Seven Samurai (4K UHD Review)
- Review Date: Nov 21, 2024
- Format: 4K Ultra HD
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Director
Akira KurosawaRelease Date(s)
1954 (November 12, 2024)Studio(s)
Toho Co., Ltd. (The Criterion Collection – Spine #2)- Film/Program Grade: A+
- Video Grade: A-
- Audio Grade: B
- Extras Grade: A
Review
The Sengoku period of 16th century Japan was marked by near constant civil war and social upheaval. It’s in this time that a poor mountain farming village finds itself plagued by a gang of vicious bandits, who strike each season after the rice harvest to steal food and women. The village elder, Gisaku, suggests to the desperate villagers that they hire samurai for protection. So four of them—Rikichi, Manzo, Yohei, and Mosuke—take what little rice they can spare and head to a larger town nearby in search of the most capable—and the most hungry—samurai they can find.
But their search goes poorly until they meet Kambei (Takashi Shimura), an honorable ronin who they first encounter while he’s saving an infant from a bandit in town. With Kambei’s help, they soon find the archer Gorobei (Yoshio Inaba), young Katsushiro (Isao Kimura), Kambei’s old friend Shichiroji (Daisuke Kato), the amiable Heihachi (Minoru Chiaki), and the finest warrior and swordsman of them all, Kyuzo (Seiji Miyaguchi). Also tagging along to help is Kikuchiyo (Toshiro Mifune), a drunken rogue who isn’t actually a samurai but who soon proves his worth in battle nonetheless. Together, these seven samurai organize the village’s defenses and teach the villagers themselves to fight. But their task will not prove easy, particularly when it becomes clear that the villagers aren’t being completely honest with their protectors.
By any standard of reckoning, Seven Samurai is a masterpiece of filmmaking that remains as enjoyable today as it was when first released back in 1954, and perhaps even more so, given the luxury of perspective afforded by the passage of time. Not only has the film inspired two American adaptations—John Sturges’ The Magnificent Seven (1960) and Antoine Fuqua’s 2016 remake—its influence can been seen in everything from Jimmy T. Murakami’s Battle Beyond the Stars (1980) to Zack Snyder’s recent Rebel Moon (2023-24), and even a 2019 episode of the Disney+ Star Wars spinoff series The Mandalorian. Director Akira Kurosawa’s action blocking and his use of multiple cameras to capture his action sequences, not to mention slow motion to enhance dramatic impact, and his creative and masterful editing—including wipe transitions, axial cuts, and cutting on motion for emotional effect—were all pioneering innovations at the time, but have since become staples of modern action cinema. Consider the simple fact that this film clocks in at over 207 minutes with an intermission, and yet it never drags. That’s an achievement.
But it would be impossible to separate the greatness of Seven Samurai from the work of actors Takashi Shimura and Toshiro Mifune. Like so many of Kurosawa’s films, the story here is deeply humanistic—a smart and knowing exploration of human nature and class issues in Japanese society. Whereas Shimura’s Kambei is honorable, deliberate, patient, and selfless, Mifune’s Kikuchiyo is reckless, impulsive, and passionate… but no less willing to gave his life in service of a worthy cause. Both actors had been (and would continue to be) reliable staples of Kurosawa’s cinematic canon, with Shimura taking the lead in Ikiru (1952) and appearing with Mifune in no less than fifteen more of the director’s films, including such gems as Stray Dog (1949), Throne of Blood (1957), The Hidden Fortress (1958), The Bad Sleep Well (1960), Yojimbo (1961), Sanjuro (1962), High and Low (1963), and Red Beard (1965).
Seven Samurai was shot by cinematographer Asakazu Nakai (High and Low, Dersu Uzala, Ran) on 35 mm B&W film using Mitchell Cameras with spherical lenses, and it was released into theaters at the 1.37:1 Academy aspect ratio. Criterion’s new 4K Ultra HD edition of Seven Samurai takes advantage of a new 4K scan and digital restoration of the best surviving 35 mm master positive by Toho Archive Co. Ltd, in Setagaya, Japan, because—as is the case with many Japanese films of this vintage—the original camera negative no longer survives. Note that additional image restoration was done by the Prasad Corp. in Chennai, India. The film was then graded for standard dynamic range (SDR) only and encoded for release on a 100 GB disc (with disc mastering by NexSpec in Los Angeles). It’s presented here on UHD at full 1.37:1.
