ReviewCannes 2026: The Samurai and the Prisoner movie review – Kiyoshi Kurosawa back on top form
The veteran Japanese director’s new film with Masahiro Motoki as a besieged warlord is an intelligent, captivating spin on the samurai genre
4/5 stars
Four decades on, the 70-year-old has taken another much-loved Japanese genre, the samurai drama, and stripped it of its swashbuckling conventions to deliver an atmospheric – and mostly action-free – suspense thriller that debunks myths of honour, reverence and reckless bravery in war.
An adaptation of a novel by Honobu Yonezawa, The Samurai and the Prisoner – also known as Kokurojo – is intelligent, intriguing and captivating throughout its two-and-a-half-hour runtime, with sturdy storytelling, immaculate production design and suitably spartan camerawork.
Set amid the feudal wars sweeping across Japan at the end of the 16th century, Kurosawa’s film unfolds mostly within Arioka Castle, where the warlord Araki Murashige (Masahiro Motoki) is defending against a year-long siege by his mentor-turned-nemesis Oda Nobunaga.