Sanshiro Sugata is widely accredited as Akira Kurosawa's directorial debut. The film revolves mainly and essentially on a basic plotline. The camera moves are quite bold at times, and the editing is far from perfect, however, Sanshiro is not the type of film to be enjoyed, but the type to be closely analyzed and carefully studied. It has been said that Sergio Leone's film making style was genuinely inspired and influenced by the works of Kurosawa. And by watching his debut film, it is striking t

Sugata is an action hero, and as an early template for action heroes, is a black-and-white outline of a character that should normally be shaded in, with some color or depth on a good day. It makes Kurosawa's debut more remarkable, and speaks to his talent, that despite this and other narrative flaws (even a few missing reels) the film is still immensely watchable and often engaging.

The underlying story is very simplistic. The characters are mere sketches, and even Sugata is just a basic template. However, it's not a complete waste of time. Kurosawa's craftsmanship shines through. You can see his style emerging. A couple of the matches are ridiculous but the others display an excellent feel for how to handle action. There's also a few lovely, lyrical moments like the shoe montage. And except for a few slow bits, the movie is fairly entertaining.

68.250

Interesting for those who want to see what Kurosawa's first film making experience would show, and in that aspect, it's revealing. He already shows a mastery of framing and the use of scene wipes is on hand. Unfortunately with 18 minutes of footage lost due to war time censorship, we' ll never know what a good story this could have been.

There's more than a few flaws I could bring up - from the lighting that makes some scenes barely distinguishable - mediocre acting - and writing that gives only a shred of character development. It's never a drawn-out affair though, the movie moves along briskly and you can even make out some early Kurosawa brilliance behind the camera in a good number of shots. All-in-all, about what you'd expect from a first-timer.

This early movie is primarily valuable in showing how great Kurosawa's improvement has been over the years.

I saw a version of this that was very very poorly translated to english and made it hard to follow the story closely.However the overall story was good and considering when it was made some stunning visuals.

A pleasant viewing experience, and a kind of precursor to silly fight movies like Bloodsport. However, Kurosawa stays away from the egregious errors of Van Damme movies and instead allows his narrative and central character to develop quietly. There are also several excellent compositions, including the opening tracking shot. However, at times the narrative seems a bit nonsensical, particularly with the villain and his motivation.

In the first part, Judo champion Sugata learns his art and then takes on the rival tradition of jujitsu; in the second, he battles an American boxer and a couple of half-crazy Karate brothers, triumphing over all through strength and purity of will. Kurosawa is still learning here, but many of his compositions and camera movements are striking, and the villains and fights are distinguished from each other with memorable details. The contest in a wind-filled field is particularly beautiful.

notable for inspiring the mascot for the sega saturn

Very rough around the edges and immensely boring. I was fighting to stay awake.