Capsule Reviews - 3 Ninja Movies

Red Blade (2018)

Starring: Yuka Ogura, Himena Yamada, Kanon Hanakage, Tak Sakaguchi, Satsuke Mine, Joey Inagawa
Director: Takahiro Ishihara
Action Director: Makoto Sakaguchi, (opening sequence) Yuji Shimomura, Tak Sakaguchi, Yoshitaka Inagawa, Ryoma Muto

I didn't really know what to expect when I sat down to watch this. So, I was pleasantly-surprised when I got something close to the "Ninjas Only"-era version of Dr. Wai and the Scripture with No Words (or a shot-on-video version of The Pagemaster, but moved to the Sengoku era). I am real sucker for these kinds of stories where normal people from our world get a chance to go on fantastic adventures (or perform martial arts in the same forest where most Japanese action films made after Versus are set).

Mako (Yuka Ogura) has a crappy life. She gets bullied at school by queen bee Miki (Satsuke Mine) and her gang. Her parents are always arguing. Her personal issues are ruining her track-and-field performance. And things reach a tipping point when her dad agrees to be the fall guy for whatever corruption his company is guilty of*, which makes the news and gives her bullies even more reason to be assholes. Mako's only solace is cutting class and going to a library. She finds a light novel (or manga) about ninjas doing ninja things and becomes enamored with it.

One day, she meets a pair of kunoichi from the novel: Hiro (Himena Yamada, of Shogun's Ninja) and "Ultraman Blazar") and Yu (Kanon Hanakage, Rise of the Machine Girls). Suddenly, she is transported into book world where she meets their master, the super-deadly ninja Saizo (Tak Sakaguchi, who needs no introduction). He agrees to teach her ninjitsu and months pass--albeit little time in her own world (similar to The Beginning Place by Ursula K. Le Guinn). After completing her first job, she returns to our world. But then she discovers that the main villain of the book, Kansuke Harada (Joey Iwanaga, of The Furious and Rurouni Kenshin: The Final Battle), is also the same corporate cutthroat that got her dad arrested. And she must stop him in order to keep the worlds from merging and changing everybody's destiny.

Like I said, I'm a sucker for these sorts of plots, so I was invested. I did find it amusing that the book characters realize that they're in a book and interact with Mako as such. There is a training sequence which shows Mako failing to do the most basic ninja arts and then gradually getting better. It's not Invincible Shaolin or 36th Chamber level of creativity, but it follows the logical progression. I also like that the three ninja girls (including Mako) have their ninjato (ninja swords) and their own personal weapon of preference: Yu has a pair of twin daggers (or kunai, the video quality was such that I couldn't really see), Hiro wields a pair of kama (or sickles), and Mako wields a knotted rope weapon, probably a kyoketsu-shoge. Watching her twirl the weapon around is always fun.

The fight scenes were staged by Makoto Sakaguchi, who also staged the action in Rise of the Machine Girls and Sion Sono's Prisoners of the Ghostland. The fight sequences are generally pretty good, although nothing spectacular. The last fight was pretty cool, although it gets a bit melodramatic, before leading into a final twist. My major issue with the action is that the foley team and sound effects editors did an awful job of inserting sound effects for the impacts of punches and kicks, and then mixed it so you can barely here the effects in the first place. It makes the fights feel very weak.

Also, the action never gets better than the 10-minute opening sequence in which Tak Sakaguchi kills about three dozen ninja. That scene is choreographed in a way similar to vintage Japanese chanbara films in which it is attack-block/evade-death blow. Very quick and direct, like most samurai films tend to be. But the camerawork and overall staging is dynamic and the action sequences with our ninja girls never reach that level of excitement. This sequence was designed by Tak Sakaguchi and Yuji Shimomura, with help from Yoshitaka Inagawa (Re:Born) and Ryôma Mutô (Demon City). After this scene, the rest of the film is fun fluff, but keep your expectations in check.

Black Fox: Age of the Ninja (2019)

Starring: Chihiro Yamamoto, Maimi Yajima, Sakurako Okubo, Mami Fujioka, Yasuaki Kurata, Yûki Kubota, Hideo Ishiguro, Kanon Miyahara, Masayuki Deai, Kôji Nakamura
Director: Koichi Sakamoto
Action Director: Koichi Sakamoto

As I have surmised elsewhere, I wonder if Koichi Sakamoto's approach to filmmaking is to use Tokusatsu as his bread and butter and then use the money he makes from those to fund his own martial arts-heavy fare. Black Fox is interesting in that it gives me the feeling of a pilot to an unmade martial arts show with Tokusatsu overtones, right down to the fact that the main bad guy is sorta shown, but is still hanging around and ready to send new villains after our heroines.

The first of those heroines we meet is Miya (Maimi Yajima, of Black Angels and Zombvideo), a young lady who is being chased through a forest by a band of warrior monks led by bad-bitch Uto (Kanon Miyahara, of Shogun's Ninja and Tatsujin Warriors). Miya apparently falls to her death and Uto leads her band of ass-kicking monks in rice hats out of forest. Miya survives her fall and makes her way to the inner sanctum of the Fox Ninja Clan. The first person she meets there is Rikka Isurugi (Chihiro Yamamoto, of Under Ninja and "Ultraman Geed"), the granddaughter of the clan leader, played by the legendary Yasuaki Kurata. We learn that Miya has been looking specifically for the Foxes in order to request their services in eliminating the Warrior Monks, who are all under the command of Lady Haku (Mami Fujioka).

We learn that Miya was raised by her father, who had both raised her and experimented on her until she developed the super power (yes, "super power") of firing lightning, Raiden (or Electro) style. But the warrior monks, in the employ of Shigetsugu Kuboto (Yuka Kubota, of "Kamen Rider Gaim"), killed him in order to whisk her away and use her as a weapon for the local Daimyo (who would become the series's Lord Zed had this become a show). The warrior monks storm the Foxes headquarters and a huge fight breaks out. Although Rikka is powerful enough to defeat Uto in combat, she is too kind-hearted to kill her outright. This incurs the ire of her grandfather, who refuses to accept the notion of a merciful ninja. He eventually sells out Miya when he finds out who Shigetsugu is working for.

