• Red Sun features an impressive international star-studded cast consisting of Charles Bronson (US- the clear star of the film), Mifune (Japan), Delon (France) and Ursula Andress from Dr. No (Switzerland) and directed by early Connery Bond films director Terence Young (from England)
  • It is a little sad to see Delon and MIfune especially play second fiddle to Bronson- but they all equip themselves well here- including Bronson (his is just by far the best written part/character). It is also a little strange to see Mifune in something so artistically light weight after all those years with Kurosawa. Young isn’t an overly talented director.
  • It is just a bit of trivia but Bronson is in The Magnificent Seven which is obviously a remake of The Seven Samurai with Mifune
  • The catchy score is by the great Maurice Jarre (Lawrence of Arabia and Doctor Zhivago)
  • An elaborate train robbery with a ton of extras – a double cross, stealing a priceless Japanese sword and a mission of revenge set—a good way to start a film.
  • It turns into essentially a buddy cop movie with Bronson and Mifune playing opposites—chasing Delon. True Grit did this a little with the two opposites in 1969 on a man hunt. Mifune is the noble samurai, Bronson the selfish monetarily incentivized loner. The enemy of my enemy is my … enemy/friend sort of idea. Triangulation. This is from The Good The Bad and The Ugly clearly—that’s the influence. That idea of the enemy of my enemy is brought to another level at the end of the film when the Comanche attack the group and they all (including Delon) have to team up
  • There’s a bit of a narrative flaw in that Bronson’s character seems to know Delon can’t be trusted and isn’t surprised that he’s double-crossed. Hmm.
  • Young starts cutting to the red sun (title of the film of course) each day (we’re on a seven day deadline before Mifune has to commit hari-kari) but he loses interest — bad form
  • Recommend but not terribly close to the top 10 of 1971