13 Assassins

2010 samurai movie

Rating: 16/20

Plot: Based on the board game Candyland, this concerns the titular assassins trying to carry out a plot to kill Lord Licorice. The evil lord of the Candyland domain gathers Plumpy, Mr. Mint, King Kandy, Jolly, Queen Frostine, Gloppy the Chocolate Monster, Gramma Nutt, and about two-hundred other warriors to try to stop them. Lots of gingerbread men get sliced.

I'd almost like to see a four-hour director's cut of this or something. The size matters when you're talking about samurai, I guess. You can really take it in three separate chunks--the assembling of the thirteen, a romp through the forest to get to Lord Licorice et al., and a 45-minute slicin' and dicin' marathon which ends with a body count that is about as high as you're likely to see in a film. That third section is about perfect. There's the calm before the storm with this ominous haze, the fortified nowhere town that looks like a crazy version of a Mouse Trap, a child urinating. If it wasn't for the goofy CGI flaming bulls, that part of the movie would have been perfect. You've got the samurai bloodbath pornography if you're into that sort of thing and enough continued character development and emotional depth to make it not completely meaningless. Those first two parts? Well, there's an attempt at character development with the first third, but it really didn't do much for me since I couldn't distinguish the characters from one another anyway. There are also some training scenes that I liked and could have used more of. The second third is nifty, working almost like a buddy-buddy-buddy-buddy-buddy-buddy-buddy-buddy-buddy-buddy-buddy-buddy movie, and they pick up the thirteenth "assassin" who winds up being the most intriguing character. But you know that this is just a prelude to the aforementioned samurai bloodbath pornography, and that's the real reason why you popped this in anyway. You wanted some Takashi Miike mayhem--necks sliced through, limbs flopping all over the place, folks disemboweled, nipples punctured. Other than a difficult-to-watch scene featuring a woman with no arms and legs, this is tame for Miike, and the violence is approached in a more human way, especially during a scene where a character kills for the first time. Miike's surprisingly (to me, at least) made himself an old school samurai picture. Well, the hari kari is awfully squelchy. And the bad guy, a dude who isn't really named Lord Licorice, is a little more ruthless than you'd normally expect. I loved that character, not just because he said cool things like "Does daddy monkey have hard bones, too?" (I wonder if that's poorly translated or actually what he said) but because of his reaction to the attack on his life. My favorite scene--the lead assassin makes a fish and hook analogy to describe how they were trapping the army of seventy. When the army turns out to be two hundred, he says, "The bigger the fish the better," and this one guy's reaction is like "Dude, that analogy just ain't working for me anymore." Anyway, good samurai flick.

Samurai Jack

2003 television cartoon movie

Rating: 16/20 (Abbey: 18/20)

Plot: An evil, polymorphous sorcerer named Aku takes over the world. A child is sent far away from the villain to be trained as a samurai for the sole purpose of returning some day to bring order back to the world. And with his magic sword, he's nearly successful until Aku opens a portal and sends him to the future where he is dubbed Samurai Jack. The future's not bright as Aku rules and robots run rampant. Jack has to search for a way to get back to the past so that he can defeat Aku and save the world. Watch out!

