Brigham Young University's International Outreach, a three-credit service-learning course, will sponsor five Samurai movies during July and August.
They will be screened Thursdays at noon in 238 Herald R. Clark Building (the David M. Kennedy Center for International Studies)..
Viewers will "witness stark conflicts of loyalty versus duty, Sheakespearean power plays and contemporary social criticism in period guise," according to the Kennedy Center.
The schedule for this "Summer Samurai Film Festival" is as follows:
13 July
The Twilight Samurai (2002)
Yoji Yamada, director
This moving family drama in nineteenth-century Japan is muted and somber—about an aging samurai, like the "gunfighter" film Unforgiven.
20 July
Yojimbo (1961)
Akira Kurosawa, director
A genre-twisting gangster western, the film is both visually stunning and darkly comic.
27 July
The Sword of Doom (1966)
Kihachi Okamoto, director
This action-filled classic features an aficionado's favorite "all-against-one" swordfight.
3 August
Samurai Jack (premiere, 2002)
Genndy Tartakovsky, director
Bid farewell to the samurai genre through a visually inventive cartoon adventure.
For more information on Kennedy Center events, see the calendar online at kennedy.byu.edu.