So, Rikka is left with no choice but to rescue her new friend by herself. But her late father, an inventor, left her with a special inheritance: a black leather ninja outfit that feels like the Sengoku equivalent to a Super Sentai costume and a non-lethal energy sword. Will Rikka, her martial arts skills, and her equipment be able to defeat all of the Warrior Monks, Shigetsugu's legions, and Kuboto himself? And what exactly are Kubotu's plans for our Nihongo Storm girl?

I was expecting more and better action from a Koichi Sakamoto film. The film has its moments, but those moments are often overshadowed by 90s-TV-show CGI effects, especially once the titular Black Fox starts fighting with her energy katana. There is a warrior monk, Jin (Masayuki Deai, of "GoGo Sentai Boukenger"), who does a lot of kicking in his fights, but he doesn't get much altitude in his bootwork. The final fight between the Black Fox and Shigetsugu is pretty decent and I like her patented multi-stroke finishing move (the kenjutsu equivalent to the Power Rangers joining their weapons and firing them at the end of each fight). The build-up to that fight, which involves Miya and her lightning abilities, does strain credibility, however. Yasuaki Kurata gets to fight a little bit during the raid on his headquarters, so watching him crack a few skulls is welcome.

In the end, Sakamoto fans may get a little out of his patented choreography style, but he's done far better work elsewhere.

Ninja vs. Shark (2023) 

Starring: Julia Nagano, Koshu Hirano, Kanon Miyahara
Director: Koichi Sakamoto
Action Director: Koichi Sakamoto

Ninja vs. Shark feels like one of those "Ohtaku Fan Wank" films that Japan was churning out by the dozen at the end of the aughts. You know, the sort of fan-service film that felt deliberately made and marketed to Western fanboys of Japanese pop culture and trash cinema in general. Although you can argue that it started with Versus (2000), the sort of film I'm referring to really got moving in 2008 with Tokyo Gore Police. Four the next four or five years, we got a slew of films starring pretty girls (often AV actresses) in school girl outfits showing their tits, being bathed in fake blood, and fighting ninjas, zombies, monsters, or any combination of the three. So, stuff like The Machine Girl; Robo Geisha; and Dracula Girl vs Frankenstein Girl. This film feels like a return to that sort of film in a lot of ways.

The film opens with a girl being murdered at sea and her mutilated corpse washing up ashore. She is a member of the Okitsu Village, who has been plagued with disappearances and sea-related killings. Although everybody knows that the devil-worshipping ninja cult known as the Crimson Devil Clan, led by Mizuchi, the villagers like to use Sayo (Julia Nagano) as the scapegoat. She is considered to be the village jinx after she murdered her drunken, abusive, and incestuous father for killing her mother--I guess it didn't help that dad was the mayor's brother. Anyway, Sayo's only friend and protector is Shinsuke (Shun Nishime), but only he can do so much.

The village mayor knows that they won't last long against the Crimson Devil Clan, so he hires a wandering fighter named Kotaro (Koshu Hirano) to be their bodyguard (the word yojimbo is used a lot in the dialog). When we meet Kotaro, he has just gotten done raping the wife of the mayor of another village for not paying him for his services. He kills the mayor and his flunkies, which the Okitsu Village mayor is willing to turn a blind eye to in order to secure his services. Kotaro sets up shop at Shinsuke and Sayo's house and starts digging up the bodies from the cemetery to find out what killed them.

When Sayo gets attacked by a shark the next day, Kotaro rescues her and figures out what is happening: the local "Sea God" is an actual entity and can manifest itself as a shark. And Mizuchi has found out how to control it using black magic--he can also transfer his soul into the bodies of younger men (thus the disappearances), Angel Heart style. Mizuchi also gets a new ally in the form of Kikuma (Kanon Miyahara), a kunoichi from the Mountain Ninja Clan, of which Kotaro used to be a member. She wants revenge against him for abandoning the clan and spurning her advances. She and Crimson Devil Clan kidnap Sayo to sacrifice to the Sea God. Only Shinsuke and Kotaro can rescue her...

Ninja vs. Shark feels like the Japanese equivalent of an Asylum film, especially in the sense that the titular battle doesn't account for more than 3 to 5 minutes of actual screen time. And like the Asylum, when that battle does happen, it is mostly questionable CGI. And the denouement is right out of a Sharknado film. However, where this film gets a leg up on the Asylum is the filler: instead of washed-up 80s singers or 90s sitcom actors (or Eric Roberts) standing around staring at screens for 80 minutes, the filler here is ultraviolent swordplay. Koichi Sakamoto and his Alpha Stunts team did the action design and it is "alright" by Sakamoto standards--certainly no Broken Path or Drive. Some of the fighting at the end is pretty good, like when Kotaro uses a katana against Kikuma's two-fisted tanto daggers.

Yeah, this is one of those movies like Machine Girl where you can spout off a list of the off-kilter things that show up in the story and the viewer can decide if they want to watch it or not: Ninja Magic! Zombies! Ultraviolence! Giant Land Sharks! Possession! Swordplay! Shark Men! Zombified Necrophiliac Lesbianism! My thoughts on this are that it was okay, but the version I watched on Youtube (via 24-7 Samurai Ninja channel) had all the bloodiest moments censored, so I wasn't able to appreciate its nuttiness to the fullest.

Shogun's Ninja (2025)

Shogun's Ninja (2025)

Starring: Himena Yamada, Kanon Miyahara, Nashiko Momotsuki, Fumi Taniguchi, Raiga Terasaka, Ryuma Hashido, Katsuya Takagi, Julia Nagano, Seiji Takaiwa, AKANE
Director: Koichi Sakamoto
Action Director: Koichi Sakamoto, Alpha Stunts Production

I get the feeling that Koichi Sakamoto works in a manner similar to Steven Soderberg in Hollywood. Soderberg is known for directing guaranteed crowd-pleasers, like the Ocean's films, and then using the money and goodwill generated from those films to fund his more personal projects. Sakamoto seems to do something similar, where he works on various successful Tokusatsu franchises, like Super Sentai and Kamen Rider, and then uses the money he and his team make from that for smaller, more personal projects. Like this. And Ninja vs. Shark. And Girl's Blood. Oh, Sakamoto, you sly dog, you.

