wickedrum

tv show

PhoenixRising

I had an idea back in the 1990s for a John Woo-style action film based on the Dashiell Hammet novel, Red Harvest, featuring the detective known only as the Continental Op. It would be part film noir, part Sergio Leone spaghetti western, part Hong Kong-style action film.

Akira Kurosawa's samurai movie, Yojimbo, was inspired by Red Harvest and another Hammett noir novel, The Glass Key. A Fistfull of Dollars was inspired by Yojimbo, and Clint Eastwood's Man With No Name was based on the Continental Op.

sum1

Yojimbo is far from being Kurosawa's best film.

wickedrum

F1 race

PhoenixRising

Friends



That's very true. The Seven Samurai, Rashomon, Ran, and Kagemusha were all superior to Yojimbo, but Yojimbo remains one of his most influential movies, inspiring Sergio Leone, George Lucas, Walter Hill, etc.

sum1

I don't know about Ran and Kagemusha. Those two were part of his decline period. More emotionally distant stuff.

wickedrum

Playing with Fire

sum1

You watch a lot of weird sith.

wickedrum

some weird, some not

PhoenixRising

Well, they were his epics. They tended to do better overseas in the USA and Europe where he earned multiple award nominations. They weren't that well received in Japan, though.

sum1

There was only close up in the whole of Ran. The two films were physically and emotionally distant, which had a devastating effect io their quality, considering that one of Kurosawa's key strengths was his immediacy and his ability to get you connected to the characters. Seven Samurai was plenty epic enough and it didn't have that distanced bull.

wickedrum

Snowpiercer

PhoenixRising

Friends

Well, Ran was based on Shakespeare's King Lear, so perhaps that's what Kurosawa was going for, a more theatrical approach with fewer close ups.

sum1

Stupid decision.

PhoenixRising

Well, it was at the end of his career.