S2E25.5: Seven Samurai

just watched this finally and i was really moved by how „real“ the fighting felt, with spacing between people and everyone acting like the weapons were really dangerous and the reach being really respected by everyone involved. Felt like a fight going between people very scared of eachother in a really realistic way! feel that modern movies could really use a bit more of this in the future, felt so naturalistic!!

"The grain of last resort" is also a weirdly hard line, lol.

One of the other things that made Seven Samurai so important was that it came out in 1954 back to back with motherfucking Godzilla and cemented Toho as one of the most successful and important studios in the world. They almost went bankrupt making these movies, and then ended up making so much money afterwards, as well as two of the greatest movies of all time.

Its worth noting: The guy who screams at Manzo for calling his own daughter a slut, specifically noting that she had sex for love, is the guy whose wife killed herself in front of him because she was raped by bandits. Which makes his statement about love hit a bit harder...

I finally subscribed for this one, but haven't listened yet. I hope I'm not shamed into regret.

I only count five, maybe six samurai in this thumbnail. What a ripoff.

If you all do The Magnificent Seven as its own bonus at some point, I feel like the next logical watch would be Unforgiven and its subsequent Japanese remake

Listening to this episode really drove home for me how much I want to hear you talk about Lawrence of Arabia. I mean, it's not too similar to Seven Samurai, other than being very long, very good, and set in the past. But I think it's a perfect fit for KJB. It's about a British intelligence agent treating the middle east as a playground and developing an increasingly obvious god complex. It's explicitly anti-colonialist (to the point where it absolutely couldn't get made today), but simultaneously kinda patronizing in it's portrayal of the Arab Revolt in WW1.

Pretty sure Oglaf has already done Village of the Femboys!

This was a delightful treat. I missed Alice, admittedly. However, the opportunity to get to enjoy any of you fabulous folk digging into this film (which I usually rewatch about once every 10 years or so and always enjoy revisiting) was a delight. My best to Alice.

god this is one of my absolutely favorite movies. If y'all did other Kurosawa films like Ran and Throne of Blood I would be over the moon

If we’ve gotten The Raid and Seven Samurai, we need to see RRR. It’s maybe the most “dudes rock” movie I’ve ever seen, spent the entire runtime thinking about Devon

Was Alice banished to the lagoon, forcing her to found a more equitable society?

If you need a bad movie for a bonus, you have to watch Now You See Me *2* it tries to be Bond with Magic but is so so bad in ways that would drive you all insane. And fits with the theme of starting with sequels!

Yes! I love this movie so much.

I've really enjoyed listening to Devon and Abi figure out in the moment how to have a podcast after a solid 2 years of having a podcast. "Do you want to tell them about the duel?" "No! Let's tell them about it together!"

6 minutes in, and I realize that this film is what A Bug’s Life is based on

When Devon says Devon mode I instinctively raise my hands into the Mac shadow karate position

*ahem*: "The Devon Samurai"

so no alice? *smashs phone*

Devon: "Hello" Me: "Oh, they're going to tell us what's gone wrong with the audio on this one."

I'd really like to hear abis takes on kurosawa's shakespeare adaptations

Now you have to watch Yojimbo, A Fistful of Dollars (Clint Eastwood) and or Last Man Standing (Bruce Willis)

Another Japanese film which is quite long (though not 3 and a half hours!) and very well paced is the original inspiration for Speed -- The Bullet Train (1975) I think you guys would enjoy that, though how good it would be for an episode I dunno.

millet: the grain that kills you instantly

Glad to see you enjoyed those haiku style lines. They are indeed good™️

Baffled where Abigail would have read or heard Kurosawa didn't make any good movies after this. Even in the "directly heavily influences westerns" realm you have Yojimbo.

Now that both westerns and Kurosawa are on the table, part of me hopes for a Dollars trilogy/Yojimbo episode run

If y'all follow up with Magnificent Seven, then A Bug's Life would round out the three quite well ;)

After this I really want you folks to do “The Magnificent Ferengi” episode of Star Trek Deep Space Nine.

Hoping this is as good as the anime adaptation, Samurai Seven.