Despite the title, this is not a remake of the 1980 film starring Hiroyuki Sanada, Etsuko Shihomi, and Sonny Chiba. Instead, we get one of the most Progressive chanbara films ever made. It is fascinating because this is based (to some extent) on historical fact. It is accepted that the third Shogun of the Tokugawa Shogunate, Tokugawa Iemitsu (played here by Ultraman Trigger's Raiga Terasaka), was bisexual. He had relations with both men and boys--the latter led to the banning of wakashu kabuki, in which the female roles were filled by young boys. And as in this film, his heir was not the product of his first marriage to Lady Takako (who is mentioned in the film, but never shown), but to his first concubine, Lady Oraku. Outside of those details, the film really does its own thing with history.

The Shogunate has a problem: the current shogun, Iemitsu, is a homosexual. He has not touched his wife, Lady Takako, and prefers to touch his kenjutsu teacher, Matajuro Yagyu (Ryuma Hashido, of "Wingman" and Assassination Classroom), instead. This is a problem for his caretaker, Lady Ofuku (AYANE, of Ultraman Orb), and the head of the Yagyu Clan, Munenori Yagyu (Seiji Takaiwa, of Kamen Rider Fourze and Mirai Sentai Timeranger). Ofuku knows that for peace to continue in Japan, the Tokugawa shogunate needs to continue. And if the Shogun cannot produce an heir because his backdoor shenanigans with a Yagyu clan scion, she is not afraid to de-legitimize the ninja clan and kick them out of the castle.

So, Lady Ofuku has Munenori send his other two children, Samon (Katsuya Takagi, of Ichi and Ultraman Trigger) and Akane (Julia Nagano, of Ninja vs. Shark), to round up candidates for concubines around Edo. One of their targets is Oran (Nashiko Momotsuki, of Mashin Sentai Kiramager and GARO: Versus Road), the daughter of a landlord and one of the prettiest girls in Edo. One of the guy's tenants is a "business" called Odd Jobs Kyoka, which is run by a pair of kunoichi from the now-eradicated Fuma Clan: Okyo (Kanon Miyahara, of Ninja vs. Shark and Kamen Rider Gotchard) and Kagaribi (Himena Yamada, of Red Blade and Rise of the Machine Girls). They are low-level assassins and vigilantes-for-hire and have a close friendship with the Oran. When the Yagyu clan shows up to kidnap Oran (and kill her parents), Okyo and Kagaribi step in to defend their friend, but turn out to be no match for the Yagyu Clan, especially Akane.

The shogun and Matajuro decide to flee the castle together, freeing Oran and another intended concubine, Oshizu (Fumi Taniguchi, of Kamen Rider Gotchard). Oshizu is actually the daughter of the founder of the Itto-Ryu style of swordplay, who fought with Munenori Yagyu for the position of royal kendo instructor. When he died at the hands of Yagyu, the daughter went temporarily insane. But if you put a katana in her hand, she becomes a completely different person. In the end, Matajuro, Oshizu, and our ninja girls, Okyo and Kagaribi, team up and fight the Yagyu so that (gay) love may prevail...

Shogun’s Ninja is a fun little action film with very little pretension, save for the message that “Love is fluid” and “We should be able to love who we want.” That is very much a progressive message by today’s standards, although it seems a little disingenuous to place it in a movie about historical figure whose (real-life) tastes extended to underage boys. The tone is actually rather light whenever swords aren’t clashing, with Odd Jobs Kyoka girls constantly bickering with each other, like how Okyo is always making long-winded speeches whenever confronting an opponent. That part of the film in endearing.

The movie has pretty good pacing, too. There are a number of shorter fights throughout the first half. Once the film reaches the forty-minute point, there is a final twenty-minute climax with the heroes fighting the legions of Yagyu Clan retainers. I like the idea of Yagyu Clan being portrayed as a ninja clan that happened to ally itself with the right clan in order to legitimize itself after Tokugawa Ieyasu united Japan and established a period of peace. That said, according to the film, they had do some really underhanded stuff to make it to that point.

As you might expect from a Koichi Sakamoto film, the fights are generally solid. This movie has more action than a lot of those no-budget “Ninjas in a forest” movies that Japan made in the 2000s. There is some CGI—one power move and a few explosions—that is obvious, but those moments are few and far between. The fights have some very bloody moments, but never feels all-out gory like the skirmishes in Ninja vs. Shark.

Our ninja heroines use tanto daggers in most of their fights until the finale, when they bust out the ninjato swords (which are shorter than katana blades). Kanon Miyahara has several throwdowns with fellow Ninja vs Shark co-star Julia Nagano, with the latter always coming out on top until the finale. Stealing the show from the leading ladies is Fumi Taniguchi as Oshizu, who acts like a little girl until she touches a katana, at which she goes into Ogami Itto mode and slaughters her opponents with extreme prejudice. I loved her character. That said, the best fight is when Okyo and Kagaribi have a duel with Munenori Yagyu at end, which has some really good two-on-one swordplay and open-handed choreography. It was a great way to end the action portion of the film.

Finally, there is the denouement, which wraps up the dramatic and historical aspects of the story and lasts almost 15 minutes. This is interesting considering that this is a genre that often ends (or just “stops”) as soon as the main villain has been dispatched. But considering this film’s pseudo-historical trappings, I was interesting to see how it would handle the love story against actual history. Long story short: Oran becomes the real-life Lady Oraku and thus the mother of the next shogun.

(History note: Tokugawa Iemitsu actually got along well with his first wife, Lady Takako. He impregnated her thrice, but she had a miscarriage each time. Here, the script suggests that he never consummated his relationship with her because of his homosexuality)

Zatoichi (2003)

Zatoichi (2003)
Aka: The Blind Swordsman: Zatoichi
Japanese title: 座頭市
Translation: Zatoichi

 

Starring: Takeshi Kitano, Tadanobu Asano, Yui Natsukawa, Michiyo Yasuda, Taka Guadalcanal, Daigorô Tachibana, Yûko Daike, Ittoku Kishibe, Saburô Ishikura, Akira Emoto, Ben Hiura
Director: “Beat” Takeshi Kitano
Action Director: Tatsumi Nikamoto

 

Takeshi Kitano’s take on Zatoichi is interesting in that it is neither a remake nor a reboot. It doesn’t attempt to retell the blind masseuse’s origin story, nor did it spawn a new series of 25 films within the span of a single decade. Maybe you could call it a remix—a term used by my fellow reviewer Scott Hamilton to describe an adaptation that has the familiar elements of an existing franchise, buoyed by a director’s personal obsessions. However, the Wikipedia article on the movie suggests that Kitano scaled back his own auteur sensibilities when making this, so even that approach is arguable. In a lot of ways, Zatoichi feels like just another entry in the original series, but with some modern special effects, top-grade sound effects and sound editing, and what many refer to as a tap dance climax(!).

