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The Men Who Tread on the Tiger’s Tail (1945) Censored by the Freedom of Speech Advocates (the United States) until 1952.

23 Nov

Here is a Kurasowa film that was made in 1945 during the final days of WWII, but prevented from general release by American censors until 1952 when the U.S. forces essentially withdrew from Japan ostensibly because the film contained elements of the bushido code.

This is not your run of the mill movie in the eyes of most westerners.  It is less than an hour long and filmed against what is clearly a painted set meant to be the mountainous horizon of Japan.  In addition, half of the dialogue is poetry that is sung making it more of a narrative now that I think about it.  People attribute these cinematic devices to director Kurasowa’s faithfulness to the “noh” style play upon which the story is based.  If, like me, you have no idea what that is, noh is a genre of classical Japanese musical dramas that has been performed since the 14th century.  Apparently, the plays focus on technical form rather than creativity and what we would call traditional “acting today.”

While researching this review I noticed something; that is, people either loved this film or hated it.  Very few opinions were “middle of the road” when discussing the merits of the movie with some going so far as to say “well it left me feeling that the best part of this film was its short 58 minutes.”  Something I’ve never heard or read about a Kurasowa film until now.

The film follows the Japanese jidaigeki or “period drama” telling the story of The Gempei War, which has just ended and now, two brothers – allies of that war – have turned into enemies.  Yoshitsune, a victorious general in the War, is being hunted by his brother, Yoritomo. Yoshitsune, along with six men, attempt to reach Hidehira Fujiwara, who may offer Yoshitsune safety. To do so, they have to pass through a barrier in the Kaga Province, under the command of its magistrate, Saemon Togashi.  The film is how are they going to get through the barrier.

Getting through the checkpoint is not going to be as easy as passing through a tollbooth.  With Yoshitsune’s right hand man, Benkei (a formidable historical figure in his own right), leading the way, the six men, disguised as monks, with Yoshitsune disguised as a porter and another real porter providing comedy relief (and in my opinion helping to save their skin in the end), travel to the barrier, but word has already reached the officials that the fugitives are moving incognito as wandering ascetic priests.  Naturally, they are stopped at the checkpoint since they fit the description of (and are in fact) the wanted men.

Since all of the fugitives have been trained in ritual, their show is very convincing.  Togashi proceeds to ask a number of questions designed to prove their priesthood.  As a real priest, Benkei has been steeped in the traditions of the Buddha and he alone speaks, and he does so convincingly.  Togashi’s final test requires Benkei to recite his mission for the temple he claims to be collecting donations for.  He famously takes up a blank scroll and recites, partially from memory and partially improvisational, in typical Buddhist fashion.  Togashi’s suspicions ostensibly assuaged, the band of merry men are allowed to pass, but as they depart, Togashi’s right-hand believes he recognizes the one of their number as Yoshitsune.  Benkei thinking on his feet, beats the heck out of his lord Yoshitsune with his staff.  In Japan during that time, no retainer would ever lay a hand upon his master, and thus the guards are convinced of their authenticity.

The best part of this movie is not the dialogue in and of its self, but the psychological questions hanging out there.  Does Togashi know that it is indeed Yoshitsune’s band and therefore allow them to pass out of some admiration for their performance?  Or has Benkei truly succeeded in fooling them?  Other versions of the story try to leave their audience hanging by making them try to guess what he knew and when did he know it.  In this film, it is clear that Togashi knows and that Benkei knows that he knows.  This may not be so easily diffused from a single viewing.  Kurosawa himself, it could be argued, winks and nods at this reading, but he never spells it out in the final product (through montage, composition or otherwise).  Instead, he leaves it to the cunning of his actors who make these points.

So here are my middle of the road thoughts on The Men Who Tread on the Tiger’s Tail the film’s narrative singing gets a little annoying after the first song, but the tension described in the preceding paragraph add significantly to the merits of this movie.

 
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Posted by on November 23, 2011 in Movie Reviews

 

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A Cruel Story.

04 Nov

A Cruel Story.

This is a tale of the Shinsengumi, a band of samurais in Kyoto that are steeped in lore and the subject of many films.  They formed and became prominent as the Tokugawa period was swiftly decaying and their goal was to preserve the Tokugawa government and keep order in Kyoto at any cost.

The Shinsengumi’s have been portrayed across the full spectrum of images from slapstick chumps (some would say) as in the 2004 NHK series to a cruel & barbaric group of ruthless bloodthirsty samurai.  A Cruel Story depicts the group as uncivilized & dirty, some members have even gone insane.  This film is unlike many previous versions where directors try to make the group more palatable by sanitizing their image sometimes a little but mostly a lot.

