MovieChat Forums > Kakushi-toride no san-akunin (1960) Discussion > rips off It Happened One Night

rips off It Happened One Night

posted 9 years ago by Outstandingness
1 reply | jump to latest

(semi tongue in cheek)

Not a bad movie at all, but I really don't see the heavy influence on Star Wars that others claim. Yes, the POV is the two lowest characters. Yes they are escorting a princess. Nice. But I think the claiming that Star Wars is a ripoff of Hidden Fortress is a little overblown. Even Lucas, who admitted he was a fan of Kurosawa, downplayed some of the influence on the criterion dvd.

It Happened One Night came years before THF and I don't hear anyone talking about that. I guess grandstanding for Frank Capra isn't as fashionable.

[–] bbpictures 8 years ago

Interesting you mention Capra, because Kurosawa's movie Scandal is sometimes said to have a Capra feel.

I can sorta see where you coming from. This film felt a little like a road trip movie to me, too (and a western, and a samurai film, and an adventure, etc).

And if it's not a full-blown screwball comedy, it at least has some real moments of levity with the kind of mistaken identity that you find in screwball movies (especially centered around the sidekicks believing the princess is actually a mute -- and them not knowing she's the princess).

I also felt a stronger influence on Leone's The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. The greedy peasants chasing gold reminded me of Tuco, and Mifune's laconic badass was an awful lot like Eastwood's Man with No Name. We know Leone remade Yojimbo as Fistful of Dollars, so it's not a stretch to think that GBU has echoes of Kurosawa, too.