Star Trek (1966) 2.07

Catspaw

Captain Kirk, Doctor McCoy, and Mister Spock beam down to Pyris VII in search of Scott and Sulu who have gone missing. Jackson, the only member of the away team to return, was dead when they beamed him back up. Kirk and the others find a castle surrounded by mists. Inside the castle they meet first Korob and then Sylvia. Scot and Sulu are both in the castle but seem to be under the control of Korob and Sylvia.

Kirk unsuccessfully tries to seduce Sylvia. She gets angry at him. Korob fears what might happen and helps Kirk to escape. Korob has the transmuter, a magic wand of sorts. Sylvia kills Korob but Kirk gets it from him and breaks it. The castle vanishes and the others who were under the control of Sylvia and Korob are freed. Kirk and the other beam back up to the Enterprise.

Alfred Hitchcock Presents 1.25

There Was an Old Woman

starring Estelle Winwood

written by Marian Cockrell, Jerry Hackady, Hal Hackady

directed by Robert Stevenson

Frank and Lorna Bramwell smell an opportunity when they learn about Monica Laughton, a rich elderly woman who lives in town. They go to see her but she seems to be hallucinating all sorts of things, including other guests in her home and the body of a relative for whom she says they are holding a funeral.

Frank gets increasingly agitated with the Mrs. Laughton. They wind of staying the night. Mrs. Laughton promises to be more cooperative in the morning. 

Harakiri (1962)

Harakiri (1962)

starring Tatsuya Nakadai, Akira Ishihama, Shima Iwashita, Tetsuro Tamba

directed by Masaki Kobayashi

Hanshiro Tsugumo (Tatsuya Nakadai), in the year 1530, in an era when most samurai were being told that there services were no longer needed, knocks on the door of the powerful Iyi clan. He asks permission to end his life ritually and honorably via harakiri, in the clan's courtyard. They accept his request but before they allow him to go through with it, the man in charge tells him a story about Motome Chijiwa (Akira Ishihama), another samurai who visited the Iyi clan in the not too distant past with a similar request.

Amazing Stories (1985) 1.09

Guilt Trip

starring Dom DeLuise, Loni Anderson, Charles Durning

written by Gail Parent, Kevin Parent 

directed by Burt Reynolds

The Big Guy (Charles Durning) sends Guilt (Dom DeLuise) on a cruise because he's been working too had and screwing things up. Guilt meets Lovely (Loni Anderson) while on the cruise and falls in love with her.

Thoughts

This episode doesn't really go anywhere. I think it might have been a little too cute for it's own good. It didn't help that the characters were kind of paint by numbers.

Shōgun 1.02

Servants of Two Masters

The episode opens up with a flashback to one year prior, when the Taikō was dying but not quite dead. He calls for Toranaga and suggests to him that he could appoint him to be the sole regent while his son is still a minor. Toranaga advises against that course of action. The Taiko concurs.

Blackthorne is called before Lord Toranaga. Father Marin Alvito, a Portuguese priest serves as a translator. Blackthorne explains that England, his country, is at war with Portugal. The priest translates truthfully. The meeting is interrupted by a visit from one of the other regents, Lord Ishido. The result of the meeting with Ishido is that Blackthorne is thrown into a prison cell.

Demetrius and the Gladiators (1954)

Demetrius and the Gladiators (1954)

starring Victor Mature, Susan Hayward, Michael Rennie

directed by Delmer Daves

101 minutes

Demetrius (Victor Mature) a free man, who was once a slave, is sentenced to the arena after he refuses to help the Roman Emperor Caligula get his hands on Peter (Michael Rennie) or the robe of Jesus Christ. He refuses to fight at first, because he is a Christian, but subsequently decides that he will kill if his survival depends upon it. He continues to be a follower of the faith that Jesus espoused until his lover Lucia is killed by one of the other gladiators.

The Seven Samurai (1954)

The Seven Samurai (1954)

starring Toshirō Mifune, Takashi Shimura

directed by Akira Kurosawa

207 minutes

The villagers of a small farming community hire a group of Samurai to defend their village from a gang of bandits who have promised to return once the grain has been harvested to take lion's share of what the villagers gather up.

There are basically three acts to this film. The first focuses on the recruitment of the samurai, the second on the preparation of the village for the return of the bandits, and the third on the fight with the bandits. There is a little more to the story such than that. Most notable to me was the maturation of the youngest of the samurai which is expressed both through his relationships with the other samurai and his romance with one of the women from the village.