Seven Samurai: Limited Edition (BFI) (4K UHD Review)
- Review Date: Nov 26, 2024
- Format: 4K Ultra HD
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Director
Akira KurosawaRelease Date(s)
1954 (November 18, 2024)Studio(s)
Toho Co., Ltd. (The British Film Institute)- 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. The BFI’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 high dynamic range (both Dolby Vision and HDR10 are available) and encoded for release on a 100 GB disc (with mastering by Fidelity in Motion in NYC). It’s presented here on UHD at full 1.37:1.
Toho’s restoration is striking and a pleasing upgrade of previous Blu-ray releases (including the Criterion disc reviewed here at The Bits), though it falls a little short of the quality you’d expect from a 4K scan of original negative. Issues of the type you’d expect from analog films of this age are in evidence, 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. However, it should be noted that the BFI 4K release’s combination of restrained HDR grading (compared to the Criterion 4K release—also reviewed here at The Bits—which offers SDR only) and the better encoding by Fidelity in Motion make this the superior 4K presentation, at least from an image standpoint.
Occasionally throughout the film, you can see very subtle vertical lines that look like print wear, which have been left untouched. The photochemical grain structure too is intact and remains light to light-moderate, and the finest image detail is looks slightly more refined here. Texturing is lovely in wood, thatched roofs, costume fabrics, hair, and skin. But on the Criterion 4K disc, one of two things has happened: Either they’ve scrubbed away the wear lines with a bit of additional remastering, or the Criterion disc’s inferior encoding has obscured them. Either way, the lines are gone, and the finest image detail appears a little more coarse or mudding looking. (Note that the BFI disc features a video data rate that appears to be about 55-65 Mbps, or about 5 Mbps higher on average than the Criterion disc.) The result is that the BFI 4K image looks slightly more filmic, while the Criterion image looks a little more digitally processed. The addition of HDR makes a difference too—shadows are deeper and highlights are slightly more bold, both of which lend the BFI 4K image just a little bit more dimensionality. You can see this in a number of scenes, but one of my favorite is a moment later in the film when Kyuzo is practicing his iaido in the forest by flowing stream. To be very clear, both the Criterion and BFI discs offer a beautiful 4K image that represents this film looking it’s absolute best, with overall clarity and resolution better than I’ve ever seen them before. But the BFI 4K image has the edge quality-wise, and is certainly my viewing preference.
The film’s 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 audio is available here in Japanese 1.0 mono in DTS-HD Master Audio format. The track is largely clean and free of age-related artifacts, with clear dialogue. Composer Fumio Hayasaka’s iconic score is presented in pleasing fidelity. Optional subtitles in English (translated by John Minchinton) are also included.
The BFI’s Ultra HD release is a 2-disc set that includes the remastered film in 4K on UHD (a region-free disc, as you’d expect), along with a Blu-ray of special features (that’s locked to Region B only). No movie Blu-ray is included in the BFI package, but one is available separately. The 4K disc includes the following:
- Audio Commentary by Adrian Martin
- Image Gallery (4K – 6:10)
The commentary is a new track recorded for this release by the longtime Australian writer and film critic Adrian Martin. The image gallery is in full 4K—a very nice touch—and features a high-quality look at poster artwork, lobby card images, costume drawings, set and publicity photography, and more. Both are well worth your time.
To this, the special features Blu-ray adds:
- Akira Kurosawa: It Is Wonderful to Create (SD – 49:08)
- Philip Kemp Selected Scenes Commentary (HD – 20:15)
- The Art of Akira Kurosawa (HD – 48:36)
- My Life in Cinema (SD – 115:58)
- Original Theatrical Trailer (HD – 4:10)
- 2024 Restoration Trailer (HD – 1:36)
Akira Kurosawa: It Is Wonderful to Create and My Life in Cinema are legacy offerings that you probably already own on DVD (they’re included on the Criterion release as well, along with the trailer). However, the Philip Kemp Selected Scenes Commentary was recorded for the BFI’s 1999 DVD release and it’s quite insightful (so I’m glad to see it carry over here). The Art of Akira Kurosawa is also a legacy piece from 2013, featuring Asian-cinema expert Tony Rayns. The BFI release also adds the 2024 restoration trailer. (Obviously missing from the Criterion 4K release are their two exclusive commentary tracks, their 2006 Seven Samurai: Origins and Influences documentary, a few more trailers for the film, and the movie Blu-ray.)
The BFI package comes in a sturdy slipcase, with the film in a thicker UK-style Amaray, an 80-page book (with new essays by Tony Rayns, Cristina Álvarez López, Charlie Brigden and James-Masaki Ryan, plus writing by Philip Kemp and Jasper Sharp, and contemporary reviews by Gavin Lambert and director Tony Richardson), a double-sided poster (featuring artwork by Matt Needle and the BFI poster for the film’s rerelease), and a set of four postcards featuring scenes from the film. (I should note that Bridgen is a friend, and his piece is particularly good—it deconstructs Hayasaka’s score, and discusses his many previous collaborations with Kurosawa more generally.)
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, not to mention Blu-ray reissues of all of the director’s earliest works. In the meantime, the BFI’s magnificent Seven Samurai UHD offers a superior A/V presentation—better even than the new Criterion 4K disc (though that disc is excellent too, and I’m certainly glad to add both to my video library). If you love this film as I do, the BFI release is not to be missed.
- Bill Hunt
(You can follow Bill on social media on Twitter, BlueSky, and Facebook, and also here on Patreon)