Trivia for
Yojimbo (1961) More at IMDbPro »

• Later remade as Per un pugno di dollari (1964) or "A Fist Full of Dollars" (1964) with Clint Eastwood and as _Last Man Standing (1996/I)_ with Bruce Willis.
  
  
• "Yojimbo" is an uncredited film version of Dashiell Hammett's novel "Red Harvest". "Red Harvest" is about a detective who comes to a small city and sets two sides of a gang war against one another until both are almost completely wiped out.
  
  
• Tatsuya Nakadai, who plays the flamboyant, pistol-waving Unosuke here, also plays the main villain role in the Yojimbo sequel, Tsubaki Sanjûrô (1962).
  
  
• "Yojimbo" means "bodyguard" in Japanese.
  
  
• Based on the novel "Red Harvest". George Lucas, a known Kurosawa fan, filmed Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi (1983) under the false name "Blue Harvest" to maintain secrecy and to make an inside reference to his favorite director, Akira Kurosawa.
  
  
• In one scene, the samurai shows incredible skill at knife-throwing by impaling a blowing leaf against a wooden floor. This was accomplished by running the shot backwards. In the frame "before" the knife hits the leaf, you can see a slit in the leaf the same size and at the exact point where the knife penetrates it a frame "later".
  
  
• Akira Kurosawa challenged his assistant directors to come up with an image for the film to let Sanjuro know he was entering a bad town. He shot down all of their ideas, since all of them had already been done. Kurosawa himself then came up with the idea of the dog carrying the human hand.
  
  
• Akira Kurosawa told Toshirô Mifune that his character was like a wolf or a dog and told Tatsuya Nakadai that his character was like a snake. Inspired by this direction, Mifune came up with Sanjuro's trademark shoulder twitch, similar to the way a dog or wolf tries to get off fleas.
  
  

• SPOILER: The massive amount of dust seen in the film being blown about the wind was actually imported by the truck load from an abandoned firing range. When the massive wind-machines started it was nearly impossible for the actors to keep their eyes open because they were being engulfed in the dust. When Tatsuya Nakadai shot his death scene over the course of three days, the combination of the fake blood and the blowing dust made him break out in hives for weeks after filming.
  
  

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