This week, we watched the film–Yojimbo. It is a Japanese film that I have never ever seen it. Usually I watch some Japanese animation, like ‘Slam dunk’, ‘Naruto’ and so on. In my opinion, filmmaker hopes to express a sense of positive spirit from the film.
Warrior belongs to a part of Japanese traditional culture. In this film, the warrior is purely to fight for justice and faith, to strive to strangers, his actions without self-interest, so in the face of the enemy, the safety are often threatened greatly, but he still dare to face all hardships and dangers. Warrior is a man who believes in his own strength and is intelligent at the same time. His desire for freedom made it impossible for him to go to the lord and become a warrior in the traditional sense. He chose a self imposed exile, dissipated in the world, they (throwing sticks and decide which direction to go), but his heart still a warrior. His intelligence and tactics are no match for anyone in this town. This approach is undoubtedly the evil warrior to replace violence with violence type, but he is free from the slaughter is not a person, his heart has the rationality of justice considerations. For example: when he saw a dog with the man’s hand, his serious expression, two people kill one evil cut hand before asking whether the paragraph thugs crime death, finally let go of the children of farmers shows that he is restraint on their own the power, in the “kill” more “save” existence together.
A samurai spirit is the core of “loyalty, courage, justice”, of which the most important is the “loyalty” to master, Knight loyal to the responsibility, “courage” and “righteousness” is to serve the warrior can be said that the highest standards do not depend on “loyalty” of the samurai what is he, for women and money in not worth a hair in his eyes, he came to the village is completely free of the titles, threw a stick as a guide in the tug of war between the two factions skillfully. After getting rid of what all don’t care, just say “this place and restore peace” after it has embarked on a journey, the spirit of Bushido dispelled only “courage” and “righteousness”, and therefore has more human warrior attributes, it seems like some Chinese historical persons. In Chinese traditional “wuxia” novels, there are many people who have a sense of justice.
I am really interested in your blog! Before seeing this film, I also used to watch some Japanese animations. I like the idea you talked about positive spirit. As I known, most of Japanese animations have positive attitude and spirit like one piece. This emotion is also well explained in this movie. Because we have watched two Chinese movies Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and Hero. These two films also depict Chinese style swordsman like Li Mubai and Broken Sword. I think they are similar in some ways. Because they all want freedom and they all have positive spirit. Do you think is there any differences and commons between Japanese warriors and Chinese swordsman?
Thank you for your comment. I think Chinese swordsman and Japanese warriors have some common point. First, they have different abilities than normal people. So they can do a lots of things that not everyone can do. For example, in this film, the warrior can keep the peace between two gangs. I think he is so brave and then he helps the poor family. Chinese swordsman also do some right things that help poor people and kill bad guys. Actually, I cannot sure they have some differences. Because they have common traditional culture. However, I can compare Japanese warrior and American super heroes. They have differences. For example, American super heroes do a lot of right things and people know them. But Japanese warriors help another people, they do not know the name of them. They usually prefer to keep a low profile.
Thanks for writing this, from the blog I can find that you’ve got a very good point of view of this movie.
The main character is indeed a ranger-style characters. Compared with other film made by the same director, the most suitable for the seven samurai only call the “warrior” , they tried to protect their own territory to protect the mentality of the village, and only in such a battle in the absence of these talented people again to recover some as a warrior The sense of presence.
The greatest place of Hezeking is the depiction of the character who are full of emotion but not favorably, and are not deliberately landscaping.