The Hidden Fortress

Coming April 18
ESSENTIAL CINEMA
at Amherst Cinema
Sunday 4/18   2:00pm
Wednesday 4/21   7:00pm

Sniveling failures at soldiery, peasants Tahei (Minoru Chiaki) and Matakishi (Kmatari Fujiwara) try to stumble back home, constantly blaming one another for their ill fortune. Captured by The victorious Yamana clan, and forced with hundreds of other slave laborers to search a pit for missing pieces of gold, they escape when the mine is attacked, only to later find some of the missing gold hidden in sticks in a mountain spring. That's when they meet the formidable General Rokurota Makabe (Toshiro Mifune), a resourceful warrior who's in a tight spot: stuck behind Yamana lines, Makabe has to find a way to smuggle both the gold, and the Princess Yukuhime (Misa Uehara) back into their own kingdom of Hayakawa. Much to their chagrin, the lowly Tahei and Matakishi find themselves aiding in a bold adventure.

Director Akira Kurosawa | 1960 | 126 mins. | Japanese with subtitles