The players include Kondo a man that assassinated the group’s founder Serizawa to become its leader and the extremely vicious homosexual Hijikata, who was the group’s chief assassin and summarily resolved internal disputes with his sword rather than with words.  One member had the audacity to question the group’s humanity that cost him a half-dozen sword cuts so he could bleed to an agonizing death.

The film follows Enami, who initially idolizes the band and wants to join their ranks so much that he attempts seppuku to prove his worthiness.  He is a hick from the sticks who dreams of becoming a true samurai, but is initially innocent of the barbaric ways the group uses to enforce its policies and carry out its mandate. 

Enami is mortified by his initial taste of the Shinsengumi’s punishing brutality and begins to vomit out of fear and disgust.  However, he is quickly seduced by the dark side and rapidly volunteers to behead a member showing us that one’s fall from grace can be fast and furious.  Nevertheless, there is more than the regression of man to primal violence, as we discover Enami is Serizawa’s nephew, Serizawa having been the past (and assassinated) leader of Shinsengumi.  He wants revenge against Kondo Isami, his uncle’s killer.

For the mid 1960’s this was one of the bloodiest black and white films of its time and is a powerful indictment of the brutality going on in Japan in the name of keeping the West out of the country.  A motion picture you should not miss.

 

 
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Posted by on November 4, 2011 in Movie Reviews

 

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That is right the co-founder of JPFmovies DT comes in from out of the cold and looks at 13 Assassins (the 2010 version) Or Vigilante Justice—Samurai Style.

24 Jun

The film is a remake of Eiichi Kudo’s 1963 black-and-white Japanese film of the same name, Jûsan-nin no shikaku and is based on a true story.  The film opens up with a bang as a nobleman commits seppuku to make an appeal to the Shogun (it sure must have been an important appeal) because the younger brother of the current Shogun (the equivalent of a prince) is roaming the country committing atrocities against his own people.

The Shogun’s administration goes to any length to cover up the prince’s behavior to prevent embarrassing the Shogun and his lineage.  But the prince goes too far, he rapes a young lady while staying at an inn and when his deed is discovered by her newlywed husband, the prince kills him and out of shame she kills herself.  To make matters worse, to protect himself from any revenge and against direct orders from the Shogun, the prince murders all of the victims’ relatives—including women and children—save one, a women whose limbs were cut off and tongue taken out that the prince left alive as a “toy.” The senior advisor to the Shogun shows a friend of his (who was also victimized by the prince) what is left of the prince’s handiwork and gives his tacit behind the scenes directive to kill this maniac.

 

The samurai begins his mission by recruiting ten men from his own clan to volunteer for what looks like a suicide mission and even convinces his lay about nephew to join the cause (so we are at 11 assassins at this point).  After assembling these 11 warriors from within, he hires one ronin for 200 ryo (the currency at that time) and in a rather ballsy move goes to meet with his former classmate who is in charge of protecting the sadistic prince and in a roundabout way says they will soon meet on the road under combat conditions.

 

The band of assassins begins preparing themselves to carry out their mission.  They know that the prince is in transit to his home province and realize that their only chance to kill him is before the prince makes it to his castle.  While the prince’s procession is en route, they try to take a different road through the territory of another clan, but the procession is stopped at the border and told to turn around because the lord controlling the province will not have anything to do with the prince and his procession. 

 

So the procession is forced to take the conventional route which passes through a village the assassins had engineered to maximize their chances of killing the sadistic prince.  On the way to the village, the samurai get lost and come across a mountain man trapped in a tree.  They free the trapped man because they find out the man has been tied up simply for hitting on his lords wife.  To thank the samurai the mountain man offers to be their guide and get them back to the village.  Once they arrive at the village the mountain man expresses his distaste for samurais and their arrogance as well as their adherence to some abstract outdated code.  The procession begins to arrive shortly after the tongue lashing and the samurai tells the mountain man that this is not his fight and he is free to go.  The mountain man retorts that the samurai are not god’s gifts to warfare and that he is going to stay and fight to show them a thing or two by using his sling and rocks.  Because they have no time to argue, the mountain man becomes the thirteenth assassin.

 

As the battle begins the prince’s soldiers begin to die left and right, but the odds are still against the assassins as it is thirteen against 200 and they make a tactical mistake by not fully utilizing their own defenses and start to fight hand to hand before they need to.  Just watching these guys get through obstacle after obstacle to get to the prince is exciting but exhausting.  Eventually, two assassins corner the prince and kill him.  Then the mountain man (who has a short sword stuck shear through his throat) shows up and the remaining three of the 13 left leave the scene.

