The 47 Ronin

Original title: Genroku chûshingura

1941
4h 1m

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Chôjûrô Kawarasaki in The 47 Ronin (1941)

The legendary Forty-seven ronin plot to avenge the death of their lord, Asano Naganori, by killing Kira Yoshinaka, a shogunate official responsible for Asano being forced to commit seppuku.The legendary Forty-seven ronin plot to avenge the death of their lord, Asano Naganori, by killing Kira Yoshinaka, a shogunate official responsible for Asano being forced to commit seppuku.The legendary Forty-seven ronin plot to avenge the death of their lord, Asano Naganori, by killing Kira Yoshinaka, a shogunate official responsible for Asano being forced to commit seppuku.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

7.2/10

2.8K

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

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Storyline

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Trivia
The Japanese Ministry of Information, under the militarist government, commissioned director Kenji Mizoguchi to make this film as a morale booster for the WWII war effort. But it was a commercial failure, being released in Japan one week before the attack on Pearl Harbor. The military and most audiences found the first part of the film to be too slow and serious. However, the studio and Mizoguchi both regarded it as so important that Part 2 was put into production, though Mizoguchi was forced to insert some close-ups of the stars which are totally absent from Part I. The film was finally shown in America in the 1970s.

Goofs
From ~1:40 to ~1:44 an appropriate dialog sequence occurs starting with three men walking a path with one saying "Counselor, the decision has come" and ending with "we need have no fear." That same sequence is duplicated at ~2:22 to ~2:26 with the additional dialog at the end "I want you two to return to Edo at once and inform our brothers there that I will be arriving shortly." This duplicate is out of sequence with the story.

Quotes
Lord Takuminokami Asano: I only regret that I failed to kill Lord Kira and I left him with only superficial wounds. You will no doubt laugh at my ineptitude. I can but ask that I receive the customary punishment.

Connections
Referenced in Kenji Mizoguchi: The Life of a Film Director (1975)

User reviews28

Review

Featured review

10/10

We've seen more simplistic and bombastic propaganda, to be sure

Yes, the pace is slow, yes the movie is long; especially to our eyes used to modern (?) movie-making of the recent years that knows only two rhythms, ultra-fast and ultra-ultra-fast. Yet the story of those 47 ronins, at least for those of us patient enough to enter it, to let themselves flow into it, is all in all very interesting and says a lot about 18th-century Japan. This movie is remarkably well constructed and acted and while the rhythm is slow, it is also implacable : the good side of having a slow rhythm is that you can eventually accelerate, something that ultra-fast doesn't allow.

But most of all, I notice this : for a film that was supposed to take place into a war-propaganda effort, I do find this tribute to the traditional virtues of the Japanese warrior to be remarkably sober in tone and almost completely devoid of any rhetoric. So, I am not at all surprised to learn that it was a commercial insuccess when it was released in 1941 Japan : for the spirit and inspiration of 'The 47 Ronins' are much too elevated to fit the ultranationalist hysteria of the times.