Tsubaki Sanjûrô (1962)

User Rating:

8.0/10   

Director:

Akira Kurosawa

Writers:

Ryûzô Kikushima (writer)
Akira Kurosawa (writer)
(more)

Release Date:

7 May 1963 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Adventure | Comedy | Drama

Plot:

A crafty samurai helps a young man and his fellow clansmen save his uncle, who has been framed and imprisoned by a corrupt superintendent.

Plot Keywords:

Uncle | Corruption | Samurai | Rescue | Ronin

Awards:

1 win

Cast

Toshirô Mifune	...	Sanjûrô Tsubaki / The Samurai
Tatsuya Nakadai	...	Hanbei Muroto
Keiju Kobayashi	...	The Spy
Yûzô Kayama	...	Iori Izaka
Reiko Dan	...	Chidori, Mutsuta's daughter
Akihiko Hirata	...	Samurai
Takashi Shimura	...	Kurofuji
Kamatari Fujiwara	...	Takebayashi
Takako Irie	...	Mutsuta's wife
Masao Shimizu	...	Kikui
Yûnosuke Itô	...	Mutsuta, the Chamberlain
Akira Kubo	...	Samurai
Kenzo Matsui	...	Samurai
Hiroshi Tachikawa	...	Samurai
Yoshio Tsuchiya	...	Samurai
Kunie Tanaka	...	Samurai
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Tatsuyoshi Ehara	...	Samurai
Tatsuhiko Hari	...	Samurai
Kôji Uruki

Directed by
Akira Kurosawa

Writing credits (in alphabetical order)
Ryûzô Kikushima		writer
Akira Kurosawa		writer
Hideo Oguni		writer
Shugoro Yamamoto		novel "Peaceful Days"

Produced by
Ryûzô Kikushima	....	associate producer
Tomoyuki Tanaka	....	associate producer

Original Music by
Masaru Satô

Cinematography by
Fukuzo Koizumi
Takao Saitô

Film Editing by
Akira Kurosawa

Production Design by
Yoshirô Muraki

Sound Department
Wataru Konuma	....	sound recordist
Hisashi Shimonaga	....	sound recordist

Camera and Electrical Department
Ichirô Inohara	....	lighting technician

Other crew
Ryu Kuze	....	fencing advisor

Production Companies

• Toho Company (presents)
• Kurosawa Production Co.

Distributors

• Toho Company (1962) (Japan) (theatrical)
• Toho Video (2002) (Japan) (DVD)
• Toho Video (2009) (Japan) (DVD) (Blu-ray)
• Cowboy Pictures (2002) (USA) (theatrical) (re-release)
• Toho Company (1963) (USA) (theatrical) (subtitled)
• Arte Vidéo (2001) (France) (DVD)
• BFI Video (2003) (UK) (DVD)
• Criterion Collection, The (2004) (USA) (DVD)
• Criterion Collection, The (2009) (USA) (DVD)
• Palace Video (1983) (UK) (VHS)
• Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) (1975) (USA) (TV) (network premiere)
• Wild Side Vidéo (2006) (France) (DVD)

Other Companies

• Toho Studios  sound stages

Also Known As:

Sanjuro (USA)

Runtime:

96 min

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Perspecta Sound encoding) (Westrex Recording System)

Certification:

Singapore:PG | Australia:PG | Finland:K-12 | Sweden:15 | Switzerland:12 | UK:12 | UK:PG (re-rating) (2002) | UK:A (original rating) | West Germany:12 | USA:PG-13

Company:

Toho Company

Trivia:

In the scene where Sanjuro has to kill about a dozen of Kikui's men and then smacks three of the young samurai for forcing him to kill so many, Toshirô Mifune slapped the three young actors for real. As seen in the film, the slaps both surprised the actors and knocked them backwards.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: When the Chamberlain's nephew goes to peek over the wall to check if Kikui's house is full of troops, he supports himself on the wall which bends slightly, belying its supposed sturdiness.

Quotes:

Sanjûrô Tsubaki: He was exactly like me. A naked sword. He didn't stay in his sheath.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Kurosawa: The Last Emperor (1999) (TV)

One of Kurosawa's most polished movies

Tsubaki Sanjuro is, unfortunately, not so widely seen abroad (= outside Japan) as Yojinbo, probably because it was not copied as a western. In Japan, however, Tsubaki Sanjuro is not less popular than Yojinbo. Not a few Japanese actually prefer the former to the latter, and it's easy to see why: It is stylistically more polished and smarter than Yojimbo and Mifune is 'cooler' as well - he shows a brilliant leadership and every Mifune fan would be really delighted to see how his young, naive disciples run after him like chicks following the mother duck.

And while Yojinbo's female main character, Orin, is an evil and crafty woman, Lady Mutsuta in Tsubaki Sanjuro is 'irritatingly light-hearted'. But she has a deep insight into Sanjuro's personality and understands him far better than his male disciples. An excellent character, and, in fact, she is the only person in Tsubaki Sanjuro AND Yojinbo to whom Sanjuro/Mifune speaks in a polite form (in Japanese).

Tsubaki Sanjuro is, so to speak, a 'concentrate' of Kurosawa's cinematography and one sees in it every aspect of his greatness in a very compact form. Therefore no one could remake this movie.