This movie has a reputation as kind of a mess. Admittedly it is a 2 1/2 hour broad comedy about paranoia right after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. In my opinion a 2 1/2 hour broad comedy about paranoia right after the bombing of Pearl Harbor was not necessarily one of the top two or three things the world hoped for as Steven Spielberg’s followup to CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND. But fuck ‘em. It’s what they got and they oughta fuckin appreciate it.
(more…)
Posts Tagged ‘Toshiro Mifune’
1941
Thursday, January 5th, 2012
Yojimbo, Fistful of Dollars and Last Man Standing
Thursday, August 9th, 2007YOJIMBO
and
FISTFUL OF DOLLARS
and – why the hell not -
LAST MAN STANDING
I’ve been doing alot of themed movie-watching lately and I don’t want that to grow stale, so I decided to mix things up a little. Three movies starring my favorite badasses, but from different years and different countries. Just a real variety of material here. YOJIMBO is about this bad motherfucker who wanders into a small town torn apart by two warring gangs, and he goes back and forth working for them, plays them against each other, rescues a woman from them then gets beaten up real bad but escapes and hides out and then tricks them some more and also I forgot to mention there’s alot of good jokes about the town coffin maker getting business from his activities. FISTFUL OF DOLLARS, on the other hand, is about this bad motherfucker who wa– hey, wait a minute!
Nah, I’m just fucking with you. Actually I thought it would be a good experiment to watch YOJIMBO and its two remakes all in the same day. See what happens. This is kind of a miracle of badass cinema we have right here. Three of the greatest badass icons – Toshiro Mifune, Clint Eastwood and Bruce Willis – all starring in the same story. Plus you got the directors: Akira Kurosawa, Sergio Leone, and Walter Hill ain’t in their league but he’s no slouch either.
You know, I’ve seen YOJIMBO before and I liked it, but it wasn’t until watching it this time that I really realized what was right in front of my nose: this is WITHOUT A DOUBT ONE OF THE MOST BADASS MOVIES OF ALL TIME (or WADOOTMBMOAT). And definitely one of the most badass characters. I mean I always think of Clint Eastwood as the very top of the badass totem pole, but you gotta take into account that the role that started that persona was based on Mifune in this movie. So he’s the grandaddy of it all. (more…)
Red Sun
Saturday, January 1st, 2005Pretty much every day, somebody comes up to me and asks, “Vern, what in your opinion is the greatest badass ensemble cast of all time?” They expect me to go for a big cast like THE GREAT ESCAPE or THE DIRTY DOZEN. But I throw em a curve ball with the best possible answer: HELL IN THE PACIFIC. There are exactly two actors in the whole movie, and they’re Lee Marvin and Toshiro Mifune. That cannot be topped. The technology just doesn’t exist.
Here’s a cast that comes pretty close though: Charles Bronson, Toshiro Mifune and Alain Delon. I mean, that’s pretty fuckin good, right? You could argue whether or not Bronson + Delon > Marvin. But there’s other people in this movie, not just those three, and that lessens the impact. The minimalism of HELL IN THE PACIFIC is part of what makes it so great.
However, this one has something going for it: Charles Bronson is a cowboy. Toshiro Mifune is a samurai. In the same movie. I’ll pause now for you to go rent the movie.
Thanks for coming back. In case you haven’t watched it yet, I’ll explain. Bronson and Delon are pulling a train robbery. On one car of the train is a Japanese ambassador guarded by two samurai. That’s got nothing to do with the robbery but while they’re poking around, Delon notices a ceremonial samurai sword the ambassador is bringing as a gift. So he takes it, and shoots one of the samurai that comes after it. Then him and some guys pull a doublecross on Bronson and take off with the boodle. (more…)
