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Embrace Some Samurai History (and film)

George Lucas’ Star Wars swims in a sea of Japanese culture. The most apparent influence, which Lucas admits had a profound effect on his films, was director Akira Kurosawa and his period dramas. In Kurosawa’s 1958 film The Hidden Fortress, a general and princess fight for survival in feudal japan. However, the story is told from the point of view of two lowly characters, serving the same function as R2-D2 and C-3PO in Star Wars.



The 1961 film Yojimbo has many scenes reminiscent of the classic cantina scene where our heroes are introduced to the gunslinger and alleged nerf-herder Han Solo and his trusted Wookie sidekick, Chewbacca, and Dersu Uzala (1975) was most likely one of several sources that helped shape the character of Yoda in The Empire Strikes Back. Even the very word “period drama,” which in Japanese is jidaigeki, created the most mystic word of the film—Jedi.



But Lucas wasn’t looking solely at films. Many believe that one the the most powerful samurai of the Edo period, Date Masamune, inspired the myth of Darth Vader, and that Masamune’s helmet inspired our favorite Sith’s iconic headgear.