Abbey picked this out, and I'm always in the mood for a little Samurai Jack action. This "movie" is really the first three episodes that set up the rest of the series. It's in three parts, and the three parts have the samurai cinema homages, the playful humor, and the fantastic action sequences that make the show one of my favorites. In part one, we meet Aku and have an montage where our young hero is being trained in different martial arts and other skills. In the second, he's flung to the future, so we get that science fiction twist on the samurai story. And some funny talking dogs. And in the third, we get a brilliant battle between the protagonist and a bunch of robot spiders. Consistently creative with artful fight scenes, a hodgepodge of eccentric characters, superb music, and simple but wonderful animation by Clone Wars guy Genndy Tartakovsky, the series is addictive and epic. And this movie kicks things off great. Tartakovsky seems to be influenced by the same exact stuff I love (samurai movies, Star Wars, Alice in Wonderland, spaghetti westerns) and the creative "camera angles," ever-changing assortments of sceneries, and the use of split screen during the action scenes keep things fresh. Watching Samurai Jack kick ass is all fine and dandy, but the humor injected into the storylines and the quiet moments are really what makes this all special. I love the use of sound effects, too. But those fight scenes! Like the rest of the series, you have violence in this that would make it completely inappropriate for children if the victims were human. You'd have limbs all over the place! But other than Jack getting scratched and bruised occasionally (and he isn't the type of hero who is completely invincible) and Aku who is just a black shape that sort of tears, the antagonists being cut down are machines. Robots don't bleed. Well, unless you count oil. And if you do and are disgusted by a little oil in your cartoons, the climax of the robot spider fight scene probably isn't for you as it makes the House of Blue Leaves scene in Kill Bill look like the violence in your typical Tom and Jerry cartoon. Actually, now that I think about it, those Tom and Jerry cartoons were exceptionally violent. Out of all the things I love, Samurai Jack is the one that makes me feel most geeky. But I'm not ashamed to admit that the news about an upcoming theatrically released Samurai Jack movie to finish off the story made me clap my hands and giggle and proclaim that I would probably dress up as a character to see it opening night. Samurai Jack makes me feel like a kid again, likely because I still rock the Samurai Jack pajamas (with the feet) when I want to have a more exciting night of sleep. And this kid, if his mother would let him, would call the premiere movie bitchin'.

Kill!

1968 samurai comedy

Rating: 16/20

Plot: A ex-samurai bumps into a farmer who desires to become a samurai in a dilapidated old town with a few people and a chicken in it. They end up on opposing sides of a gang war.

More a parody of samurai cinema than an actual samurai movie, Kill! is an entertaining ride albeit a convoluted and wacky one. I really liked Tatsuya Nakadai as the "Man with No Name" character Genta. He seemed recognizable, but that's probably just because all samurai look the same. And that's not racist because samurai ain't a race. Look it up. Look up Nakadai's resume, and you'll see a ton of movies I've seen though. I remember watching this movie before I should have (like, before I'd watched a bunch of the other movies on Nakadai's resume), and I understood it even less. This time, I dug it despite not completely being able to follow every twist and turn, every betrayal and backstab. The cinematography's nifty, the camera often finding itself in places other directors wouldn't put it, and Okamoto, like so many other Japanese action directors, sure can frame a scene. He also knows how to set a mood, from the claustrophobic fort the seven guys hole themselves up in to the ubiquitous dust during the opening ten or so minutes that reminded me more of a spaghetti western than anything else. And speaking of that genre, I thought the music, obvious nod to Morricone, was strange but also strangely fitting. Pretty cool flick, the personal level of coolness probably determined by how many of these types of movies the viewer has seen.

Kihachi Okamoto is the director of a really bitchin' movie called The Sword of Doom, by the way. You should definitely see that one.

Zatoichi and the Doomed Man

1965 Zatoichi movie

Rating: 15/20


Plot: Zatoichi meets the titular domed man in jail. The man, soon to be executed, informs him that he is innocent and pleads with the blind swordsman to get him some help once he's released. Zatoichi is sick of getting into trouble every time he helps somebody out, but eventually finds himself involved anyway.


Good entry in the Zatoichi series has plenty of swordplay but also has a more comedic tone than most of them. It's been a bit since I've seen this blind mo-fo in action, and I'd almost forgotten how much I like watching his movements, not just in the swift sword swipes and pouncing pirouettes, but in Shintaro Katsu's actions portraying a blind guy. And this reminds me of a dream I had and immediately forgot about. In the dream, Shintaro Katsu, not as Zatoichi but as himself, rides to my front door in a rickshaw. I'm sitting on a chair that I don't have that is on a porch I don't have. I'm wearing booty shorts and smoking an absurdly large red and yellow pipe with a goat's head carved into it. Orange smoke billows from the pipe, and I keep wondering how bad I smell, so bad, I fear, that the neighbors across the street might be able to smell me. Katsu tells me not to worry about it and points with a cane (again, he's not Zatoichi but does still have his cane sword) at my shorts. He says, "Your worries lie in those tight, lime-green shorts." When I don't say anything, he explains. "Don't come crying to me if somebody tries to rape you." Then, just like in all these nocturnal meanderings of my subconscious, the dream ends with my dream self weeping uncontrollably and my real self waking up in a puddle of my own urine.

