Sanjuro (1962)

Director: Akira Kurosawa
Starring: Toshirô Mifune, Tatsuya Nakadai, Masao Shimizu, Yunosuke Ito, Takao Irie, Reiko Dan, Kamatari Fujiwara, Keiji Kobayashi
Certificate: 12
Genre: Samurai
Awards: None

In the follow up film to Yojimbo, Kurosawa returns to the nameless warrior in a new adventure. This time a group of nine warriors have been tricked by a criminal and are saved from assassination by Sanjuro who then joins them on their quest to rescue the sheriff of their village.

Sanjuro has a lighter tone than Yojimbo due to its use of comedy and lack of torture scenes. Mifune works brilliantly with the same character in a different environment. Whilst in Yojimbo, he was the lone wolf who could do whatever he pleased, here he becomes the leader of the group and, after an order from a hostage he frees, has promised not to kill unless necessary. These are new challenges and therefore new sides to his character come out. Nakadai also returns as a new villain - Hanbai - and again shows what a great actor he is.

Like Yojimbo, this film is quite simple yet it is a joy to watch. All the characters pique an interest whilst the action is as good as one would expect from Kurosawa; A duel near the end is absolutely stunning and worth watching the film for alone. It defies all expectations and shows how formidable Sanjuro actually is. I preferred this film to Yojimbo (but perhaps only because I did not know the plot so well) and it should definitely get more recognition when talking about the Kurosawa catalogue.

****Good

Odd Man Out (1947)

Director: Carol Reed
Starring: James Mason, Kathleen Ryan, Dennis O'Dea, Robert Newton, F. J. McCormick, Robert Beatty, William Hartnell, Cyril Cusack, Joseph Tomelty, W. G. Fay, Maureen Delaney
Certificate: PG
Genre: Film Noir
Awards: None

During the 1940s, Carol Reed made three films back-to-back which remain monuments in cinema. Odd Man Out was the first of these three, featuring an Irish terrorist named Jonny McQueen (Mason) who kills a man in a bank robbery before being shot and left hiding in the streets as the police swarm around looking for him. As he tries to get to safety, Johnny goes on an odyssey of the city, meeting a vast array of different people who react to him in many ways.

Aesthetically, Odd Man Out is beautiful. The use of film noir cinematography allows the city to look stunningly sinister, as if a threat is around every corner. Reed also uses some phenomenal editing techniques in order to bring about the hallucinations Johnny is subjected to. On one occasion, Johnny is hidden in a war bunker before it fades into a prison cell, exactly the same room. I can't remember the last time I saw a hallucination so stunning, due to both technique and the atmosphere conveyed by the film it becomes incredibly haunting.

The real high-point of the film, however, is the characters. In the beginning of the film Johnny is the main focus and Mason fills him with charisma. He makes creating a likeable gangster look easy and his unique voice is just as loveable as ever. Other members of his gang also feature to certain degrees and get there time to shine. Beatty and Cusack bring the best out of their characters and it is disappointing how little screen-time they have but it does add to the story. By the second half of the story, Johnny has grown weaker and says less and less. Mason still acts brilliantly with his body and creates a marvellous contrast to how he was in the beginning. With Johnny becoming less and less active, this creates a hole that other character fill in with exuberance. Perhaps most notable is Robert Newton's Lukey, a drunken homeless painter who wants to draw in order to capture the element of death. Ryan is also great as Kathleen, the woman in love with Johnny and tries to find him. The ensemble paints life into the nameless city as well as its problems with poverty that could be an underlying message from the film.

Odd Man Out is a milestone of British cinema that is often overlooked for its later sibling, The Third Man, although some - such as Roman Polanski - think it is Reed's greatest work. For me, The Third Man is slightly better due to the fact that Odd Man Out's ending is perhaps a bit too prolonged. One may argue that the film had deserved its drawn out ending but I think the pacing did take away from the ending somewhat. Nevertheless, this film comes highly recommended.

*****Brilliant