Okay, follow along with me here. It’s well-known that George Lucas was a big Kurosawa fan during his formative years as a film-maker, and that he cites ‘The Hidden Fortress’ by Kurosawa as a key inspiration for ‘Star Wars’. Some have even described Lucas’ movie as a science-fiction remake of ‘The Hidden Fortress’, much the same way as ‘A Fistful of Dollars’ is a Western remake of ‘Yojimbo’. Which leads me to wonder, what might have happened if Lucas had been inspired by a different Kurosawa film? What if it wasn’t ‘The Hidden Fortress’ that shaped the direction of his classic film?
The Seven Samurai: Tatooine moisture farmer Luke Skywalker stumbles upon information that his insignificant homeworld is about to become the crux in the Empire’s plan to destroy the Rebellion. Princess Leia of Alderaan, a key figure in the Rebellion, is coming to this distant world to exchange vital information with Rebel spies; little does she know that the Empire has already learned of her mission, and has set a trap for her with a hidden garrison of Imperial troops…a garrison led by the Emperor’s personal enforcer, Darth Vader. Skywalker longs to help the princess, but he’s only one man, and an untrained fighter at that; he needs help if he’s going to save her. So he recruits a rag-tag band to help him: An exiled Jedi Knight named Ben Kenobi, a smuggler with a heart of gold named Han Solo, a bestial Wookie named Chewbacca, a grizzled bounty hunter named Boba Fett, and a Rebel pilot named Wedge Antilles. The six of them rescue the princess from the initial ambush; and together, the seven of them retreat into the Tatooine desert, where they use Ben’s knowledge of the terrain to slowly winnow away the Empire’s advantage of numbers. In the end, although Ben and Boba die in battle, Leia succeeds in her mission and (possibly) begins the end of the Empire.
Yojimbo: In the distant galactic backwater of Mos Eisley, Ben Kenobi (a former Jedi Knight who fled to the Galactic Rim after the fall of his order) becomes embroiled in the middle of a war between rival gang lords Jabba the Hutt and Xizor. He hires himself out first to one, then the other, playing both sides against the middle while he secretly works to clean up “the most wretched hive of scum and villainy.” The end features him dueling against Jabba’s top enforcer, Boba Fett. (The scary thing is, this requires only minimal changes to fit into continuity…)
Rashomon: In the aftermath of the death of Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi at the hands of Sith Lord Darth Vader, we see differing interpretations of the event from Vader, Kenobi, Leia, and finally the droid duo of C-3P0 and R2-D2. In the end, though we see many versions of the final battle between the two, the truth remains elusive and unknowable.
The Lower Depths: Owen Lars and his wife, Beru, run a small flophouse on Tatooine for scoundrels down on their luck. Among them is Han Solo, a smuggler and thief, and Ben Kenobi, a mysterious wise old man with a troubled past. Han is having an affair with Beru, but his growing friendship with Beru’s nephew Luke makes him consider breaking it off. At the same time, his admiration for Ben makes him think about finding a better life. When he discovers that Owen and Beru beat Luke, he breaks into their house to defend his young friend, only to wind up inadvertently killing Owen. Beru claims that he did it to continue their affair, which ends his friendship with Luke, and Ben flees when Imperial stormtroopers come to arrest the smuggler. In the end, Beru is arrested as well, leaving Luke without guidance and support.
Ran: Emperor Palpatine’s ambitious plan for his succession backfires on him when he delegates power to three of his most senior advisors, Grand Moff Tarkin, Grand Admiral Thrawn, and his apprentice and “son” created through Jedi magic, Darth Vader. Vader questions the wisdom of splitting the Empire between so many ambitious men, and is disowned and banished along with his droids. But Vader is proven right when Tarkin and Thrawn go to war over the Empire, and both of them try to put the Emperor out of the way as a potential obstacle; with his Royal Guard slaughtered, the insane Palpatine is left to wander the countryside. There he is discovered by R2D2 and C3Po, two of Vader’s droids that have remained loyal to the Emperor. They take refuge in a peasant’s hut on the swamp world of Dagobah, only to find it occupied by Yoda, Palpatine’s old Jedi foe who he had ordered to be blinded.