Back at the ranch, word of the prince’s death reaches the castle.  The administration needs to save face so they put out the official story explaining that the prince died of an illness rather than being killed by vigilantes.

Over all I think the movie kicks ass and is an all-around excellent film.  The movie not only has great martial arts action, but the story engages you to the point of making you wanting to revolt with the 13 assassins as well.  On a different level, the film relays problems of the samurai way of life, showing the huge self-imposed burdens samurais carry on their shoulders and does a very good job of depicting the amoral aspects of the samurai code.  For instance, the prince’s protector always justifies and rationalizes his conduct by saying it is not his place to question but only to obey.  The movie shows how the samurai fall because there is no room for that way of life in the modern age—because the samurai used words like honor and duty to defend the indefensible, their way of life needed to come to a close.  The irony really hits home at the end when the slacker nephew is told by his dying uncle to drop the way of the sword and seek a new way of life.  The mountain man asks the nephew what he is going to do and the nephew replies that he will become a bandit and take a boat to America. 

 

This movie also distinguishes its self because in today’s typical Hollywood film all of the loose ends would have been tied nice and neatly with the good guys winning over the evil prince and everyone goes home happy.  13 Assassins, however, does not leave you with the typical good triumphed over evil feeling.  Instead, it is more of a tragedy because all of the truly righteous samurai have died during the mission while the amoral (even corrupt) samurai depicted by the nephew survives drops the way of the sword and wants to become a bandit outside of homeland Japan.  I think the final line of the movie was brief but powerful with lots of layers that comment on the state of Japanese society.  What may look like on its face as a simple samurai ninja movie is actually a complex commentary on the inevitable changes in Japanese whether they be for better or worse.   

 
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Posted by on June 24, 2011 in Movie Reviews

 

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Ever hear of a castle named after a bird? JPFmovies Looks at Owl’s Castle (1999)

19 Jun

Based on the 1999 novel by Shiba Ryotaro and directed by Shinoda Masahiro the same year, Owl’s Castle is thoroughly tangled in actual Japanese history and a terrific depiction of the politics of the times.  One of the great features of this movie is that it was shot on site at many of the original locations in Osaka and Nara. Owl’s Castle attempts to recreate the politically tumultuous times following the Sengoku Era during which the entire nation was engaged in civil war.  Traditionally three key figures are credited with resolving that anarchy and inching Japan along the path of political unification that would last about 300 years from 1568 until Japan finally opened itself up to the West in the Meiji Era circa 1868.  The three figures were Oda Nobunaga (1534-1582), Toyotomi Hideyoshi (ruled 1584-1598), and Tokugawa Ieyasu (1543-1616).

 

Aspiring to the appointment of Shogun by the Emperor, Oda Nobunaga skillfully crushed many of the most powerful daimyos (military families – of which there were about 200 at the beginning of the Sengoku period), resulting in a gradual establishment of a working yet risky unified stability.  Following Nobunaga’s death in 1582, his top general Hideyoshi, though holding the lesser title of regent (kwampaku) rather than Shogun, established himself as the de-facto military leader and immediately set out to further solidify the remaining daimyos under a national government.  In the ruthless pursuit of complete military domination of the country Hideyoshi violently conquered any remaining groups he believed to be unfriendly.  In 1577, having overcome all his national enemies, Hideyoshi amassed a huge army of 200,000 and set out by ship from Kyushu to attempt a conquest of China via Korea.  When the King of Korea refused to allow Hideyoshi’s troops to pass through the country toward China, Hideyoshi fought his way as far north as Rakuro (PyongYang, North Korea). Through gradual realizations of the difficulties in logistics and their potentially being outnumbered by the Chinese, Hideyoshi’s ambitious vision was at last discarded at his death in 1598.

 

Owl’s Castle is set during the height of Hideyoshi’s rule and tells the tale of an assassination attempt by a surviving member of the Iga Clan, one of the groups vanquished by Hideyoshi.  The assassination plot ultimately involves infiltrating the immense and (thought to be) impenetrable fortress built by Hideyoshi, nicknamed Owl’s Castle.  Hideyoshi had built a monstrosity of a castle during the years 1583-1585, modeled after Nobunaga’s mammoth Adzuchi Castle (the ruins can still be visited in Shiga prefecture).  But Owl’s Castle was much grander than Adzuchi, Hideyoshi built a massive edifice using enormous granite blocks surrounded by deep moats and steep embankments.  The castle is known (in real life) as Osaka Castle. It remains to this very day and is considered the grandest and most elaborate castle in Japan.  The infiltration of this castle (and the ensuing escape) marks the dramatic climax of the narrative.

