Release date: November 19, 1956 (USA)
Running time: 207 minutes
Description
Marauding bandits approach a mountain farming village, but having attacked it before, their chief decides to spare it until the harvest. A villager overhears this and warns the rest. Farmers Manzō, hotheaded Rikichi and timid old Yohei, go to the village elder, Gisaku, who declares they must hire samurai to defend the village. Since they have nothing to offer but food, he tells them to find samurai in need of it. Eating millet themselves, the men go to the city to find samurai and offer white rice, their best, but are shunned by most.
An experienced rōnin, Kambei, deftly rescues a boy taken hostage by a thief. Impressed, a young samurai named Katsushirō approaches him to be his disciple, while the farmers are overjoyed when, initially reluctant, Kambei agrees to help them. Kambei recruits old friend Shichirōji and three other samurai with Katsushirō's assistance: the friendly and strategic Gorobei; the good-willed Heihachi; and Kyūzō, a taciturn master swordsman with whom Katsushirō looks at in awe. Though Kambei judged that seven would be necessary, time is short and Katsushirō is taken as a sixth. The poser Kikuchiyo, despite attempts to be driven away, follows them.
When the samurai arrive, they feel insulted by the cold reception as the villagers cower in their homes, so Kikuchiyo raises a false alarm to make them realize their need for help. The samurai accept him as the seventh, but are angered when he brings them armor from samurai the villagers had killed before. Kikuchiyo then castigates them for ignoring hardships the farmers overcome to survive, including harassment from samurai, which reveals his origins as an orphaned farmer's son. The anger the samurai felt turns to shame.
The samurai train the farmers and construct fortifications, as the two groups grow to trust each other. Katsushirō begins a relationship with Shino, Manzō's daughter, who had been forced to masquerade as a boy for protection from the supposedly lustful samurai. As time for the raid approaches, two scouting bandits are killed, while another is captured to reveal the location of their camp before his death. Heihachi is killed in a preemptive strike on the camp led by Rikichi, where it is burnt. Further compounding his sorrow, a woman emerges and kills herself in the fire: Rikichi reveals her as his wife, who had been kidnapped and raped.
The bandits then attack the village but are confounded by the new fortifications, including a moat, and several are killed attempting to cross them. Kambei's successful stratagem is to whittle down enemy numbers by repeatedly letting one bandit enter through a gap, then killing him while blocking the rest with a spear wall of farmers. Meanwhile, Gisaku refused to abandon his home on the outskirts and perishes with his family, who tried retrieving him. A lone grandson survives, which tragically reminds Kikuchiyo of himself.
The bandits possess three deadly muskets. Kyūzō ventures off alone and returns with one. A jealous Kikuchiyo abandons his post to get another, but leaves his contingent of farmers leaderless. They are overwhelmed in an attack and some, including Yohei, are killed. Kambei is forced to send reinforcements, leaving the main post undermanned as the bandit chief attacks it and Gorobei is slain. With the bandit numbers lowered, Kambei instructs all at night, including a remorseful Kikuchiyo, to prepare for a final, decisive battle. Meanwhile, Manzō catches Shino with Katsushirō and beats her until Kambei and the village intervene. Manzō is told to accept romance between youths.
In the following rainy morning, Kambei orders to let the remaining bandits in. Most are killed, but their musket-armed chief, unseen, takes refuge in the hut containing the village women. He shoots Kyūzō, and a distraught Katsushirō watches his hero die. An enraged Kikuchiyo charges towards the hut, only to be shot as well. However, Kikuchiyo gets up and kills the frightened bandit chief as his final act before dying. Kambei and Shichirōji, who had hoped to find death in battle, observe that they have survived once again. Afterwards, the three surviving samurai watch the villagers joyfully planting the next crop. Having lost their comrades, they reflect on the fact that it is the farmers who are the true victors.
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