Saturday Night Movie

If you love old school fantasy, you must watch Legend of the Eight Samurai

This English dubbed fantasy Samurai movie has it all. And it hooked me within the first 5 minutes and paid off every promise made along the way. You won’t regret watching this tonight as a Saturday night flick. I’d put it in the PG to PG-13 realm. Although there are a few decapitations and mature content along the way, if your (inner) kid plays D&D and is over 12 years old, give it a viewing.

With a synthesizer score, there are vibes of John Carpenter’s Big Trouble in Little China. We’ve got a not-so ancient prophecy, avatars of a good/lawful? pantheon? and ditto for chaos/evil. So many great costumes, sets, matte paintings, special effects, and choreographed fight scenes throughout the film. The action is relentless, but there is character development and there are mini-story arcs along the way.

The plot twist a little over half-way through the film was foreshadowed, but still caught me by surprise. I will definitely give this a rewatch.

I don’t want to oversell it so I won’t claim this is better than Conan the Barbarian. This is not Western mythos and is distinctly Japanese. At times, it felt like a Konami video game from the 1980s/1990s. But it is so much better than most fantasy trash out there, I think you’ll agree that it deserves a place of honor. It is criminal that I never would have heard of this film without stumbling into the YouTube channel that posted it.

Trust me, you’ll enjoy seeing:

• A princess in distress
• Decapitations
• Samurai swords and pole arms
• A black powder pistol or two!
• A Sorcerer who casts fireballs (sort-of)
• Castles
• Fog shrouded caves / dungeons
• People swinging/hanging from ropes
• A falling block trap
• A shape-shifting witch
• Giant, flying snakes
• A giant, flying centipede
• An Indiana-Jones style rolling boulder
• A magic scroll and a magic bow and arrow

The finale is better than you’d ever expect for a non-Hollywood production. I was giddy.

This movie pulled out all the stops including having a cheesy 1980s love ballad. I’ll research more on this director and film later, but for now, your homework assignment is to get a bowl of popcorn and watch Legend of the Eight Samurai tonight.

Originally published on Substack on March 21, 2026.