The movie is set in a small town that is being overrun by the Ginzu Gang. Several parties show up at the town for differing reasons. First, we have Zatoichi (Kitano), who wanders into town because…well…wandering into town is what he does. Zatoichi takes up shelter in the house of a widow, Aunt O’ume (Michiyo Yasuda, of Zatoichi’s Pilgrimage and Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in the Land of Demons). Our masseuse hero mainly hangs around doing chores and occasionally heading into town to gamble. There he befriends O’ume’s gambling-addict nephew, Shinkichi (Taka Guadalcanal, who worked with Kitano in Boiling Point).

Also new to town is a ronin named Hattori Genosuke (Tadanobu Asano, who has recently shown up in the Thor films and the Mortal Kombat reboot). Genosuke’s wife (Yui Natsukawa, of When the Last Sword is Drawn) is sick, probably with tuberculosis, and he needs to find work to pay for her medicine. Against her wishes, Hattori becomes a “bodyguard” for the Ginzu Gang. In this case, “bodyguard” is more like “mob enforcer” or “assassin,” as he mainly carries out hits against rivals gangs.

Finally, there is a geisha girl duo, comprised of siblings Okinu (Yûko Daite, of Kitano’s own Hana-Bi) and Osei (Daigorô Tachibana). These two have arrived in town looking for the men who slaughtered their family and stole the family fortune. One of the earliest scenes has them attending to a former family clerk before violently stabbing the man to death.

Like a lot of Zatoichi films, our hero spends the early part of the film gambling, drinking and making merry with geisha. Eventually, the paths of these parties will cross, although it will take a little while. We all know that Zatoichi will ultimately take up the Okinu and Osei’s cause, but not before we the viewer are treated to a few flashbacks explaining the duo’s tragic backstory, which involves crossdressing and attempted child molestation! One of the best things Kitano does about the movie is developing the stories of the supporting characters while keeping the Zatoichi character as enigmatic as he was in the earlier films. No revamped origin. No origin at all. Just a blind masseuse who happens to be capable of cutting down legions of foes with his cane sword.

On the same token, as far removed from the conflict as our hero is, it’s tough not to feel for the ronin and his wife. He loves his wife and he wants to take care of her. However, the tenets of samurai culture meant that the death of a master would guarantee “unemployment” for the samurai, often forcing him into banditry and other unsavory jobs. Hattori doesn’t want to be a hired killer, especially on the payroll of a bunch of no-good extortionists, but a mixture of bad luck and cultural quirks force him into that niche, at least if he wants any hope of his wife recovering from her illness.

The movie is often slow moving, with Zatoichi not really getting active until past the halfway mark. He does keep the story moving with both the characterizations and the occasional moments of humor. The humor ranges from quirky (i.e. villager who thinks he’s a samurai) to subtle (most of Shinkichi’s tomfoolery) and finally just goofy (i.e. the laugh-out-loud gag with the eyes). I never felt “bored” while watching this, but I did wonder how long it would be before Zatoichi became a more proactive character.

The answer is “not until the last half hour.” That isn’t to say that the first 80 minutes are completely bereft of action. The movie opens with a brief sword fight between Zatoichi and some sword-wielding bandits. There are several fight sequences involving Hattori cutting down his employers’ rivals, too. Around the halfway mark, there is an ultraviolent fight between Zatoichi and the employees of a gambling den. That is followed in short order by a flashback fight scene that has nothing to do with the narrative—I think the filmmakers thought that the script was light on Zatoichi action and needed an extra one.

The fights were probably staged by Tatsumi Nikamoto, who worked on the super popular Ultraman Tyga series and Toho sci fi-horror film Mikadroid. Although Nikamoto’s contemporaries in 2003 were moving more in the direction of Hong Kong-flavored action, he sticks with more traditional chanbara carnage, in which opponents are taken out with one or two sword strokes, crumpling to the ground in a fountain of blood. Fight results are determined by a mixture of strategy and sheer speed, as opposed to drawn-out exchanges of blocks and strikes until one technique bests the other.

Nikamoto’s craft reaches its apex during Zatoichi’s assault on the Ginzu headquarters. The Geisha girls have failed in their assassination attempt and have been pushed back against the door, so to speak. Suddenly, a sword blade passed through the wood from the other side and moves upward to lift the crossbar and open the door. Zatoichi appears and proceeds to hack a couple of dozen armed ronin to pieces. It’s the longest fight in the film and by far the best in terms of staging and editing.

Much has been made of the climax, which is a long tap dance sequence featuring a troupe known as The Stripes. When I read about this sequence (prior to watching the movie), I wasn’t sure how to understand this. Dance sequence? Climax? What does that mean? Does Zatoichi and his buddies enage in a dance off with the Ginzu gang? That would certainly be an odd way to finish a violent chanbara film. Well, it’s not quite that. It’s mainly the a long and elaborately-choreographed village festival dance—mixing modern African-American dance techniques with traditional kabuki clog dancing—that is intercut with scenes of Zatoichi clearing up the loose ends of the Ginzu case. This is the first movie I’ve seen since Seven Step Pagoda in which the conflict resolution is intertwined with an elaborate dance. I never thought that a Taiwanese cheapie would have anything to do with a Beat Takeshi film, but there you go.

