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Fresh: a new take on Yojimbo and Fistful of Dollars

posted 18 years ago by Wakanohana
7 replies | jump to latest

The main story in Yojimbo, and in Sergio Leone's adaptation, is about a man who pits two rival gangs against each other, and cleverly finds a way to get each to destroy the other.

Both are fairly simple and straight-forward, though. Kurosawa and Leone treat all the bad guys and the innocent bystanders as simple creatures, and usually pretty stupid. Their motives are simple: money and women.

Fresh adds the mechanism of the chess board, and deals with individual characters as if they are pieces on that board. The motives are the same, money and women, but the characters are more differentiated, like bishops from knights and rooks and queens.

I haven't really developed this idea completely, but I want to put it out here for comment.

[–] oni013 18 years ago

Quite right, quite right.

[–] 18 years ago

[deleted]

[–] Wakanohana 17 years ago

Thanks for responding, and keeping this thread alive.

I don't think Fresh is better because of greater complexity, just a different take on the same theme. Kurosawa never made his stories more complicated than they needed to be, and that's what makes them timeless. Leone told a similarly simple story, for an audience that definitely wouldn't have appreciated anything else.

But Fresh is a great story because it adds the psychological factors, and the unexpected plot twists, and the superior acting. Yojimbo had Toshiro Mifune and no one else of note, Fistful had Eastwood while he was still developing his acting skills. Fresh has excellent actors in all the prominent roles.

[–] 17 years ago

[deleted]

[–] Wakanohana 17 years ago

If you are referring to Chucky, he was a stupid character. The kid playing that character was fine, he was doing what the director wanted. He was more like the bulk of the characters in Yojimbo and FOD.

[–] 17 years ago

[deleted]

[–] SoylentGreenScreenPodcast 10 years ago

I like your theory.