The ’60s were an age that saw Hollywood running dry on Western ideas, so they turned elsewhere for influence and found gold in samurai movies.
Up until this point, the genre had dominated a large part of moviegoers’ diets.
Classic Westerns were being cranked out of Hollywood left and right in the ’50s, with most bearing a heart of gold, and clear lines in the sand between good and evil.
Over in Japan, there were way more interesting movies being made by folks like Akira Kurosawa, who was making some of the greatest movies of all time.
Many samurai movies would go on to influence Western filmmakers, but no one would have a greater impact than Kurosawa.
After the release of movies like Seven Samurai, Rashomon, and Yojimbo, cowboys would never be the same again.
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