Akira Kurosawa: Four Samurai Classics (Seven Samurai / The Hidden Fortress / Yojimbo / Sanjuro) (The Criterion Collection)
by Akira Kurosawa
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DVD details
Actor: Eijirô Tôno, Keiko Tsushima, Misa Uehara, Takashi Shimura, Toshirô MifuneDirector: Akira Kurosawa
Producer: Akira Kurosawa
Writer: Akira Kurosawa
Producer: Ryûzô Kikushima
Writer: Ryûzô Kikushima
Producer: Sanezumi Fujimoto
Writer: Hideo Oguni
Writer: Shinobu Hashimoto
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Subtitled); Japanese (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono
Format: Black & White, Box set, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 548 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2002-10-08
Audience Rating: Unrated
Studio: Criterion
DVD Reviews of Akira Kurosawa: Four Samurai Classics (Seven Samurai / The Hidden Fortress / Yojimbo / Sanjuro) (The Criterion Collection)
DVD Review: Awesome movies, but way too expensive.
Summary: 2 Stars
Awesome movies, but way too expensive for the product itself.
First, I bought it at a reduced priced, since it was left sitting on a shelve collecting dust for a few years in the store. They dropped the price from a initial $200 Can (around $150 U.S.), to $149 Can (around $110 U.S.), and that was the cheapest price I could find it in my city and by far. A few of the stores told me that their cost was around $149 Can, so it was able to buy it at around cost. Considering that, it was a bargain, so I got lucky to start with.
Now the movies, they are awesome, and after watching them all in two days, I felt sad, sad at Hollywood and the current level of movie making, after tasting a piece of history, with movies that are deep, funny, either deals with issues (Seven Samurai and Hidden Fortress) or don't (Yojimbo and Sanjuro), they are all movie gems. But we can also be realistic here, seven Samurai in my opinion is the real champion in this set, it has everything, it's epic, yet personal, it's deep, yet sometime funny, but always powerful and superb.
Now to the quality of the disk, that where it's hard to tell, these are old movies. But something struck me as odd, Seven Samurai (7S), was done around 10 yrs before Yojimbo and Sanjuro but looks and sound better, obviously, they cleaned it out a little before putting it to DVD, but then, if Yojimbo and Sanjuro where made 10 yrs later, someone should expect at least a equal quality, if not better then the 7S, but it's not the case, especially Yojimbo is painful to watch, the sound track has a loud background hiss for at least half of the movie, scratches as big as a straw that last a full min multiple times, the contrast and brightness is out of wack in half the scenes, it's a painful experience, you tell yourself how great the movie is, but is it ever ugly to watch.
So far I would give it 4 stars, why then I give it 2?
It's down to price vs quality and extras. No extras what so ever beside the theater trailer of each movie, and a commentary track for 7S, then nothing. So Criterion in my mind had two choice, drop the price to 1/3 to 1/2 of what it is now, or pick a better original copy to bring on DVD, clean it, and add extras, selling it to the same price it is now, but they did neither. They used for Yojimbo, a terribly copy, add nothing, and charge full Criterion price, BAD !!! So in the end, one fell like being robbed by Ronins. In my case, I wanted to see those movies, and own 7S and this box set was the only way to go about doing this, and in the end, I praise the movie, the acting, the story, the camera work, everything, except Criterion DVD who brought those movies it North America, they dropped the ball on this one.
So 0 stars for Criterion and there DVD product (in this case) and 4 stars for the movie themselves so my end review is 2 stars.
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