Toho pulled the plug on the project several times when it ran
over budget, forcing director Akira Kurosawa to go back and
personally argue with the board of directors who were convinced
they were making a flop. The movie is set in 1586. We learn
during the scroll scene that the real Kikuchiyo was born in year
two of the Tensho era (1574) and is now 13 years old. Japanese
convention considered a child to be one year old when he was
born and advanced his age one year each new year. Often credited
as the first modern action movie. Many now commonly used
cinematographic and plot elements - such as slow motion for
dramatic flair and the reluctant hero to name a couple - are
seen for perhaps the first time. Other movies may have used them
separately before, but Akira Kurosawa brought them all together.
Akira Kurosawa's original idea for the film was to make it about
a day in the life of a samurai, beginning with him rising from
bed and ending with him making some mistake that required him to
kill himself to save fa