Ugetsu

1953 Japanese ghost story

Rating: 18/20

Plot: There's a civil war going down, but this doesn't affect a pair of peasant couples as they dream of riches and heroic deeds. Genjuro travels to the big city to make his fortunes selling pottery while neighbor Tobei longs to be a samurai despite his lack of sword and armor. Their greed and delusions of grandeur threaten to mess everything up.

A very-Japanese movie all about dichotomies. I think. Male and female. War and peace. Self and the selfless. The living and the dead. Delicately spiritual, this breezes along yet manages to make every minute detail seem like it's the most important detail that's ever appeared on film. The camera work is masterful, swirling this way and that way and back to this way, flowing and stumbling through a black and white world right along with the lost characters. The supernatural elements in here are almost fragile and help give the entire film this hypnotic, dreamlike quality. There's depth here but it's a liquidy depth that you might drown in if you don't wear a life preserver while watching. This says stuff, not obviously or in a preachy way, and is a very rewarding experience. I was really tired after watching this movie, and I'm not sure if it's because the movie drained me or I'm just really tired.

Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai

1999 afro-samurai gangster flick

Rating: 17/20

Plot: Ghost Dog, a black contract killer who adheres to the philosophies and codes of the samurai, finds himself a target of a clumsily inept mob. He and his pigeons have to take care of business.

I noticed the other day that I had no Jarmusch movies on this blog and felt the need to remedy that. I'd actually always avoided this movie despite a recommendation from a buddy, and I'm not exactly sure why. Jim Jarmusch? Good. Samurai? Good. Comical mobsters? Good. I'm not sure why I'm surprised to like this rather special movie so much. It has a lot to say about personal codes, fading traditions, communication, friendship, stereotypes, and loyalty. And it's really fucking entertaining. There's action, there's laughs, and there's a great performance by Forest Whitaker in the title role. A hammier performance would have easily destroyed the character and the film, but Whitaker plays it suave and delivers exactly what the role calls for. Ghost Dog's interesting because it's more the characters, their motivations, and the philosophies that push the plot forward rather than just a story. With typical Jarmusch nuances, those characters that meander just outside the fringes of normalcy, and thematic depth, this is the type of uniquely entertaining movie that will be rewarding again and again. I'm going to have to watch Dead Man again soon to see if there are some thematic connections.

Zatoichi's Vengeance

1966 Zatoichi movie, the 13th in the series

Rating: 15/20

Plot: A dying gambling cheat hands Zatoichi a bag of money and tells him to take it to his son. The title masseuse has no clue where to find the gambler's family but stumbles upon them in a town overridden with gangsters. He becomes a Shane-esque hero for the boy while at the same time questioning the decisions of his violent past after conversations with a wise wandering blind priest/musician.

Interesting entry in the series as Zatoichi struggles with his conscience and guilt and loneliness and fills out a bit as a character. Fortunately, it doesn't stop him from hacking up the bad guys by the end of the film, and that's exactly what the last 15-20 minutes are. There isn't necessarily anything new in the action sequences, nothing that you don't see in any of the other Zatoichi movies, but there sure seems to be a lot more of it in this one. Huge body count although, unlike the Lone Wolf and Cub series, there's almost no blood. This is beautifully shot with a sword fight between silhouettes on a bridge at dusk maybe being the highlight. The story is a little convoluted (a lot of these are), but this one comes together very nicely at the end as Zatoichi tidies up financially. And I'd like to mention again how good of an acting job Shintaro Katsu does bringing this character to life. The fact that I'm not tired of these movies probably has a lot to do with him.

I wonder if I should have watched these Zatoichi movies in order.

The Private Eyes

1981 comedy

Rating: 14/20 (adjusted for Don Knotts bonus)

Plot: Inspector Winship and Dr. Tart have been sent from Scotland Yard to a sprawling mansion to investigate the murders of Lord and Lady Morley. Occupying the secret-passageway-ridden mansion are the adopted daughter of the Morleys and a motley assortment of hired help including a samurai, a hunchback, and a guy with no tongue. They encounter ghosts with bombs, buzzard puss, cleavage, a torture chamber, and a few murders as they investigate the case.

