This movie is considered one of the greatest movies of all time and was certainly groundbreaking in many ways. However, for this viewer, there were too many flaws or distractions to allow me to rate it higher than a 7.
Yes, the story is well told, but the movie is too long. Some scenes drag on longer than necessary to make the point. There is a lot of setup to get to the more entertaining action scenes in the last third of the movie.
Some things that particularly bothered me and detracted from the movie for me were the incredibly obvious skull caps that many of the main characters wore. It was close to comical with some actors and that immediately distracted me and weakened the movie for me. Next, while Kirasawa is famous for his attention to detail and cinematography in the battle scenes, there were real weaknesses there. While the villagers had very long spears, they did not seem to use them to maximum effect, when simply ramming the riders with the spears would have been enough in real life to knock them off their horses immediately or kill them outright. They also would have used them against the horses themselves in a real battle. Then, in most cases after riders fell from their horses, even when surrounded they almost always were able to crawl away briefly before being stabbed. Next, despite the great potential for exciting sword fights between the samurais and the bandits, this was almost or entirely nonexistant. The samurais never really got to show their skill, other than single swipes at the riders or simply stabbing the bandits. A complete waste of cinematic excitement!
Finally, while presumably the bandits were in it to fight to the death, this is only hinted at and it just seemed idiotic for their forces to get weaker and weaker and yet they continue to attack with no hope for success or even a plan to win. I could not help but focus on how stupid they were and that it was obvious they were going to lose badly. The film tries to build up the drama for the "climactic" battle, but it is completely ridiculous.
Last, while the bandits have their "fort" destroyed by fire, they never think to use fire to defeat the villagers. This, again, makes no sense at all and was so obvious a solution that it was very distracting.
Another annoying factor was that the villagers were portrayed as completely pathetic, actually crying hysterically many times in the movie. They came across more as losers than people deserving of sympathy. I just didn't get the purpose of the excessive crying. Also, a few times the screaming of various characters seemed excessive and made them less realistic to me.
So, in conclusion, these were significant flaws to me that brought my rating of the film down. I consider it worth watching and overall entertaining, but just not a great film.
Yes, the story is well told, but the movie is too long. Some scenes drag on longer than necessary to make the point. There is a lot of setup to get to the more entertaining action scenes in the last third of the movie.
Some things that particularly bothered me and detracted from the movie for me were the incredibly obvious skull caps that many of the main characters wore. It was close to comical with some actors and that immediately distracted me and weakened the movie for me. Next, while Kirasawa is famous for his attention to detail and cinematography in the battle scenes, there were real weaknesses there. While the villagers had very long spears, they did not seem to use them to maximum effect, when simply ramming the riders with the spears would have been enough in real life to knock them off their horses immediately or kill them outright. They also would have used them against the horses themselves in a real battle. Then, in most cases after riders fell from their horses, even when surrounded they almost always were able to crawl away briefly before being stabbed. Next, despite the great potential for exciting sword fights between the samurais and the bandits, this was almost or entirely nonexistant. The samurais never really got to show their skill, other than single swipes at the riders or simply stabbing the bandits. A complete waste of cinematic excitement!
Finally, while presumably the bandits were in it to fight to the death, this is only hinted at and it just seemed idiotic for their forces to get weaker and weaker and yet they continue to attack with no hope for success or even a plan to win. I could not help but focus on how stupid they were and that it was obvious they were going to lose badly. The film tries to build up the drama for the "climactic" battle, but it is completely ridiculous.
Last, while the bandits have their "fort" destroyed by fire, they never think to use fire to defeat the villagers. This, again, makes no sense at all and was so obvious a solution that it was very distracting.
Another annoying factor was that the villagers were portrayed as completely pathetic, actually crying hysterically many times in the movie. They came across more as losers than people deserving of sympathy. I just didn't get the purpose of the excessive crying. Also, a few times the screaming of various characters seemed excessive and made them less realistic to me.
So, in conclusion, these were significant flaws to me that brought my rating of the film down. I consider it worth watching and overall entertaining, but just not a great film.