This review is part of the "Oh, the Insanity! Oh, the Japanity!" series (click the "banner" below):

The Princess Blade (2001)

The Princess Blade (2001)
Japanese title: 修羅雪姫
Translation: Lady Snowblood

 

Starring: Yumiko Shaku, Hideaki Itô, Yôichi Numata, Shirô Sano, Kyûsaku Shimada, Yôko Chôsokabe, Yôko Maki, Naomasa Musaka
Director: Shinsuke Sato
Action Director: Donnie Yen, Kenji Tanigaki

The Princess Blade was filmed during Donnie Yen’s “choreographer” period, in which he spent most of his time behind the camera directing fight scenes than as an actor. The period went from 1999 until 2004, after which the success of both Seven Swords and Sha Po Lang turned him into the Great White Hope of Hong Kong martial arts actors. The “choreographer period” had been preceded by Donnie’s “Indie Director” period, marked by movies like Legend of the Wolf and Ballistic Kiss[1].

Donnie’s first gig in this action director period was in the romance-cum-crime drama Moonlight Express, starring Leslie Cheung. Nobody ever talks about this movie anymore, so I can only imagine that the action was both limited and fairly negligible. The following year, Donnie went to the West for a pair of gigs. One was the choreographer for the German TV series “Der Puma,” starring martial artist Mickey Hardt. The second was on the Hollywood film Highlander: Endgame, for which he staged the fights and played legendary assassin Jin Ke, the same guy he essentially fought two years later in Hero. After going to Japan for this movie, he went back to Hollywood for Guillermo del Toro’s Blade II, once again choreographing the fights and playing a supporting a role as a katana-wielding vampire.

The year 2003 saw Donnie’s stock rise, as he choreographed the well-received action-horror-fantasy The Twins Effect, which earned him his first Hong Kong Film Award for Best Action Direction. He immediately went to work directing the action on the next Twins movie, Protégé de la Rose Noire. Most people these days try to pretend that movie doesn’t exist, which should give you an idea as to its quality. However, if you want to see Donnie’s younger sister in action, then there’s that. He also took an “important” supporting role in The Twins Effect 2 that same year (i.e. 2004), although the action duties were handed over to Corey Yuen this time.

The Princess Blade is based on the same source material, the manga Shurayuki Hime, that inspired the classic chanbara film Lady Snowblood. This film pushes the story into a dystopian future, in which the Meiji restoration never occurred, but Japan had remained closed for a good 500 years, placing the story around A.D. 2103. The Japanese did manage to push their technology forward, although much like the 1990s Japan in real life, this fictional Japan has suffered economic stagflation for long enough that you get the feeling that inertia is just killing the place—much like Mad Max.

The main characters in this film belong to a clan known as the Takemikazuchi. The clan were originally the bodyguards for the royal family, but eventually one of the later kings turned on them. Most of them were hunted and killed. Many had their swords confiscated and/or were physically mutilated so as to prevent them from using martial arts. Those who escaped went underground and became paid assassins, sort of the ninja of their day. One of their number is Yuki (Yumiko Shaku, of Sky High and Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla), whose deceased mother had been the former “princess” of the clan. These days, however, the clan is run by the bass-voiced Byakurai (Kyûsaku Shimada, of Shin Godzilla and Tokyo: The Last Megalopolis).

One day, Yuki is out in the forest to kill a deserter when she runs into Kuka (Yôichi Numata, of Ringu and The Golden Bat), a former servant of her mother’s. Kuka informs her that her mother wasn’t killed in combat, but was actually murdered by Byakurai. When Yuki returns, she confronts her chief about the matter and he responds by trying to kill her. Yuki gets the heck out of dodge and takes refuge in a rundown gas station run by Takashi (Hideaki Itô, of the Onmyoji movies), a former dissident and terrorist, and his mute sister, Aya (Yôko Maki, of The Grudge and The Vanished). After recovering, Yuki takes leave and meets Kuka at the abandoned industrial district for more information about what happened to her mother. Unfortunately, the other Takemikazuchi assassins have figured out that the two would be meeting again. Yuki isn’t go to get away so easily this time…

The only real similarities between this and Lady Snowblood is the general theme about a woman who grew up being trained to kill seeking vengeance against those who killed her parents. Otherwise, they are completely different films, and this goes beyond the sci-fi trappings of this movie’s setting. While Lady Snowblood  had a lot of historical politics in the context of its story, the politics here are relegated to a limited subplot involving Takashi and his former dissident buddies. Cue a cameo by the ubiquitous Shirô Sano, of Godzilla 2000; Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack; and Godzilla: Final Wars.

Lady Snowblood’s Yuki also didn’t have much a character arc in her two movies. She’s has been taught since childhood that the entire reason for her existence is to get revenge, and that’s what she dutifully does. At no point does ever really stop to question her purpose or lot in life, or even ponder the morality of killing people, especially the henchmen of her enemies who had nothing to do with their original sins. Lady Snowblood is resigned to killing and that’s that. Princess Blade’s version of Yuki, as played by Yumiko Shaku (who was a big thing in the early 2000s), is a lot more introspective. While Shaku lacks the beauty and charisma of Meiko Kaji—a tall order to fill, although Shaku has her own following thanks her role as the tortured Akane Yashiro in Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla—her character has a complete arc. From unfeeling killing machine to reluctant warrior to a human being that embraces her emotions, Yuki is definitely a different person at the end than she was at the beginning.

The character development does have a bit of a cost in that the second act slows down a lot. You do start feeling for the characters by the time the third acts sets in and Yuki has to face her past once and for all, but a lot of viewers will probably be getting antsy by the hour mark. Said Phil Mills of Far East Films:

 

“The main problem is the lack of a significant story, as the film seems to play all of its cards early on and we’re left meandering around as the main character contemplates how to deal with her predicament. This ultimately means that the film becomes somewhat dull in places and you’ll regularly find yourself looking at your watch, just praying for something meaningful to occur[2].”

When something meaningful does occur, it is usually a pretty good swordfight courtesy of Donnie Yen and his protégé, Kenji Tanigaki. While Donnie needs no introduction, Mr. Tanigaki has had an impressive career, especially in recent years. Tanigaki joined Donnie’s stunt team around 1998 for Ballistic Kiss and has stuck by the man’s side until this very day. But he has also worked on various non-Donnie films, too. In his native Japan, Tanigaki did the action direction for the Rurouni Kenshin films, the first of which is said to have one of the best sword fights of all time. He won a Taiwan Golden Horse Award for his action in the film Hidden Man. Tanigaki has also worked in Hollywood on G.I. Joe Origins: Snake Eyes.

