There’s something wonderfully strange about watching a samurai movie where the samurai doesn’t really want to be a samurai. Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s The Samurai and the Prisoner takes the familiar trappings of the genre — castles under siege, political betrayal, questions of honor, and men with swords — and strips away much of the expected spectacle to make something considerably more story driven than action based. What emerges is less a traditional war epic but more a slow-burning murder mystery about leadership, survival, and the absurdity of the systems people are willing to destroy themselves for. Samurai and the Prisoner flips the genre on its head and creates a marvelous, touching, heartfelt and impactful adventure that the audience gets whisked away on for nearly two and a half hours.
For the majority of the film takes place within the castle walls, where Lord Murashige Araki (Masahiro Motoki) wants to stand his ground against the tyrant Oda (Bando Shingo), he gets banished and trapped within the walls of his own castle – Oda rises to power, and mysterious crimes start occurring and Oda’s army gains more power and control. However, with a traitor hiding within the ranks, Murashige is forced to work with Kanbei Kuroda (Masaki Suda) who is a brilliant but dangerous samurai and strategist who is held prisoner in the dungeon. Murashige along with Kanbei now and his wife, Chiyoho (Yuriko Yoshitaka) and his most loyal followers he needs to discover the plan that Oda has to ultimately stop it and ensure the safety of everyone and the integrity of the castle and its walls.
Masahiro as the films co-protagonist is incredible in his role as the exiled emperor, but moreover Masaki Suda highlights the integrity and performances throughout the feature. Their juxtaposition between each other, one exiled and one imprisoned battling one another but fighting a common enemy in Bando Shingo’s Oda – both Masahiro and Masaki are perfectly cast separately and entangled in each other to create a deeply powerful performance from both actors. They are working for the same goal, but never knowing which one of them has the upper hand and can get their desires first keeps the intrigue and adventure top notch. Bando is sheerly terrifying as the films antagonist, constantly being cold and calculated ensuring that he secures the castle and the village for himself, not knowing ultimately what is happening behind his back and ultimately closed doors. The power imbalance ultimately between good and evil here – is what keeps the film engaged and enticing for the audience – even if expecting an action packed masterpiece, the slow burning masterpiece cannot be understated here.
While Kurosawa deserves all of the flowers for his excellent direction, without having read the original novel by Honobu Yonezawa it isn’t fair to state how much of a faithful adaptation this is to the book, but the screenplay is nonetheless brilliant. If this is a truly accurate representation of something so multi-layered and dense it’s a miracle how tight and concise the movie ends up being. There is so much going on throughout the movie, but everything is calculated to a specific tee, there is not a second wasted, not a decision made without precise calculation. Kurosawa is one of the most exciting and interesting international voices out there, as none of his movies ever follow the same path, and Samurai and the Prisoner is no exception to the sheer and utter brilliance that Kurosawa continues to deliver time and time again, led by an absolutely outstanding cast.
