History Film / TheHiddenFortress

''Kakushi Toride no San Akunin'' (approximately "Three Bad Men of the Hidden Fortress") was Creator/AkiraKurosawa's first widescreen film. The film is a JidaiGeki with an interesting twist: rather than concentrating on TheHero, the film instead focuses on a [[ThoseTwoGuys pair of bickering peasants]], with none of the other major characters putting in an appearance until twenty minutes or so in. Once the audience's sympathies have been firmly attached to the peasants, the [[KnightInShiningArmor Hero]], the RebelliousPrincess, and the rest of the film's major characters begin to show up. From then on, it's a series of hairbreadth escapes as the protagonists have to travel through enemy territory to reach safety.

!! This film provides examples of:

* HollywoodDensity: The Akizuki treasure is said to be made up of 200 Kan of gold. A Kan is Japanese unit of measure equal to 3.75 kg (approx. 8.27 lbs.), meaning the whole treasure weights 750 kg (approx. 1,653.47 lbs.) or ''¾ of a metric ton''. After the wood concealing the gold and the cart are burned, the party has to carry the gold on backpacks, with Rokurota carrying 40 Kan, Tahei and Matashichi carrying 30 Kan each, the two women 20 Kan between them and two captured Yamana soldiers carrying the rest. This means Rokurota was supposed to be carrying 150 kg (330lbs) of gold on his back, Tahei and Matashichi 112.5 kg (248 lbs.) each and the women 37.5 kg (82.6 lbs.) each. None of them should've been able to walk with that kind of load, let alone climb a mountain, but only Tahei, Matashichi and the soldiers are shown to be staggering under the weight at all.

* CruelMercy: After being defeated in duel, Hyoe demands to be killed by Rokurota but the latter decides to spare his life, much to Hyoe's dislike.

* AuthorityEqualsAsskicking: Justified with Hyoe Tadokoro, who certainly moved up to his high rank thanks to his superb fighting skills.

* BladeOnAStick: A really nifty duel with these.

* ReversePsychology: Makabe tries this on the Princess. She catches on, but goes along with it anyway.
** Works successfully when Makabe tries it on Tahei and Matashichi who try to make off with some of the gold.

* WhipItGood: The princess carries a horse whip.

* HoldMe: Tahei and Matashichi have plenty of "Hold me, I'm scared" moments.

* SecretTestOfCharacter: Rokurota claims that this was the reason why he made Tahei and Matashichi dig in the ground of the hidden fortress when the gold was hidden in the spring all along.

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* HollywoodDensity: If the gold bars are intended to contain 10 ryo (1 ryo = 16.5g) of gold each, then the 200 bars total would weigh somewhere between 70 and 90 pounds, depending on the purity of the bars, which is a plausible amount for two grown men to be able to carry with some difficulty. Once the party loses the horse and cart, the peasants carrying the gold are shown staggering under the weight. But based on the volumes of their packs, they should be carrying between two and three tons of the stuff each, as opposed to forty-odd pounds.

This film is best known in the West for the idea of focusing on the peasants at first; this storytelling tool provided the inspiration for [[Franchise/StarWars two droids named R2-D2 and C-3PO]].

* FaceHeelTurn: Averted with the farm girl, who after learning about the award of 10 gold pieces, decides to no rat out her four liberators. Played around with Tahei and Matashichi, who get worse and worse as the film progresses yet are constantly prevented from doing anything truly heinous.