There are a handful of fights, most of which are in the first act. The movie opens with the Takemikazuchi assassins ambushing some cars on a highway and killing the men inside. Donnie and Kenji go for the stylish, with slow motion aerial attacks, some wire-enhanced acrobatics, and rapid-fire editing (mainly to hide the fact that actress Yumiko Shaku is often doubled by Yuji Shimomoura, another Donnie Yen collaborator). Yuki’s brief fight with Byakurai is mainly notable for its hard-hitting falls and throws.

Even better is the brief fight with the Takemikazuchi assassins in the abandoned factory, which features a lot of dynamic camerawork and one-versus-many sword choreography. In this fight, the result looks like a 1990s Ching Siu-Tung film, or the machete fight at the beginning of Donnie’s own Legend of the Wolf. That fight ends on a very graphic note involving torture and impaling.

The best choreography is saved for the finale, which is an eclectic mix of the sort of bootwork that Donnie Yen is most known for and swordplay that looks more like Western fencing than Japanese kenjutsu. While some may consider that inappropriate for a Japanese movie, the fact that Shaku (and Shimomoura) are fighting off half a dozen men at the same time makes the choreography that much more impressive. There are some nice slow-motion flips, wire-assisted jump kicks, and a neat way to neutralize her opponent’s sword techniques. Although action is infrequent and sometimes a little chaotic, it is good enough that, combined with Yumiko Shaku’s performance, it makes this a must for a single viewing…at the very least.

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[1] - It technically started in 1995 with the film High Voltage. Donnie apparently did most of the directing after the director walked off the set.

[2] - https://www.fareastfilms.com/?review_post_type=the-princess-blade

This review is part of the "Oh, the Insanity! Oh, the Japanity!" series (click the "banner" below):

Lady Snowblood 2: Love Song of Vengeance (1974)

Lady Snowblood 2: Love Song of Vengeance (1974)
Aka: Web of Treachery
Japanese Title: 修羅雪姫 怨み恋歌
Translation: Lady Snowblood – Grudge Love Song

 

Starring: Meiko Kaji, Jûzô Itami, Ransui Tokunaga, Kazuko Yoshiyuki, Yoshio Harada, Yoshio Harada, Shin Kishida, Tôru Abe, Rin'ichi Yamamoto, Kôji Nanbara
Director: Toshiya Fujita
Action Director: Kunishirô Hayashi

 

In a review of the first movie that I read many years ago, online film critic Scott Hamilton mentioned that one detail he thought should have been touched upon in Lady Snowblood was the question of: “What does a person who has literally been raised as tool of vengeance do with their lives once their mission is accomplished?”

The question is sort of answered in Lady Snowblood 2: Love Song of Vengeance.

The initial answer is: “Not much.” The movie opens with Yuki Kashima (Meiko Kaji) on the lam from the police and different assassins trying to collect a bounty on her head. While other movies gloss over the legal ramifications of vicious, martial arts-fueled vengeance, the police in the Meiji Period of Japan simply cannot overlook the murder of 37 people, including important arms dealers and policemen, too. Yuki has been a fugitive for a decade or so by this point, but she’s getting worn down, both physically and psychologically. It isn’t long before one police ambush results in her simply throwing down her sword and letting herself get captured. Considering the numbers of dead bodies that she has accumulated over the years, it isn’t surprising that she gets the death penalty.

As Yuki is on her way to her hanging, the police carriage she’s in is attacked by a bunch of masked men, led by a sai-wielding mute named Toad (Kôji Nanbara, of The Bloody Shuriken and The Resurrection of Golden Wolf). Toad works for the head of the Japanese Secret Police, Kikui (Shin Kishida, of Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla and Evil of Dracula). Kikui wants to employ Yuki’s services as a spy. Specifically, he wants her to infiltrate the home of a known anarchist, Ransui Tokunaga (Jûzô Itami, the director best known for Tampopo and A Taxing Woman) and get a secret document in his possession.

Yuki reluctantly accepts and is able to enter the Tokunaga household as a maid. It doesn’t take long for Ransui to figure out who she is. But instead of killing her, he leads her to the pet cemetery where his fellow anarchist buddies are buried, treated like mere animals by the authorities. There, he reveals the document to her, which is a letter consisting of recorded conversations between Kikui and high-ranking official Terauchi Kendo (Tôru Abe, of Shogun and Girl Boss Guerilla). The nature of these conversations is enough to bring down the entire Meiji government, it would seem. However, Yuki is swayed to Ransui’s side, bringing the ire of the Secret Police down on her and the Tokunaga family. And to put it bluntly, the Secret Police do not screw around.

Like the first movie, there is a historical context to this film, which mainly serves as background info, but ultimately makes the film more political than it might have been otherwise. Whereas the first movie dealt with the early tax rebellions of the Meiji Restoration and those who sought to profit from it, this movie is set after the Russo-Japanese War, which is referenced in the opening narration. The war itself is mentioned in several scenes, but the narration points out that the war more or less cemented Capitalism as the replacement for Feudalism, with there once again being a class of winners and losers, the latter being devastated by post-War inflation (gosh, was this movie made today?). There is a lot made about people who worked in menial jobs being forced to live in slums, none of whom the government ever gave a flying rat’s a** about. It isn’t directly related to Yuki and her mission, but it helps set the stage to showing us the Japan that Lady Snowblood was living in.

The general criticism levied against this film—which I agree with to an extent—is the pacing. It starts out promising, with Meiko Kaji getting in three different fights in the first 15 minutes. But, after she gets arrested, the action is toned down for the next hour or so. There is also a prolonged sequence where Lady Snowblood is incapacitated and we focus on the love triangle between Ransui, his wife Aya (Empire of Passion’s Kazuko Yoshiyuki), and the former’s brother, a slum-based doctor named Shusuke (Yoshio Harada, of Yagyu Clan Conspiracy). There is a lot of bad blood between them, plus a conflict of motives and goals. There is also an extended subplot involving the Bubonic Plague, which is very Camp 731 in its atrociousness.

