Hiroyuki Nagano's "CR Seven Samurai" remake with Shinichi 'Sonny' Chiba!

[chanbara]

In 2008, "Samurai Fiction" director Hiroyuki Nagano faithfully recreated selected scenes from Akira Kurosawa's masterpiece Shichinin no Samurai (Seven Samurai) for use on Pachinko machines.

Former Kurosawa costume designer Emi Wada, cinematographer Shoji Ueda, and fight choreographer Hiroshi Kuze (pupil of the legendary Ryu Kuze), were brought in to make sure the look and feel was just right.

The Rolling Stones’ “Satisfaction”, “Paint It Black” and “Jumping Jack Flash” were used as the soundtrack.

I have a lot of mixed feelings about this, but one thing I'm not on the fence about is the casting of the great Shinichi 'Sonny' Chiba as Kanbei. From what I saw when the trailer was still online, he nailed the role perfectly and his fighting in the final battle against the invading bandits was fantastic.

Up until recently I didn't think this could be seen outside of a Pachinko parlor in Japan, but apparently there's actually a DVD of it. The running time appears to be 15 minutes, so clearly it's a pretty short film, but I'd still love to get my hands on it. But so far I can't find any place other than auction sites with sellers that ship only inside Japan that have it like http://auction.jp.msn.com/pitem/118022243 and http://page7.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/g85355186. If anyone knows how I might be able to get my hands on one of these or if it's available to view or download online somewhere, I'd be mighty pleased if you'd let me know.

Anyway, here's the cast:

Masatoshi Nagase (Kikuchiyo)

Shinichi 'Sonny' Chiba (Kanbei)

Mitsuru Fukikoshi (Kyuzo)

Naomasa Musaka (Shichiroji)

Masato (Katsushiro)

Tomorowo Taguchi (Gorobei)

Yoji Tanaka (Heihachi)

Kumiko Aso (Shino)

And here's a HUGE poster for it

http://www.amenities.co.jp/pachinko-blog/futagobashi/img/7samurai.jpg

[KUNG FU BOB]

OMG

This is the first I've heard of this. Thanks for the freaking awesome poster bro! I certainly hope someone out there has answers/info on this...

[gorhama]

Holy crap!!! This sounds too amazing!!

[daisho2004]

I hope that it is going to be released on DVD soon.

[daisho2004]

Asian Cinema Scene: 'Seven Samurai' Remade for Pachinko

by Peter Martin Jul 23rd 2008 // 7:14PM

Filed under: Action, Foreign Language, Fandom, Remakes and Sequels

Prepare to roll your eyes in disbelief. The remake of Akira Kurosawa's venerated classic The Seven Samurai has been completed. But it's not the one planned by The Weinstein Co. And it's scored to The Rolling Stones?!!

Let's clarify: Don Brown at ryugangi says that Hiroyuki Nakano, director of the excessively stylish Samurai Fiction and Red Shadow, has been busy creating a new version of Samurai for a pachinko machine. (Yes, you read that right.) The official site features a half-dozen clips. The ones I've watched look surprisingly good and faithful to the spirit of the original -- except, er, for Mick Jagger singing "Paint It Black," "Jumping Jack Flash," and "Satisfaction."

How could this happen? Kurosawa's son Hisao has reportedly irked many by licensing his father's films and image for everything from remakes to a canned coffee commercial. Seven Samurai itself was made into a video game in 2004 (Seven Samurai 20XX) that was recently named one of the worst movie games ever by Wired.com. The same Japanese company that produced the video game (Sammy) also makes pachinko games, so I suppose this was inevitable.

Initially, I thought the article was either a bad joke or a slam at Nakano's directing style. Surely this was an advance peek at the Weinsteins' remake. But that project won't start shooting until later this year and the cast will feature American, European and Asian stars (per Variety), not just the Japanese actors pictured. My eyes are still rolling.

[loempiavreter]

YOu could always try the auction and let it ship to forwarding service like tenso.com.

[chanbara]

Thanks for the tip, loempiavreter. I'll look into that.

[DeathFuMaster]

If anyone ever gets their hands on this dvd, please put it on your trade list or host a download for it somewhere.

[Karlos]

This YouTube link:

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=%EF%BC%97%E4%BA%BA%E3%81%AE%E4%BE%8D&aq=f

Takes you to a page with footage taken directly from the SS pachinko game.

There are 8 or so clips, over the inital page and the one after.

Quality isn't great but, until a DVD appears, it's the next best thing.

[wigsplitta]

This looks so cool. I can't believe that I didn't hear or find out about it for so many months!!

I decided to take a trip to Yahoo Auctions and pick up the DVD. Fingers crossed it should be with me in 2 - 3 weeks from now. If no-one else has picked it up yet and fancies a copy, let me know and i'll point you towards a website that you can buy it from!

Joking of course. I'll sort out anyone that is interested.

[wigsplitta]

Well, it ain't quite what I was hoping for, but it's still worth a watch.

Part1

Part2

Part3

ohhellyeah!

Basically it's a 15 minute preview with some behind the scenes stuff. Sadly there are no full action scenes, but it does have some cool looking stuff.

Fingers crossed there is a proper release of it. A few cool fight scenes cut together would do me!

For thos that can speak Japanese, it'll proper give a better idea as to whther this is just a promotional disc for what will be included in the Pachinko machine, or whther there will actually be a short film released in the future?

Here's a quick screen grab.

Covers

Outside

Inside:

[Karlos]

Awesome - thanks for uploading, bro!

I am on that tonight!!

[chanbara]

I never did manage to get my hands on one of these, so thanks a lot for sharing, wigsplitta!

[John]

If anyone can make this work, I suppose Chiba can. That pic of him looks pretty awesome. I have mixed feelings about the remaking of what's already about as brilliant a film as one could hope for; it's got to be a real challenge to do something relevant with the material. Here's hoping it's turned out well.