Andrei Tarkovsky on Akira Kurosawa & "Seven Samurai" - "The main thing is his modern characters, modern problems, and the modern method of studying life. That's self-evident. He never set himself the task of copying the life of samurai of a certain historical period. One perceives his Middle Ages without any exoticism. He is such a profound artist, he shows such psychological connections, such a development of characters and plot-lines, such a vision of the world, that his narrative about the Middle Ages constantly makes you think about today's world. You feel that you somehow already know all of this. It's the principle of recognition. That's the greatest quality of art according to Aristotle. When you recognize something personal in the work, something sacred, you experience joy. Kurosawa is also interesting for his social analysis of history. If you compare The Seven Samurai and The Magnificent Seven, which share the same plot, it is especially visible. Kurosawa's historicism is based on characters. Moreover, these are not conventional characters, but ones which issue from the circumstances of the protagonists' life. Each samurai has his own individual fate, although each possesses nothing except the ability to use a sword; and, not wanting to do anything else because of his pride, each finds himself serving peasants to defend them from the enemy. There is a text of pure genius at the end of the film, remember, over the grave, when they plant rice: samurai come and go, but the nation remains. That's the idea. They are like the wind, blown this way and that. Only the peasants remain on the earth."

Frankly, I'm very surprised by the comments here. I'm not going to change any minds on here, but I will say that it's length is justified in its ability to build a complete character arc for each character, and even many of the bit players. Taking the time to ensure that your audience can identify and empathize with the characters is something most action movies fail to do.

Masterpiece from Kurosawa. Amazing acting performances from Toshirô Mifune and Takashi Shimura. Great soundtrack and cinematography! One of my favorites!