Feb. 8 movie: The Hidden Fortress. IFC was doing some kind of Kurosawa special, and I also taped Drunken Angel, which I hadn't yet seen, but based on the description I decided I'd rather watch The Hidden Fortress again. I've heard that this movie, about a samurai smuggling a princess out of enemy territory with the help of two peasants, was the basis for a lot of the plot of Star Wars, and it makes sense.
It was interesting to compare this movie with Once Upon a Time in China 3, which Georg watched last night (I was in and out of the room so I saw a bit of it). Jet Li as Wong Fei Hung, as is typical for Chinese action movies, is basically a superhero. He doesn't just fight bad guys; he's completely moral and upright, respects his father, saves women from foreign brutes, rescues puppies from burning buildings, etc. In contrast the heroes in Kurosawa movies are usually cranky bastards, and Mifune's samurai in The Hidden Fortress is no exception. In one scene the princess demands that Mifune rescue a young woman from her clan who's been sold into slavery, but he refuses. When the woman escapes and follows them, Mifune screams at her repeatedly to go away. He's not totally heartless -- he risks his life to save the woman after she sacrifices herself for the princess -- just unconcerned about the plight of random peasants.
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