Considering the scope and scale of his films, it’s a little
surprising that Akira Kurosawa didn’t explore widescreen—oops, I mean “Toho Scope”—until 1958’s The Hidden Fortress, a film that often fills the frame with vast,
vacant vistas of sand and rock. That just makes us concentrate all the more on
the four characters who are Kurosawa’s real interests. From the bottom of the
class system are Tahei and Mataschichi (Minori Chiaki and Kamatari Fujiwara), a
couple of greedy, endlessly scheming, and totally inept peasants. They want to
score big by capturing the missing Princess Yuki Akizuki (Misa Uehara) and
serving her up to the enemy that put a price on her head. Tahei and Mataschichi
don’t realize she’s already in their company, masquerading as a mute girl under
the watch of stern General Rokurōta (the ever awesome Toshiro Mifune). As the
quartet traverse inhospitable landscapes and foes, there is much action and
more comedic hijinks than you’ll find in any other Kurosawa picture, thanks to Chiaki
and Fujiwara’s cartoonish capering. But this is still a Kurosawa movie and
darkness pervades.
Although the peasants are ostensibly comedic figures,
they’re also really, really rotten, at one point drawing straws to decide who
gets to rape the sleeping princess. While classism does play a role in the
seedy portrayal of the peasants, their so-called betters can also be grey
figures, as when the upstanding Rokurōta allows his own sister to be beheaded
in the princess’ stead and doesn’t express nearly as much grief about it as she
does. On the flip side, a character introduced as wholly villainous is also
capable of noble heroism at a moment when he really seems to have gone
completely down the dark path.
Kurosawa hadn’t made a big crowd pleaser since The Seven Samurai four years earlier,
and this was his idea of a bit of good old entertainment. Indeed, The
Hidden Fortress often is great fun even as the characters’ immorality or
moral complexities make for uneasy fun. In fact, these days the film’s biggest claim to
fame is that it was a major inspiration for the ultimate fun flick. George
Lucas based R2-D2 and C-3PO of Star Wars
on Tahei and Mataschichi. Wisely, Lucas didn’t have his droids contemplate
raping anyone though.
As film historian Stephen Prince points out in his
commentary on Criterion’s new blu-ray/DVD combo of The Hidden Fortress, the film was also highly influenced by and
influential on American Westerns, which should also give extra inkling of its
action-focused entertainment value. Prince’s commentary is the most significant
new extra of this upgrade. The Hidden
Fortress was one of Criterion’s early titles. This new blu-ray edition
enjoys a 2K digital upgrade and the picture looks fabulous and blemish-free.
Old features include the Hidden Fortress
episode of the terrific 2003 series “Akira Kurosawa: It Is Wonderful to
Create”, which features interviews with the filmmaker as well as numerous cast
and crew members, and an interview with George Lucas, who like Prince, plays
down the direct influence Kurosawa’s film had on his. I’m not sure I agree that
the influence was so slight, though, and I’ll admit that some of the fun of
watching The Hidden Fortress is
spotting the details that would play a part in Star Wars.