The restoration is striking and a pleasing upgrade of the previous Blu-ray (reviewed here at The Bits), though it falls a little short of the quality you’d expect from a 4K scan of original negative. The photochemical grain structure is intact and remains light to moderate throughout, though finest image detail is just a little more coarse or muddy occasional than optimal. There are others issues of the type you expect from analog films of this age as well, including a loss of generational quality in optically-printed transitions and a very subtle “pulsing” effect in the focus, presumably caused by either the negative going through the camera gate or the analog process involved in creating the master positive element. And given the SDR grade (10-bit, Rec.709), while shadows and highlights are decent they aren’t truly bold, yet there’s still a slight loss of detail. (Note that the new BFI 4K disc offers Dolby Vision HDR, though I have yet to compare the two to see if it makes a difference.) But even so, this is still a beautiful image—one that represents this film looking it’s absolute best. Texturing is lovely in wood, thatched roofs, costume fabrics, hair, and skin. There is pleasing nuance in the many shadings of gray in this image. And the overall clarity and resolution appear better here than I’ve ever seen them before, with video data rates averaging 50-60 Mbps.
The original monaural audio has also been remastered for this release from a 35 mm soundtrack positive, also by Toho Archive Co. Ltd., to reduce unwanted noise and age-related defects. That original audio is available here in Japanese 1.0 mono in uncompressed Linear PCM (LPCM) format. An optional Japanese 2.0 Surround mix is also available in DTS-HD Master Audio format. (And unlike the aforementioned Blu-ray, this is indeed LPCM and DTS-HD MA.) Both tracks are largely clean and clear sounding—the 2.0 surround mix simply has a wider presence across the front of the soundstage, with the surround channels adding a bit of light sound effects ambiance and in particular enhancing the staging of composer Fumio Hayasaka’s iconic score. Optional subtitles in English (translated by Linda Hoaglund, Masako Mori, and Kerim Yasar) are also included.
Criterion’s new 4K release is a 3-disc set, featuring the film in remastered 4K on Ultra HD, as well as 1080p HD on Blu-ray (note that this is the same 2K-mastered disc as before, which was framed at 1.33:1), along with a Blu-ray of special features. The two movie discs include the following extras:
- Audio Commentary with David Desser, Joan Mellen, Stephen Prince, Tony Rayns, and Donald Richie
- Audio Commentary with Michael Jeck
The first track is a scholars roundtable that was recorded for Criterion’s 2006 special edition DVD release, while the second features Japanese cinema expert Michael Jeck—it appeared on their 1999 DVD (and was originally recorded for the 1990 Criterion LaserDisc). To this, the Blu-ray special features disc adds:
- Akira Kurosawa: It Is Wonderful to Create (SD – 49:10)
- My Life in Cinema (SD – 115:59)
- Seven Samurai: Origins and Influences (SD – 55:12)
- Trailer 1 (SD – 4:11)
- Trailer 2 (SD – 2:57)
- Trailer 3 (SD – 2:44)
- Teaser (SD – :42)
- Behind the Scenes Gallery (HD)
- Posters Gallery (HD)
This is essentially everything from Criterion’s special edition DVD release. You get the theatrical and teaser trailers, galleries of production photography and poster artwork from around the world, a 50-minute episode of the Akira Kurosawa: It is Wonderful to Create documentary series on the making of this film, the full 1993 My Life in Cinema: Akira Kurosawa interview with the director (by filmmaker Nagisa Oshima), and the 3-part Seven Samurai: Origins and Influences documentary created by Criterion (for the 2006 release) to examine the history of the samurai in Japanese life and its influence on the making of this film.
The packaging is nearly identical to the 2-disc Blu-ray edition, with a high-quality paper slipcover featuring the banner of the seven samurai on the front. Inside, you’ll find the discs contained in a Digipack, as well as a reproduction of essentially the same booklet included with the 3-disc DVD and the 2-disc Blu-ray, featuring rare photography and liner notes by several film critics, historians and filmmakers (including Kenneth Turan, Peter Cowie, Philip Kemp, Peggy Chiao, Alain Silver, our own Stuart Galbraith IV, Arthur Penn, and filmmaker Sidney Lumet), as well as a 1993 reminiscence by Mifune.
While it’s next to impossible for any cinephile to pick a consistent list of the best films ever made, Seven Samurai would certainly rank at the top of any such list curated by me. Kurosawa is at his most brilliant, insightful, and energetic here, and that’s saying something. With its classic story, archetypal characters, abundant action, and powerful human drama, Seven Samurai continues to be one of the cinema’s greatest achievements, and it’s an experience every reader of The Digital Bits owes it to themselves to have. I continue to hope for more Kurosawa films in 4K from Criterion, not to mention Blu-ray reissues of all of the director’s earliest works. In the meantime, Criterion’s terrific Seven Samurai Ultra HD offers the film’s best A/V presentation to date. It’s simply not to be missed.
- Bill Hunt
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