Which Kurosawa film was remade in the U.S. as The Magnificent Seven?

Seven Samurai was the Kurosawa film remade in the United States as The Magnificent Seven.

Released in Japan in 1954, Seven Samurai follows a poor farming village that hires seven samurai to defend it from bandits expected to return after the harvest. The film combines action, social drama, comedy, and tragedy, while contrasting the samurai’s warrior status with the farmers’ struggle to survive.

John Sturges’s 1960 American remake transferred the basic story to the Old West. Instead of samurai, the defenders are gunslingers hired to protect a Mexican village. The change of setting made the premise accessible to Western audiences while preserving the central idea of a small community assembling a team of professional fighters.

The connection is sometimes muddled because The Magnificent Seven itself received later sequels and a 2016 remake. Those films descend from the 1960 Western, but the original cinematic source is Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai. The Japanese film also inspired unofficial variations such as Battle Beyond the Stars and A Bug’s Life.