7 Samurai (1954)

A poor village under attack by bandits recruits seven unemployed samurai to help them defend themselves.

This 1954 Japanese epic film has achieved near mythical status in the movie critic world being quoted as on the greatest japanese movies of all time. Despite its epic length at nearly three and half hours this movie serves as one of the supreme examples of the art of storytelling on film, the story and characters are so engrossing, the time seems to fly by quickly.

The poor 16th century villagers are fed up with bandits raiding there village the village elder tells them of a time long ago when bandits where a problem and the only village who wasn't ravished by bandits was a village that hired samurai. So some of the men from the village go into town to track down some samurai. They have nothing to offer the samurai except food and lodging. So the Samurai they manage to round up are kinda the rag tag bunch or down on their luck Samurai of the time. Yet their flawed diversity is what makes there characters so believable and compelling.

The film is Divided into three sections, the introduction of characters, the preparation of the villagers and village for battle and Battle for the village where the bandits attack in waves.

The Movie for a 1954 Black and white film is beautifully filmed, lots of wide angels and very few close ups or shots of one character at a time. the few Close up shots are usually For a good reason or shot inside

Picture Source: (2003 http://www.lovehkfilm.com/panasia/seven_samurai.htm)