Quite possibly the funniest movie ever made, The Private Eyes benefits from the chemistry between Knotts and Conway and top-notch old-school humor. I'll come clean and admit that I can't look at Don Knotts without laughing. All Don Knotts has to do to get a laugh from me is be present in a scene, and he's present in many scenes in this movie. Conway, who co-wrote the script, is also good. Screwiness, horror, an intriguing story, twists and turns, cleavage, mystery. This film's got it all! An undeniable masterpiece!

Kill Bill Volumes 1 and 2

2003, 2004

Rating: 16/20

Plot: Beatrix Kiddo, a member of The Deadly Viper Assassination Squad, gets knocked up and decides that it's time to hang up her samurai sword and settle down in Texas. Bill, her old boyfriend and father of her unborn child and head honcho of the aforementioned squad, doesn't like that idea and crashes her wedding rehearsal in a violent manner. Four years later, after Beatrix wakes from a coma, she's not very happy about it and wants revenge. So she hunts down Sonny Chiba, gets herself a sword, and does some killin'.

There's such an odd combination of grace and mayhem in these movies. The fight scenes and choreography are terrific, but the quiet moments preceding and following the fight scenes are terrific, too. Sure, that killing spree in the House of Blue Leaves is entertaining and beautifully choreographed, but the long-shot prior to Beatrix's arrival and the tranquil wintry scene following that slaughter are in some ways even more exciting. I've seen enough kung-fu movies to appreciate the allusions in both halves of this revenge epic, and I've seen enough spaghetti westerns to appreciate the allusions in the second, less frenetic installment, and it's really an interesting marriage of these movies. Tarantino's got a good eye and ear, and the visuals and music collide in stunning ways throughout both volumes. There are some song choices I don't like, but for the most part, the recycled soundtrack stuff fits great with the action. And while there's truly some virtuosic filmmaking going on here, Tarantino often gets in his own way and makes a mess of things. Kill Bill is probably far too ambitious and sprawling, and it could easily have been a series of films. I would have loved to see more characterization for the other assassins anyway. The dialogue is strong although once again, Tarantino's goofiness gets in the way (see that "Silly rabbit, Trix are for kids" line). There are also a lot of great humorous moments hidden amidst the strewn limbs and blood-stained walls. My favorite is the conversation with Bill and the four-year-old daughter:

Bill: What movie do you want to watch?
Daughter: Shogun Assassin.
Bill: Shogun Assassin is too long.

Together, these are a really solid, if uneven, film. It is a bit jarring that Beatrix goes from killing about a hundred people in the first half and only one in the second.

Sukiyaki Western Django

2007 samurai western

Rating: 14/20

Plot: A mysterious gunslinger arrives in a tense Nevada town where two warring clans, a red one and a white one, are at a Yojimbo-esque stalemate in their battle over some treasure that neither of them can even find. Both sides could use his services, but he's got his mind on something other than treasure. Lots of Gungans gonna die.

Takashi Miike is at the top of my list of directors whose work I'd love to see more of. This movie's an addictively quirky blend of tomfoolery and dramatic action. You've got stylized cartoon gore in a stained-glass world, a grotesque mixture of the wildest West and the wacky East. You've got comical caricatures--a buffoon of a sheriff, the nearly invincible leaders of the rival gangs--who die and then claw their way back from the grave inexplicably, use wind gusts and gravity to absurdly angle their bullets to meet their targets, and survive numerous riddlings with bullets. You've also got extremely goofy dialogue, the goofiness accentuated by the broken English used by the Japanese actors. I really doubt most of the actors even have any idea what they're saying, but it lends a uniqueness to the characters. I love the look of the film, the cultural clash of Japanese architecture and dusty Nevada, sets seemingly borrowed from spaghetti westerns, some looking like they were just vomited from a kaleidoscope. The story's not strong and there are lots of moments that cross the line from cool to stupid, but the odd balancing act between homage and parody makes this an intriguing movie.

Revenge of a Kabuki Actor

1963 revenge movie

Rating: 13/20

Plot: Yukinojo is a transvestite who is pissed off at some people about something. So he really slowly develops a plan to use his fighting skills and his acting skills to get his revenge on them. And apparently me.