Vader discovers what happened to Palpatine and gathers an army to find him; this is viewed as an attempt at conquest by Tarkin and Thrawn, who send their own armies to stop him. In the final battle, the three armies weaken each other to the point where the Rebel Alliance is able to overthrow them; it’s revealed, in the end, that this was the ultimate goal of Tarkin’s wife, Mon Mothma. Tarkin kills Mothma, but is himself killed when Rebel ships blow up his Star Destroyer. Vader finds Palpatine, but is killed by Boba Fett, an assassin sent after him by Tarkin before his death. Overcome with grief, Palpatine dies, marking the end of the Empire. The film ends with a shot of Yoda, blind and alone on Dagobah, the only survivor of the film’s events.
(And by the way, before anyone thinks to comment on it, yes, I know ‘Ran’ came out after the trilogy was finished. If I can postulate an alternate universe where Lucas based ‘Star Wars’ on other movies, I can postulate one where he did it a decade later.)
Related Articles
36 users responded in this post
It wasn’t until I’d seen the summary written down, but I never realised how much Ran is similar to King Lear before.
Ikiru: Ben Kenobi, an elderly Jedi Knight who has served as a paper push at the Jedi Temple for his entire life, discovers that he is dying of cancer. Wandering through Coruscant in a state of grief and shock, he happens to meet young Leia Organa, and become infatuated by her youthful exuberance.
Damn, I was going to ask for Ikiru. I guess everyone was going to go there.
And Jake, Ran is meant to be King Lear, just like Throne of Blood is MacBeth.
Regarding the Star Wars Yojimbo: With three versions of Red Harvest having been made into films (Yojimbo, A Fistful of Dollars and Last Man Standing), why hasn’t anyone made a sci-fi version yet? I’d watch it. It would be awesome.
@ Jake: Ran is intentionally a Japanese retelling of King Lear just as Throne of Blood is a retelling of MacBeth.
After reading this column, two thoughts come to mind:
1) Han Solo hooking up with Aunt Beru is a mental image I really coulda lived without; and
2) I REALLY need to see more Kurosawa films….
Madadayo — Chewbacca runs away in a storm, and Han Solo mourns him.
@Jonathan: Maybe they haven’t since it would turn out like Battle Beyond the Stars, the science fiction version of Seven Samurai.
I’d like to see what you’d’ve done with Sanjuro.
Now I *really* want to see the Rashomonization of the Vader/Kenobi duel. I can see it working quite well as an animated feature, with a different team working on each version a la Animatrix.
Some are sorely mistaken. “Sort of inspired by” and “a direct remake of” are very different kettles of fish.
Well, if you’re interested, The Clone Wars tv series already did a Seven Samurai episode. It was well done, but a bit on the nose.
[…] Alternate Star Wars. What if George Lucas had been inspired by a Kurosawa film other than HIDDEN […]
If you look at the original draft of the script, it’s also based on The Seven Samurai to a marked degree. The attack on the Death Star shared much in common with the village battle, originally.
I would actually sort of enjoy a Kagemusha thing, with someone different inside the Vader costume to continue to inspire fear.
Of course, “Battle Beyond the Stars” was a Star Wars ripoff that modeled itself on Seven Samurai, and it was fairly awesome.
Kurosawa wanted to direct a Godzilla movie, but tragically never had the chance. Something about the execs at Toho being afraid of how much the whole thing would cost. Now I’m wondering what this hypothetical Star Wars movie would be like were it based on Kurosawa’s hypothetical Godzilla movie.
And now I need to lie down.
The two most awesome things in “Battle Beyond the Stars” were Sybil Danning.
Thank you! I’ll be here all week!
(Actually there was plenty in the movie that was awesome in a large wheel-shaped and cheddar-flavored fashion.)
“Rashomon: In the aftermath of the death of Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi at the hands of Sith Lord Darth Vader, we see differing interpretations of the event from Vader, Kenobi, Leia, and finally the droid duo of C-3P0 and R2-D2. In the end, though we see many versions of the final battle between the two, the truth remains elusive and unknowable.”
