The Japanese critics thought Kurosawa's ordinary films were too Western, and with Yojimbo he totally broke the mold. Paced more like a comedy than a period picture, and peopled with characters refreshingly free of historical meaning, this swordplay free-for-all invented a new style of super-hero samurai warrior. The entire enterprise celebrates mercenary cynicism, as Sanjuro encourages bloody battles between two warring super-powers, cleverly taking money from each.

Toshirô Mifune plays the character lampooned by John Belushi on Saturday Night Live's skits - forever scratching himself and pulling his arms inside his tunic. Aloof, calculating, Sanjûrô always has one more trick up his sleeve. Just as in Leone's Spaghetti Western remake, the character isn't a clown. But most of his shenanigans win our approval and make us laugh as well.

The story is structured as a farcical fairy tale: the cagey Sanjûrô (Yojimbo = bodyguard) hires himself out to one warring faction, causes some mayhem, and then switches sides. Pretty soon he has both sides annihilating one another while he sits in the middle getting rich. But he isn't totally bad: Along the way Sanjûrô makes friends with a neutral barman, and helps an innocent couple escape the clutches of one of the evil families. Like James Bond, we know Yojimbo won't get killed.

Tatsuya Nakadai plays Unosuke, Sanjûrô's only real opponent. Somewhat of an anachronism, Unosuke carries an American pistol in the folds of his clothing and adorns himself with a plaid scarf. The character has been described as the film's proto-Yakuza.

Even as we marvel at the lightning-fast swordplay, we never take Yojimbo all that seriously. In one outrageous sequence with the warriors lined up for combat, one giant fighter carries an oversized Yosemite Sam-style mallet. I'm informed that such a weapon was indeed real, but it's hilarious just the same.

Kurosawa's storytelling style plays clever tricks with the pacing. The picture slows down for long stretches, only to burst into fast action at a moment's notice, and then subside again ... and the relaxed segments get shorter until the expected violent climax.

I'm not kidding about the 'similarities' between Yojimbo and Fistful of Dollars: Sergio Leone's western closely follows Kurosawa's script, and changes only a few details. Actually, Kurosawa's film has also been noted as an adaptation of Dashiell Hammett's Red Harvest, so where the borrowing began is a subject for debate. Legal trouble apparently contributed to a delay in the American release of Fistful -- we're told that after negotiations made Kurosawa a profit participant, Fistful became one of the Japanese director's biggest 'moneymakers,' helping him to finance independent productions like Red Beard.

Criterion's reissue of Yojimbo gives us a stunning copy of the popular action film and an excellent set of extras. Howls of protest went up when the 1999 disc turned out to be a so-so flat letterboxed copy of a tired 'Seneca International' print with a ragged soundtrack. The clean transfer is in a true 2:35 and the mono sound is equally clear. The film was originally shown in Perspecta Stereo. The extras inform us that Yojimbo introduced custom Whoosh and Slash sound effects for its whirling samurai blades, making each of Sanjûrô's killing sprees sound like music from an angel's flaming sword.

Author Stephen Prince provides a thorough and entertaining commentary. The teaser and trailer are here along with some stills, but the main attraction is a 45-minute installment of the TV Toho Masterworks series Akira Kurosawa: It is Wonderful to Create. Former collaborators of the director give us a run-down on his personality as well as relating anecdotes about the filming. Kurosawa used wind machines to throw up dust but insisted that his actors not shut their eyes; he auditioned the odd-matched music by first placing it in the film's trailer. Witnesses describe Toshirô Mifune as a perfectionist and an agile action performer who really could slash his sword around at a rate of 1 killing per second (KPS?). We learn of Kurosawa's interest in shooting the entire picture with telephoto zoom lenses, a choice that required a focus puller with magic fingers. The docu explains Kurosawa's cynical new style by recounting how he came up with the arresting image of a dog carrying a severed hand.