There's some weird stuff going on here, recalling Seijun Suzuki. There are some strange visuals and some interesting uses of color. Other than that, there's not a lot going on. To be fair, I was feeling way too lazy to watch this and kept thinking about that time I went to a circus and watched the ringmaster shoot a trapeze artist. I likely would have really enjoyed this under different circumstances. Like, if I were a gay man who liked samurai movies but made sure my gay friends didn't know.

Lone Wolf and Cub: White Heaven in Hell

1974 feast of blood

Rating: 14/20

Plot: The final confrontation between Itto and the Yagyu clan. He's killed off three sons in previous movies, so the guy with the white beard and eyepatch sends his daughter, a juggler, to take care of business. Dead. Then he remembers that he has another son and attempts to align with him to hunt down and kill the assassin. Dead, dead, dead. Finally, Itto winds up at a ski resort where he must face hundreds of sword-wielding skiers. Spoiler alert: Dead, dead, dead, dead, dead, dead, dead.

Completion of the hexology is about what you'd expect. There's blood, people cut in half, gratuitous breast flashes, swords sticking out the tops of skulls, etc. This episode seems a bit darker at times and then almost slipping into self-parody during the denouement when Lone Wolf is slicing up assassins on skis. Another near-ludicrous bit includes three zombie assassins who have the ability to burrow underground like moles. Weird but it works in these movies. It's too bad this concludes the series, not only because I could sit around watching this stuff all day but also because the ending wasn't quite the satisfying resolution this series deserves. The graphic novel series' ending would have been great to see.

Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in the Land of Demons

1973 chapter of the Lone Wolf and Cub series

Rating: 14/20

Plot: The Kuroda tribe seeks the wandering assassin's services and sends five representatives to challenge Itto to a fight. Defeated one-by-one, they reveal a piece of information required to accomplish the task and 1/5 of his payment. Then, he goes out and chops some heads off.

With a convoluted plot and a weird and strangely detached subplot involving Itto's son, this one appeared early to be the weakest of the series. It's saved by an absolutely brutal display of sword frenzy at the end as well as the earlier typically-great fight scenes. That climax though. Whoa, Nelly! The over-the-top bloodfest brought out both a laugh and a fist-pump, and that's really all a guy can ask for on Samurai Friday. Some funky camera angles are used in a scene that is otherwise a whole lot like that House of Blue Leaves scene in Kill Bill. A gripe: it seems like these films came out pretty rapidly which on the one hand enables the kid playing Daigoro to play him in each installment but on the other hand makes me wonder what this could have been with a little more time put into it. It's great stuff, but at times, there's some sloppiness. One more of these to go, and from the preview on this dvd, it looks like it can be summed up in two words--ninjas skiing. Booyah!

Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in Peril

1972 continuation of "Lone Wolf and Cub" series (#4)

Rating: 14/20

Plot: Itto is hired to kill a tattooed female assassin who is on a bit of a killing spree. While searching, he defends himself against the ever-present Yagyu clan and encounters a blast from his past, a guy who once beat him in a fight.

This had a different director, and although the story is one with lots of potential, the result is sort of a mess compared to the first three in the series. Positives include real peril (see title) for the title characters, lots of quick fight choreography, no slow moments at all, nudity (heck, the first shot has a waxy nip in it), cool characters, and terrific cinematography. Unfortunately, there wasn't enough character development, and the story with its side plots and twists doesn't really get a chance to gel. This is the only entry in the series so far that really could have used some stretching. It was entirely too jumpy. Real oddball of the series so far, too, with a guy who can light his sword on fire, the woman who exposes her breasts before killing people, blue ninja-looking guys, people with baskets on their heads, weird style choices, and tacky music. Enjoyable stuff, but my least favorite of the series. The final fight amongst the rocks was full of bloody goodness though with the final body count even higher than the ridiculous body count of the last entry.

Note: This is the only one of these I can't get at my library. I blame the nipples. The version I was able to download wasn't the best with one scene almost too dark to see and subtitles that didn't make much sense at all. That may have soured the experience.

The return of Samurai Friday!

Ambush at Blood Pass

1970 samurai movie

Rating: 14/20

Plot: A ronin-with-no-name (a "yojimbo" quite possibly the same character as in the Kurosawa film of the same name) is hired by a slimy fellow to make his way to Blood Pass and "wait for something to happen." Mifune's character accepts. He goes to the place. he waits. Things happen.

