Toshiro Mifune
The Seventh Samurai
Curiously, the best player on the Japanese film classic, the perfect embodiment of the Samurai, was born, although Japanese parents in China in 1920. Toshiro Mifune symbolizes better than any other actor's brutal transformation that Japan suffered in the second half of the twentieth century, a transformation that after the tremendous tragedy of World War II led the country to evolve a system to convert almost feudal in the great power economic and technological it is today.
Toshiro Mifune came to Japan after the war, beginning to work on casual jobs until, almost by chance, I come into the world of cinema for 26 years, without any prior preparation. After some minor roles Akira Kurosawa was set at the beginning at that time one of the most productive relationships the modern cinema, a relationship that would be extended almost 20 years and crystallize that in 15 movies absolutely essential. Despite what its fruitful collaboration with Kurosawa, Toshiro Mifune worked in many more films, we will try to do here a necessarily incomplete summary of his singular career.
The first film together Mifune was to Kurosawa "Yoidore Tenshi" (The Angel Drunk), a heartbreaking tragedy of war in which there is an interesting duel with another interpretation of the players' favorite Kurosawa, Takashi Shimura, embodies a selfless doctor and the Mifune in the role of a Gulf fond of drink, in this movie already come out clearly highlights the tremendous talents of interpretative Mifune, giving his character an expressive and emotional rarely seen in the film East, El Angel Drunk is a direct and powerful film that still retains its full force.
Barely a year later would reach two other films in which they were returning to repeat the roles of Kurosawa at the address with Mifune and Shimura in the roles, "Shizuka Naro Ketten" (The Quiet Duel) and Nora-Inu "(rabid dog ), Two shocking stories inspired also in the shattered post-war Japan in which appear well-defined all the nuances of the work of Kurosawa, the conflict between tradition and modernity, between honor and freedom. Mifune gives these two new tapes show his versatility and interpretive ability, especially brilliant is his role in rabid dogs, embodying a cop tormented by the loss of his gun, perhaps Paul Thomas Anderson thought of this film to define the character of Officer Jim Kurrey in "Magnolia."
These early collaborations with Toshiro Mifune to Kurosawa gave a remarkable popularity in his country, and soon he emerged new projects, Mifune filmed in 1950 no fewer than six films, most notably, back to the orders of the great master the sensational "Rashomon "Brillantísima a tape set in feudal Japan in which a story is told by different characters, accentuating the contrasts and paradoxes of the Japanese mentality, a great movie, brilliant and visually stunning, with some of these levels of rainfall in white black and knew that only Kurosawa film. Mifune welcomes the new requirements to which it is subjected to the shooting (he had to learn different dance based on movements of animals) and strengthened its prestige comes with experience. Authentic masterpiece.
If 1950 was a year intense for Toshiro Mifune, the following seasons did not stay back, rotating between 1951 and 1953 a whopping 17 feature films, unfortunately many of these tapes are virtually impossible to find in the Western market and I have not had occasion to see Most of the films of that era, along with Kurosawa filmed "Hakuchi" (The Idiot) in 1951, a work definitely minor considering what was to come, and also worked at the orders of Japanese directors such as Senkichi Taniguchi, Hiroshi Inagaki Kenji Mizoguchi or more if it is expanding its records. In the mid-50 Mifune was already an institution in his country, an experienced actor who represented the ideal perfection all the values of Japanese society, a versatile actor who gave memorable performances in dramas, comedies and stories of time, a character already beginning to be known around the world, thanks particularly to "Rashomon", presented tape in the Venice Film Festival with more than a remarkable success.
Toshiro Mifune is best known for his roles give life to samurai, to embody the ideal of Tateyaku, strongly rooted in the culture of Japan, the ideal of stoic men, slaughtered at the service of his master, with the honor as the sole motivation, as single purpose. Since 1954 many of these films come, the same year Rodari two of the most fascinating of his career, on the one hand "Miyamoto Musashi" (Samurai: The Legend of Musashi) by Hiroshi Inagaki, part of the so-called "Trilogy of Samurai, "a sensational film which is described perfectly the birth and the trajectory of a perfect Samurai, from his humble origins to its final victory, a film and a fascinating trilogy with a truly memorable sequences, a saga full of action, love, a sword fighting and spectacular scenarios.
1954 is also "Shichinin no Samurai" (Seven Samurai), perhaps the work of Akira Kurosawa summit, a masterpiece in which he cast doubt on the strict and unchanging values of the samurai, a film in which the protagonists are weak Men loaded with doubts and fears, samurai without a master (Ronins) who find redemption in one last desperate mission, Toshiro Mifune here is Kikuchiyo, a crazy young man from humble origins who pretends to be Samurai to join the group, a false and tireless warrior taught many lessons to the real samurai. It also stresses once again the presence of veteran actor Takashi Shimura in the role of Kanbei, the old warrior who has to gather the group.
