Last Updated on April 19, 2021 by rob
A terrific film that vaults into the first rank of my favourite Kurosawa’s alongside Ran, Rashomon, High and Low and Rhapsody in August. Toshiro Mifune is an absolute delight here as the scruffy, indolent, but-light-years-ahead-of-everyone-else warrior who rescues a bunch of witless samurai and then cleans up their corruption difficulties in local government. Two things I loved about his character; first, that he’d rather use his brains than rush in and kill everyone (an attractive trait that undergoes a brilliant and scary reversal when the rash actions of the samurai he’s befriended forces him to slaughter an entire roomful of enemy soldiers in one breathtaking sequence), and second, Mifune’s marvellous physical presence.
Constantly yawning and scratching himself, with a series of fed up facial expressions hilariously well deployed, Sanjuro’s’s purposeful when needs be but otherwise he’s like a cat that just wants to go off and snooze. For me one of the most delightful moments in the film is the scene where the other samurai run in and out of his room in a panic as an irritable Sanjuro moves from one corner to another trying to get some sleep. Mifune’s performance – even if it owes something to the previous years Yojimbo is a great creation and I love that the one thing that rattles his otherwise invincible demeanour is the presence of women – specifically the elderly wife and daughter of the kidnapped Lord, the former of whom admonishes Sanjuro about using too much violence(!) and puts a distinctively feminine spin on the final rescue. All of this in ways that only serve to underline that under that scruffy, bad tempered surface Sanjuro is – just as he was in Yojimbo – a thoroughly honourable individual.
And as good as Mifune is he’s matched here as he was in Yojimbo by the great Tatsuya Nakadai (Sword of Doom, Goyokin) as his nemesis. Even if you haven’t seen Sanjuro you may have heard about the final duel between them, about how it may well be the briefest ever filmed, it must certainly be the bloodiest (that fashion for blood spurting like a geyser from the human body? It all began here) and it’s a truly show-stopping moment. Elsewhere Kurosawa gets great performances from the actors playing the naive samurai. Best of all is just how tight the story is. From the opening scene everything clicks with the kind of ease and clarity one suspects could only have come from a great deal of hard work.
Perfectly paced at 95 minutes there isn’t a shot or line that feels wasted. Sanjuro seems to get dismissed by some on the grounds that because it has so much humour it’s therefore ‘lightweight’. I think this is very unfair because hard as it is to make a great drama it’s even harder to do so in the guise of a comedy. To deal with serious themes in a light hearted manner, to be able to pivot from comedy to drama as Kurosawa does so effortlessly here, seems to me the mark of a real master. So I think Sanjuro is pretty great and it would make the perfect intro for those new to Kurosawa.