More action and strewn limbs are required for Samurai Friday! I may have to go with Kung-Furiday next school year, but I'm afraid I'd be fired for a bad pun. This was a fine samurai flick though with both Mifune and the guy who plays Zatoichi, the latter with a really interesting character. This has twists and turns--a really convoluted and hard-to-follow plot--so enough is happening to make up for the lack of sword on sword action. The mountain setting also gives you enough to look at when nothing else is going on.

Sad side note: I remember watching Hiroshi's samurai trilogy a while back but remember absolutely nothing about it. I think there's something wrong with my mind.

I watched this while wearing a tie and eating ice cream. Unfortunately, there's no photographic proof.

Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart to Hades

1972 third part of the baby cart series

Rating: 15/20

Plot: A more complex story here as Itto and child are still fending off attacks from the Yagyu clan while encountering a troubled prostitute, a troubled ronin, and a troubled man missing an arm. Itto is employed to take out a corrupt district deputy, and after defeating a sharpshooter, some ninjas, and a guy who boasted of his flying sword technique, he faces an entire army of archers, gunmen, and sword wielders with tricks both up his sleeve and in his baby cart. Absolute carnage.

Perhaps more emphasis on developing the character than on action although there is plenty of the latter and the highest body count of any film of the series so far. It's also the most Western (as in, spaghetti) so far, and one of my only gripe would be that Itto uses guns at one point. I'm not sure why that bothers me though. There's philosophical depth, humor, tension, slicing, and dicing, and it's pretty much all a guy can ask for on Samurai Friday.

As usual with Samurai Friday, no picture is available.

Fight, Zatoichi, Fight

1964 samurai movie

Rating: 15/20

Plot: Zatoichi is on the run from some hired assassins. He agrees to ride in a palanquin after receiving a discount, but being the nice guy he is, he gives it to a weak woman traveling with her baby. The assassins, who saw their target enter the palanquin, charge in and kill the woman. Zatoichi feels bad about the whole thing and feels it's his duty to take the baby to his father in a distant village as the assassins follow closely behind.

Confession: I only picked this up because I needed something for "Samurai Friday" at school and because it made the third movie in a week and a half or so that has the "____, Somebody, ____" title. There was more drama than samurai hijinks in this one with the Zatoichi-as-father-figure thing driving most of the plot, but it's still a worthwhile piece of the blind masseuse's tale. Some quick sword action (Zatoichi only seems really in danger in one scene featuring a pair of sumo wrestlers) and some of his typical wise dialogue even if this one was more serious and, at least at the end, slightly sad than fun. Although if you really want to see Zatoichi change diapers and get urinated on, this is the film for you. There was more of a focus on the acting in this one, and it forced me to notice just how good Shintaru Katsu is in these movies as the title character. Solid story with some really beautiful moments.

No camera at school=no picture of me on Samurai Fridays. Just picture me sitting in a dark, locked classroom eating from a tub of ice cream and trying my best to ignore the fact that I have a job.

Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart at the River Styx

1972 samurai movie

Rating: 17/20

Plot: Anti-hero Ogami Itto and his child are still on the quiet run from the Yagyu clan. The Yagyus seek help from a group of deadly female ninjas (that's right, deadly female ninjas) who seem eager and well-equiped to chop men into pieces. At the same time, Itto is employed (he is, after all, an assassin for hire) to kill a guy who is going to give away the secrets of a successful dye-making business to the Shogunate. That guy is guarded by three brothers with gigantic hats and deadly garden implements. One straps a rake to his hand! They're the Gods of Death! So, he's got female ninjas to the left of him, murderous gardeners to the right, and more tricks in his baby cart than Inspector Gadget's got in his ass. Limbs get strewn about.

