One of the best recent examples of Japanese film-making, this festival entry is distinguished by high grade direction. It also abounds in action, and is handsomely acted and produced.

| Jun 28, 2022

Suspense and tension are maintained by able performances, skilled direction, shrewd photography.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 28, 2022

The photography is excellent.

| Jun 28, 2022

It’s good to have Japanese director Akira Kurosawa back with us in top form again with his The Hidden Fortress.

| Jun 28, 2022

The scene in The Hidden Fortress where the escaping captives ride down a hill into the valley below, exulting in their freedom, has a poetic force which is hard to find elsewhere.

| Jun 28, 2022

The aim this picaresque romance about a couple of comic peasants who find themselves involved in matters military and political... is not unrewarding the background being unusual and the acting as always with this director of a high standard.

| Jun 28, 2022

[A] splendidly scenic adventure.

| Jun 28, 2022

It does not achieve, and for that matter does not even attempt, the subtleties of some of [Kurosawa's] other films. notably Rashomon and The Seven Samurai... but even as entertainment it is still just as clearly the work of a major talent.

| Jun 28, 2022

George Lucas says he lifted the plot of Star Wars from this 1958 production, which remains the only Kurosawa film unburdened by a need to make art.

| Jun 28, 2022

[Kurosawa has made] it with zest and with a magnificent sense of timing : it is a very handsome film and it goes at a varied, beautifully judged pace for all its two hours.

| Jun 19, 2019

Kurosawa's calculations pay off in thrills and clever character delineation. The trials of the journey impose heroic imperatives and bonds of loyalty that ennoble even the meanest characters.

| May 6, 2017

Kurosawa stages every scene with an eye toward screen-filling spectacle, [...] But he's also concerned with the characters' journey, and how they change-or don't-along the way.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Mar 17, 2014

Somewhat overshadowed by the likes of Seven Samurai, this is a vigorously played, meticulously staged adventure. It's not top drawer, but still ranks among the best of Kurosawa's minor masterpieces.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 30, 2006

Kurosawa's treatment is part traditional (the plotting, the concept, the use of Noh theatre music), part eclectic (there are reminiscences of John Ford Westerns), and part truly idiosyncratic (the Shakespearean contracts between clowns and heroes).

| Jun 24, 2006

This is not to say that the action is not vivid, exciting and tense... This is simply to say that "The Hidden Fortress" is essentially a superficial film and that Kurosawa, for all his talent, is as prone to pot-boiling as anyone else.

| May 9, 2005

George Lucas gives this Kurosawa classic its props as one of his inspirations for Star Wars.

| Mar 10, 2003

Arthouse classics aren't usually as welcoming and entertaining as this.

| Feb 3, 2002

The Hidden Fortress effortlessly intertwines action, drama, and comedy.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Jan 26, 2002