Little more thing you can say about this extraordinary film, there is an extensive bibliography has been published about her, but the best is still to return to enjoy the movie, a band that always brings new excitement to the viewer.
Between 1955 and 1957 Toshiro Mifune continued its relentless pace of work, participating in numerous projects, including the second and third parts of the trilogy Inagaki: "Zoku Miyamoto Musashi" (Samurai II: Duel in Ichichoji) and "Miyamoto Musashi Yori : Ketto Ganryujima "(Samurai III: Duel on the island Ganryu) Law & Order addition of three new films Akira Kurosawa:" Ikimono No Kiroku "(Chronicle of a Living Being)," Donzoko "(The Netherlands Funds) and the superb" Kumonosu -Jo "(Throne of Blood), in the spectacular film that is worth stopping, as was discussed in depth on this page, although he did not recall the most incredible visual force of a tape, adaptation of Shakespeare's Macbeth that exceptuanto "Dersu Uzala" is without doubt the most spectacular of its director, the scenes of fog, rain, the darkness of the forest, music, the violence of the battles, the betrayals and the hundreds of elements that come together in this film transported to viewer to a universe certainly attractive, Throne of Blood is for me the best film of Akira Kurosawa and one of the best roles of Toshiro Mifune. All of a classic.
The extraordinary success of these productions set in feudal Japan took Toshiro Mifune in successive years to embark on a large number of productions of this style, handing his appearances between films of Kurosawa and Hiroshi Inagaki mainly, with both directors, between 1958 and 1965 Rodari a lot of films to develop its role as a perfect Samurai, let's see some of the most prominent of that period:
Filmed in 1958 "Kakushi-Toride No San Akunin (The Hidden Fortress) from Kurosawa is another spectacular film adventure with herrantes Princesses, and a samurai disguised palette of characters and situations that many say served to George Lucas to help shape the universe one galaxy "very, very far away."
Less well known than the saga of Inagaki's Samurai is the saga of "Yagyu Bugeicho" (Secret Scroll I & II), action films gender impeccably performed, which served to define the so-called "Chamber", an equivalent of the Western United States.
Other notable films with Mifune Inagaki of that period are tapes as "Tanja Nihon" (The Three Treasures), "Osakajo Monogatari" (Daredevil In The Castle), "Chusingura" or "Daitatsumaki," among many others.
Next to Kurosawa, Mifune worked in the first 60 in a long list of productions of different genres, highlighting its role in Sanjuro "Yojimbo" and "Sanjuro," the story of a wandering samurai ruthlessly imposed by law on his sword for wherever he goes, Kurosawa returns on these movies to surprise unpublished introducing elements of humor in the usually too serious productions "Chamber".
As long as other "Warui Yatsuo Hodo Yoku Nemuru" (The rogue sleep in Peace) and "Tengoku To Jigoku" (The Hell of Hatred), intense dramas of social content, Mifune momentarily abandons his Katana once again demonstrated its breadth of records .
By the period 1958 to 1965 also have a curious movie, "Animas Trujano," also known as "The Important Man," a film shot in Mexico to the orders of Ismael Rodriguez, in which Toshiro Mifune plays a quarrelsome and violent farmer committed to being the big man of the people, to film this strange production Mifune had to learn in a record time to vocalize in Spanish, learning from their memory recorded on a tape, a film that beyond the curiosity of seeing Mifune with Mexican hat was no joke, is that important burden of social drama of the best Mexican films of the era.
In 1965, Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune worked together for the last time in "Akahige" (Red Beard), a drama in the line of the great "Ikiru" (Living), in which Mifune offers another interpretation sublime giving birth to a dedicated country doctor . With this tape ended one of the most fruitful collaborations in the history of cinema, Toshiro Mifune then founded his own production company to continue conducting productions that "Chamber" of irregular result.
Chapter deserve separate raids carried out by Toshiro Mifune in the U.S. market, the first of these was a secondary role in "Grand Prix" by John Frankenheimer, a feature film without too many pretensions that went virtually unnoticed, rather more remarkable was his second appearance (this same year) in "Hell in the Pacific" by John Boorman, a remarkable interpretive hand in hand with Lee Marvin who gave a magnificent result, the film brilliantly narrates the story of two soldiers during the Second World War (one Japanese, one American ) Who are forced to read to be shot down their aircraft and found themselves on the same island.
No doubt this movie was the most brilliant shot that Toshiro Mifune outside their country, then appear in roles with little substance in other U.S. productions such as "Midway" by Jack Smight (1976) or "1941" by Steven Spielberg, although his work continued focusing on Japan in their own productions with which it was not too successful, which gradually forced him to accept minor roles in productions of samurai of dubious entity.
Toshiro Mifune died in 1997, having starred in more than a hundred films, many of which have fallen naturally into the ink in this special that you just want to be a simple tribute to one of the most extraordinary actors in the history of movies.