This was even better than the first--bloodier, more action-packed, more stylish. The "Cub" has a more interesting role, sort of like Maggie in The Simpsons in a way, and the minor characters (really only introduced to the saga to die violently) are really interesting (loved the three brothers and the head female ninja especially). But it's the main character who brings the coolness. Eyes like Bronson! Itto is fast becoming my favorite samurai character. Nothing against Zatoichi, but I've never seen that blind son of a bitch chop off this many limbs or split skulls in half. The deadpan expression as the blood sprays is just perfect. There's not much difference in feel between this and the first in the series. There was more exposition in the first while this one could just jump right into the blood spilling goodness. If I'm remembering correctly, this one does have a little more style--nifty shots more typical of Japanese samurai films and some weird camera play and trickery and large chunks of the movie that flow in silence. Can't wait to see part three! I'm hoping the films continue to gradually get more darker and more violent although I honestly can't see the latter being all that possible.

No picture of me watching this is available. I watched it at school on the big screen when I was probably supposed to be doing something else.

Zatoichi Meets the One-Armed Swordsman

1971 Asian genre-blending action flick

Rating: 15/20

Plot: The one-armed swordsman, Wang Kong, is travelling in Japan to receive martial arts training with some monks. He meets a family of three and decides to travel with them. They come across what appears to be a funeral procession which the young boy disrupts. The mother and father are killed immediately, and Wang Kong slashes up some people and runs off with the child. Zatoichi stumbles along and agrees to travel with them despite their language barrier. Misunderstandings lead to distrust as the blind Zatoichi and the one-armed Chinese man have to fight off hordes of bounty hunters. Lots of people get sliced open.

A gigantic body count here. There's some wonderfully poetic blood splatterin' and some terrific fight sequences. Genres cross with the Zatoichi samurai stuff (humor, swordplay, Zen-like reflection and philosophy) clashing with the early kung-fu one-armed swordsman stuff (high flying, punch and kick choreography). I prefer the fight scenes with Zatoichi (the one-armed swordsman is a pre-kung-fu boom stuff that looks a little slow and unnatural), but the climactic fight scene between the title characters is good stuff. There's almost zero rapport between them since they don't speak the same language. In fact, you're required to read two sets of subtitles to explain puns as they try to communicate. I could watch this blind bastard cutting people up all day, so it's a good thing there are about 300 Zatoichi movies. They're a little formulaic, but I still haven't seen a bad one.

This is me watching, I believe, my eleventh Zatoichi movie:

Six-String Samurai

1998 neo-samurai spaghetti western comedy

Rating: 11/20 (Abbey, who's sick, watched a large chunk of this but refused to give it a rating. "I don't like it, and I don't want to watch it.")

Plot: Forty years after the Russians have taken over all of America with the exception of Las Vegas (that would be 1957 for those of you interested in history), a suave and calm and collected 50's throwback with busted glasses, a suit, a guitar, and a sword travels to take over the kingdom from none other than Elvis Presley. He stumbles upon an orphan (as he's being orphaned actually) who refuses to leave his side. They meet critters, fiends, cannibals, dirty astronauts, bowlers, Death and his posse, more rockabilly bands than you can shake a samurai sword at, and a large chunk of the Russian army along the way. Buddy is forced to fight and fight again as his relationship with the child grows in a way that makes everybody a little sick to their stomach.

This was Johnny Suede meets Kill Bill (both volumes!) meets a Tom and Jerry cartoon meets El Topo (kid + desert + umbrella) meets Mad Max meets Dr. Strangelove meets Fistful of Dollars meets Evil Dead II meets a strange Seventh Seal/"Devil Went down to Georgia" hybrid meets The Wizard of Oz meets Rambo meets an episode of the Power Rangers in a darkly comic rockabilly circus. So it should have totally worked! The reasons I didn't like it much (although I was entertained for 3/4 of the time; the rest of the time I was just wanting scenes to end) are the same reasons I didn't like Bubba Ho-Tep. There's just too much stupid here, along with too much of an effort to create a cult classic and a cult icon along the lines of an Ash in Evil Dead. He even had one-word one-liners very close to Bruce Campbell's "Groovy." Another midget appearance in this. If Leonard Cohen were a midget, this would make four in a row, I think. There were cool scenes and I did like the stark desert (another desert movie!) cinematography and some of the action sequences. The latter, however, did get a little monotonous. Buddy gets an angry look and jumps up in the air with his sword above his head. Buddy chops a bunch of people up. They don't bleed. Wild stuff here, but it just doesn't completely work.

Here I am, apparently ticking off Lucyfer because I'm in her spot: