15
  Speaker 2: this House of Kirasawa and see him grow and refine
• 46:19
  Speaker 2: and change his style as he continues and just keeps
• 46:22
  Speaker 2: getting better and better at his craft. Darren, what are
• 46:25
  Speaker 2: we doing next week?
• 46:27
  Speaker 4: Next week is going to be the end of the
• 46:28
  Speaker 4: House of Kirasawa. We're jumping to the eighties with kagamusha.
• 46:33
  Speaker 4: Here on house lights. Join the revolution, Join the net Party.