Just as Hollywood loves to remake J-Horror and, now, anime ("Speed Racer" being the latest, but unlikely to be the last), the Japanese film industry has taken to remaking classics by Akira Kurosawa. Last year's "Tsubaki Sanjuro" was Yoshimitsu Morita's shot-by-shot recreation of the 1962 original, though Yuji Oda gave a lighter spin to the role of the canny, hygienically challenged ronin (masterless samurai) played by Toshiro Mifune.
Now we have "Kakushi Toride no San Akunin: The Last Princess," which is based on the 1958 Kurosawa film known internationally as "The Hidden Fortress" that was an inspiration for George Lucas's "Star Wars." Instead of another homage, however, director Shinji Higuchi and scriptwriter Kazuki Nakajima have delivered a radical reworking that is likely to outrage Kurosawa-loving traditionalists.
I am less outraged than resigned. Half a century after the original film came out, many under-25 filmgoers barely know the Kurosawa name, let alone the films. If Higuchi's star-studded, action-packed, CG-driven version can persuade some of them to check out the Kurosawa section at Tsutaya, more power to it.