- Seven Samurai is a 1954 Japanese film directed by Akira Kurosawa; it starred his longtime collaborators Takashi Shimura and Toshiro Mifune in two of the lead roles. It is considered by many Western critics to be the finest Japanese film of all time, and a few of them consider it to be the finest film ever made, period.
- Latvia (Wikipedia)
Latvia (/ˈlætviə/ LAT-vee-ə, sometimes /ˈlɑːtviə/ LAHT-vee-ə; Latvian: Latvija Latvian pronunciation: [ˈlatvija]; Latgalian: Latveja; Livonian: Lețmō), officially the Republic of Latvia (Latvian: Latvijas Republika, Latgalian: Latvejas Republika, Livonian: Lețmō Vabāmō), is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is one of the three Baltic states, along with Estonia to the north and Lithuania to the south. It borders Russia to the east, Belarus to the southeast, and shares a maritime border with Sweden to the west. Latvia covers an area of 64,589 km2 (24,938 sq mi), with a population of 1.9 million. The country has a temperate seasonal climate. Its capital and largest city is Riga. Latvians belong to the ethnolinguistic group of the Balts and speak Latvian, one of the only two surviving Baltic languages. Russians are the most prominent minority in the country, at almost a quarter of the population.