…except, of course, for the fact that droids are robots, and therefore perfectly objective observers. Really, you could probably just hack into them and see their sensory input to see how the whole thing went down.
What, no Stray Dog?
Oh well, we can’t have everything we want in life. Good column, boss.
@Grazzt: Maybe all that rain messes with their circuts.
Stray Dog: Just as the Clone Wars begins, Anakin discovers that his light saber has been stolen by the young clone Boba Fett. Teamed with his older, wiser mentor Obi-Wan, the two Jedi claw their way through the criminal underbelly of an increasingly corrupt Corsucant, hunting down young Boba who’s taken to hiding among Twi’lek dancers and deathstick dealers.
They did; “Omega Doom”, starring Rutger Hauer and directed by the guy who did “Cyborg” and “Kickboxer 4”. It is not very awesome.
Whoops. That was supposed to quote this: “With three versions of Red Harvest having been made into films (Yojimbo, A Fistful of Dollars and Last Man Standing), why hasn’t anyone made a sci-fi version yet? I’d watch it. It would be awesome.”
@Christian: Ooh, I want to see that!
@Jonathan: You could do a double bill with Omega Doom and Blind Fury, Hauer’s americanized version of Zatoichi.
If we can just delay Star Wars long enough, there’s a Tarantino-inspired scene I’d like to see, on the scene in the Corvette:
(Darth Vader interrogating crewman)
“Where you from?”
“What?”
“‘What’ ain’t no planet I ever heard of. They speak Galactic on ‘What’?”
“What?”
“GALACTIC, (censored)! DO YOU SPEAK IT?”
“Yes!”
“WHAT! DOES THE EMPEROR! LOOK! LIKE!”
So long as the comparisons are being made, Roy Thomas’ first story for the ongoing Marvel Star Wars series was a play on the Seven Samurai (SW#7-10).
Sanjuro is conspicuous by its absence! How about:
Ben Kenobi meets a hapless band of Rebels who hope to rescue Princess Leia from the clutches of Tarkin, but their misplaced idealism makes them soft targets for the Empire; Kenobi’s pragmatism guides the band as he feigns kinship with the Empire, befriending Tarkin’s right hand man Vader. Even after the mission succeeds, Kenobi must reckon with Vader in one-on-one combat.
Of course, Ran was based on King Lear, so there’s that consideration.
Dreams (or at least the only two segments I clearly remember):
1. Obi-Wan Kenobi, on his way home from the Clone Wars, is confronted by the spectres of the clone troopers who died under his command. Then he is chased into the desert by a snarling, emaciated Bantha.
2. In training on Dagobah, Luke Skywalker enters a dark cave. There, he meets Vincent Van Gogh, who is portrayed by Francis Ford Coppola.
“– If we can just delay Star Wars long enough, there’s a Tarantino-inspired scene I’d like to see, on the scene in the Corvette: –”
So the plans for the Death Star were the glittery thing in the suitcase?
Desumaytah:
“– Now I’m wondering what this hypothetical Star Wars movie would be like were it based on Kurosawa’s hypothetical Godzilla movie. –”
OH NO! THE SARLACC IS ATTACKING THE CITY!
These ideas open up whole new avenues for speculation on different ways that Lucas could have gone back and fucked with the films and made everything worse, not to mention entirely distinct new ways for the prequels to be terrible.
Mr. Seavey, you just blew my mind. I only have a single thing to say to you:
“You were fantastic! Absolutely fantastic!”
– The Doctor
I really like the Seven Samurai and Yojimbo pitches.
…except, of course, for the fact that droids are robots, and therefore perfectly objective observers.
This would be amazingly pedantic, if it were even correct, but you’re talking about C3P0, who is utterly capable of subjective self-delusion, and R2-D2, who lies like he invented it.
Dreams:
Young Luke Skywalker witnesses an Ewok wedding procession. Later that evening, Aunt Beru encourages him to kill himself with a lightsaber, as a means of atoning for his transgression.
[…] are some entertaining reimaginings of Star Wars, as though George Lucas had taken his inspiration not from The Hidden Fortress, but other Akira […]