A Fistful of Yojimbo: Appropriation and Dialogue in Japanese Cinema

Abstract

There are many ways to read the relationship between a film and its remake: in terms of fidelity, imitation, plagiarism, appropriation, or other enactments of power. For the most part, such models rely on a binary system to analyse the relationship between two films in isolation from their surroundings. In this chapter I wish to examine such a relationship in terms of a wider model of understanding, based on possibilities of dialogue with a wider film genre. The case study will be the relationship between Akira Kurosawa’s film Yojimbo (Y¯ojimb¯o 1961) and Sergio Leone’s remake, A Fistful of Dollars (Per un Pugno di Dollari 1964).1 The two films themselves are very well known. Akira Kurosawa (1910–1998) made Yojimbo because he had always wanted to make a movie in the Western genre after the style of John Ford, whose movies he had seen as a child. Sergio Leone (1929–1989) was electrified by Yojimbo and made his own version starring Clint Eastwood, a relative unknown. Both films broke box-office records, inspired sequels and made huge stars of their main actors, Toshir¯o Mifune and Eastwood.