Also, while there are some great moments of bloodshed—like one character stabbing a police inspector in the eye with a hairpin—it feels like the geysers of blood are saved for the last swordfight or so. A lot of the early sword duels are surprisingly bloodless, making me wonder if the film’s make-up effects budget was smaller than that of the first film. Once the action gets going again at the end, there are some nice moments of red paint splattering all over the film’s “canvas,” plus a few severed limbs, too. You’ll just have to wait a while to get there.

The action is once again staged by Kunishirô Hayashi. He doesn’t do quite a good job as he did in the first film, and the fight scenes are ultimately saved by the film’s marvelous cinematography. The first fight is filmed a single continuous shot of Meiki Kaji walking toward the camera as it draws back at the same pace. All the while, sword-wielding assassins are running around her, occasionally mustering up the courage to charge her, only to get cut down in a brief moment. The bravura camerawork and Meiko Kaji’s beauty ultimately stand as the main reasons to watch this movie. The beautiful bloodshed and gorgeous scene compositions are toned down too much and the second act is a bit too slow more my tastes. I can’t call this movie a waste of time, but it certainly does not live up to the standards of its predecessor.

This review is part of the "Oh, the Insanity! Oh, the Japanity!" series (click the "banner" below):

Lady Snowblood (1973)

Lady Snowblood (1973)
aka: Lady Snowblood: Blizzard from the Netherworld; Snow of Blood; Blood Snow; Lady of Blood
Original Title: 修羅雪姫
Translation: Lady/Princess Snowblood

 

Starring: Meiko Kaji, Toshio Kurosawa, Masaaki Daimon, Miyoko Akaza, Shinichi Uchida, Takeo Chii, Noboru Nakaya, Yoshiko Nakada, Akemi Negishi, Kaoru Kusuda, Sanae Nakahara, Hôsei Komatsu, Hitoshi Takagi, Eiji Okada, Kô Nishimura
Director: Toshiya Fujita
Action Director: Kunishiro Hayashi

 

Lady Snowblood is one of those classic chanbara films that has influenced a lot of filmmakers and other artists, most notably Quentin Tarantino on his Kill Bill movies. Its reputation precedes it in most martial arts cinema circles as being one of the best examples of the 1970s grindhouse fare from Japan. As such, it is frequently of danger of over-adulation, in which newbies who hear and read about may expect a beautiful woman in a kimono to be getting into Crazy 88’s style of swordfights every few minutes. It is not that, although it does feature a beautiful woman in a kimono—the gorgeous Meiko Kaji—hacking people up with a sword.

In 1867, Japan left the so-called “Edo Period”—or the Tokugawa Shogunate ended—after a few hundred years and entered the “Meiji Period,” in which the country was opened up to foreign relations and the country entered the process of modernization. Obviously, such a transition was not always a peaceful one and at one point, there were a series of uprisings known as the Tax Revolts. The government started an obligatory military conscription program for boys as young as 16 in order to quell these rebellions. A lot of rural villages did not relish the idea of giving up their sons—I assume for both personal and practical purposes—and some dishonest, enterprising spirits caught on to this fact.

Charlatans showed up in villages claiming that they knew a way “around” the conscription laws, in which for a small value—270 yen—they could keep their sons out of the army. After fleecing the villagers of their hard-earned money, they filled the villagers’ heads with lies that anyone dressed in white Western clothes were the Japanese equivalent to an American draft agent. Villagers would naturally fall upon these guys and kill them with the understanding that they were saving their kids from forced military service.

And that is just what happened in 1874 in a place called Koichi Village. A gang of four bandits set up an anti-conscription racket and convinced the ignorant villagers that anyone dressed in white was out for their sons. And so an innocent teacher named Gô Kashima (Massaaki Daimon of Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla) gets cut down by the bandits while the villagers bash in his son’s head and leave him for dead. Gô’s wife, Sayo (prolific actress Miyoko Akaza), is a bit of a looker, so three of the bandits—one of them is a woman—make sure to rape her up real good. One bandit ultimately takes her with him to Tokyo to serve as his plaything and help out at his restaurant. Sayo ultimate murders him, which earns her a life sentence at a women’s prison.

Distraught that she won’t be able to carry out her revenge in person, Sayo does the next best thing: she seduces the guards on a regular basis until she gets pregnant. The child, Yuki, will then inherit the mission of avenging the wrongs committed against the Kashima family. Sayo dies from complications in childbirth, and a pickpocket named Tajire (Akemi Nigishi, of Sex & Fury and King Kong vs. Godzilla) raises the child, along with a warrior-priest (Kô Nishimura, of Yojimbo and 13 Assassins). The latter trains little Yuki in the martial arts and swordsmanship until she is 20 years old, at which point her mission begins.

Yuki does not know how to find the three surviving bandits, so she gets herself some eyes and ears to help her. More specifically, she kills a corrupt magistrate named Genzo Shibayama (Hosei Komatsu, of Ohyaku, the Female Demon), who is known for harassing the famous Beggar’s Clan. This ingratiates her with the clan’s leader, Matsuemon (Hitoshi Takagi, of Hanzo the Razor: The Snare), who agrees to have his contacts all over the country keep their eyes out for her targets. So let the killing begin…

The backstory for Lady Snowblood is a lot more involved than it was for its Hong Kong remake, Broken Oath. The latter was set in the Qing Dynasty and involved a very generic attempt at a rebellion, but the former is rooted in actual Japanese history. It makes the story a lot more political than it might have been, as it points out that the modernization of Japan (and the introduction of capitalism) came with a price, in that bandits and other awful people could legitimately get rich and gain power. You could argue that feudalism similarly exploited people, but now the more enterprising people had foreign powers to back them up. Moreover, any semblance of a chivalric moral code, even if it only existed in the abstract, was abandoned in the pursuit of profit, which guaranteed power.

To draw out the comparisons between this and Broken Oath even further, it is rather revealing how these two movies—and possibly the Japanese and Chinese cultures--treat religion. In the latter movie, Angela Mao’s character learns kung fu from the Shaolin Temple, but it is obvious that the monks are wary about her character’s tendency to violence. Moreover, there are lots of kung fu movies in which a character goes to the temple to train for revenge, only to be admonished the whole time by the monks that such a pursuit flies in the face of Buddhism. Compare with Lady Snowblood, where a priest specifically trains her for revenge. Not only that, he specifically teaches her to set aside any sort of emotion that doesn’t involve vengeance. The best moment that encapsulates this idea is when the protagonists put into effect a plan to draw out one of her targets by having a journalist-novelist write about Yuki’s adventures, and the priest tells Yuki: “Be patient. If you take a day to rest while your plan for revenge is in effect, Buddha will forgive you.” You would never see a Shaolin Abbot say something like that.

The main draw for a film like Lady Snowblood is to see the beautiful Meiko Kaji prance about in kimonos with a determined look on her face cut down her enemies. At that, this movie excels. Kaji is an important actress for genre fans, having also showed up in the Female Prisoner Scorpion films and the second Wandering Ginzu Butterfly movie. She also was a singer, providing the vocals for this movie’s music. Nerd note: her songs enjoyed a resurgence after the success of Kill Bill and she came out of singing retirement to record a new album. Kaji doesn’t have Angela Mao’s martial prowess, or Yuen Woo-Ping’s team to make her look good a lá Uma Thurman, but she certainly has a screen presence.

Speaking of Yuen Woo-Ping, the action scenes here were choreographed by Kunishiro Hayashi, whose only other credit on the IMDB is the 1984 Hollywood film Ghost Warrior, which involves a samurai coming to life in modern-day Los Angeles. The fights themselves are competent, but don’t expect Meiko Kaji to fight an entire army like Ogami in the Lone Wolf and Cub series. Instead, this is more of the sort of film you watch the revel in the bloodletting, as each slice unleashes gallons of red paint, which the camera lovingly lingers on as if the carnage itself was sexier than the sword technique that caused it. And to be honest, there are some beautiful compositions of violence, like when Yuki cuts down one of her enemies on the seashore, and you see the body lying in the water, repeatedly “baptized” by the red-stained water that the waves keep pushing on him.

If you go into this movie expecting something along the lines of the Lone Wolf and Cub movies, you’ll probably be disappointed. If you, however, can appreciate Meiko Kaji’s beauty and no-nonsense performance, some good photography, and a large helping of Dario Argento-esque gore, than Lady Snowblood is the film for you. I don’t think I consider it one of the classics, but it’s pretty darn good at what it does.

This film is part of a series called "Oh, the Insanity! Oh, the Japanity!" (click the "banner" below):

Oh, the Insanity! Oh, the Japanity!

Oh, the Insanity! Oh, the Japanity!

I am currently on vacation from work and will be for most of July. While I do have my own real-life trips planned with my family, I would like to take my readers on a virtual trip to Japan. 

Japan has always had a robust cinema, for better or worse, Kaiju eiga in the 1950s gave rise to the tokusatsu show in the 1960s, which is an integral part of Japanese pop culture today. Even Godzilla, the king of them all, has been popular enough to get a handful of Hollywood films in recent years. Meanwhile, the samurai drama, or jidai geki, gave rise to the ultraviolent chanbara film in the 1970s, which tradition inspired Hollywood in films like Kill Bill Vol. 1 and is active to some extent in Japan to this day. 

All sorts of exploitation films were produced in the 1970s, when theaters were struggling to match the popularity of TV shows. We had pinku films like Female Prisoner Scorpion and Delinquent Girl Boss series. Hundreds of Roman Porno movies, generally produced by Nikkatsu, came out to varying degrees of mainstream success, filling theaters for more than a decade. There were disaster movies; violent yakuza films, or jitsuroku eiga; Godzilla movies that featured blood geysers; and let's not forget Sonny Chiba's bone-crunching karate films.

Things calmed down in the 1980s; for some reason, it was classier to make Roman Porno rapesploitation films than to make action movies. But then the 1990s arrived. The Godzilla series was now back in full swing. New and insanely popular adaptations of Ultraman, including series produced in both Australia and the US, popped up after a relative lull. Softcore sex films about female ninja, or kunoichi, also became popular. J-horror evolved, bringing the ghost story out of the Edo Period and into contemporary high schools and apartment complexes.

The following decade saw a new generation of filmmakers arise, many of whom had grown up on the works of Jackie Chan and Yuen Biao, both of whom had strong cult followings in Japan. They brought that Hong Kong influence into their movies, regardless of the genre. Names like Ryuhei Kitamura, Yuji Shimomura, Go Ohara, and Seiji Chiba became popular with martial arts fans, especially those who were growing increasingly dissatisfied with Hong Kong cinema. Meanwhile, some studios realized the market for Japanese cult films in the West and started making movies for the ohtaku, filled with cute girls in schoolgirl outfits, lots of fake blood, and maybe even some boobs and sex. And so it goes.

In any case, stay tuned for a month of Japanese movie reviews of numerous films from different decades, mainly in the martial arts genre. This post will be included in the "Misc. Articles" page and plan on updating it regularly with the reviews I post, or old reviews I update should I do that. So, sit back, get some sushi or tempura, and enjoy the ride!

And thanks to Forest Taylor of Slaughter Film for allowing me to use the title "Oh, the Insanity! Oh, the Japanity!" for this marathon.

New Reviews:

Yo-Yo Girl Cop (2006)
Lady Snowblood (1973)
Gothic & Lolita Psycho (2010)
High Kick Angels (2014)
Blood Heat (2002)
Gothic Lolita Battle Bear (2014)
Bloodfight (1989)
Lady Snowblood 2: Love Song of Vengeance (1974)
The Princess Blade (2001)
Rogue Ninja (2009)
Alien vs. Ninja (2010)
Kunoichi: Ninja Girl (2011)
Zatoichi (2003)
G.I. Samurai (1979)
Samurai Commando Mission 1549 (2005)

Movies watched, but not reviewed:

Akira (1988)
Love Ghost (2001)
Suicide Club (2002)
Vital (2004)
Angel Beats (2010 - anime)
Forget Me Not (2015)
A Silent Voice: The Movie (2016)

Older Reviews:

The Street Fighter
Return of the Street Fighter
The Street Fighter's Last Revenge
Sister Street Fighter
Karate Warriors
Soul of Chiba
Karate Wars
Sky High
Death Trance
Ichi
Machine Girl
High Kick Girl
KG: Karate Girl