 

The plot itself involves a survivor of the formidable ninja school located in Iga Province (modern day Nara prefecture) which Hideyoshi cruelly slaughtered (including women and children) out of fear of their skill and growing influence.  The locations and regions conquered are historically accurate, making this film a dramatic exploration of the otherwise heralded campaign by Toyotomi Hideyoshi to bring order to the nation.

 

Most of the film is shot in wide panoramic cinematography, using the actual historical locations in both Nara and Osaka.  Thus we are in for an illustrated history lesson which includes all the major figures, maps, castle interiors, and social life and trends of the time—that is why I am going through the history so much.  For this reason alone you should watch this film.  In addition, however, Owl’s Castle boasts an amazing cast of popular talent, most of whom have plenty of experience in similar productions. The narrative itself, running at 138 minutes, is chock full of character studies and plot-relevant relationships and rivalries. There is also plenty of action ranging from military conquests to hand-to-hand ninja battles upon massive rooftops.  When put all together, along with the aid of an effective soundtrack, this film does deliver what it promises to Japanese audiences: a thoroughly engrossing tale enmeshed in the history and politics of one of Japan’s most formative and memorable periods.

 

Now on to the story itself.  After 10 years of seclusion hiding in an abandoned temple, the formidable ninja Juzo (Nakai Kichii) is called back into action to assassinate the nation’s leading military leader Toyotomi Hideyoshi.  Juzo watched his own mother and sister die horribly during Hideyoshi’s brutal conquest of Iga (Nara), which left only a handful of survivors.  The mission will require him to return to Osaka and infiltrate the new castle which Hideyoshi built for himself. Only a ninja of unparalleled skill will be able to scale and penetrate the formidable defenses Hideyoshi resides in.

 

During his mission, Juzo encounters a number of the survivors of the Iga massacre.  They, like him, live anonymously in lowly positions, but are eager to aid Juzo once they realize his mission. All, that is, except Gohei, another well-trained ninja of the Iga school whose allegiance now lies with Hideyoshi and whose aims involve attaining a high-ranking samurai position within the Hideyoshi faction.  The capture or death of Juzo during such an attempt on Hideyoshi’s life would provide the opportunity needed for Gohei to attain this coveted position.

 

Even during the governmental stability established by Hideyoshi, political turmoil and plotting continued making trust and alliances difficult for Juzo.  So he must not only survive the complexities of the political environment, but also develop and carry out a plausible scheme to fulfill the assassination.

 

In my opinion this is a thoroughly entertaining film filled with historical tidbits and is heavy on dialogue (which is not a bad thing).  The degree of dialogue, however, is also matched with highly detailed panoramic scenes of landscapes, architecture and the bustle of 16th century life in Japan.  The polished film visually presents you with top-notch scenes and historical re-enactments. Because it is complex and intricate, this storyline is far from boring while action permeates the film from first to last scene.

 

Anyone interested in Japanese history or jidaieki (history-based films) will enjoy this film and not be disappointed.  The film also presents a much more realistic vision of the ninja instead of the superhuman image seen too often in films, making it enjoyable by martial art and samurai fans as well.

 
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Posted by on June 19, 2011 in Movie Reviews

 

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Musashi-NHK’s 2003 49 Episode Series Part 1.

28 Apr

NHK (Japan’s National Broadcasting Co.) 2003 Series on Musashi—This could be my favorite.

“You must cultivate your wisdom and spirit. Polish your wisdom: learn public justice, distinguish between good and evil, study the Ways of different arts one by one. When you cannot be deceived by men you will have realized the wisdom of strategy.”  Miyamoto Musashi, The Book of Five Rings, The Book of Water.

As we know from previous posts, Musashi is often regarded as the greatest samurai of all time. He was undefeated in over 60 duels and has attained the legendary status of Sword Saint (“kensei”). Aside from being an undefeated swordsman, Musashi was also a painter and calligrapher. It seems like he applied his Way of the Sword to all walks of life.

The 42nd NHK Taiga Drama “Musashi” (Taiga Drama is the name NHK gives to the annual, year-long historical-fiction television series it broadcasts in Japan) is based on the famous biography written by Yoshikawa Eiji, “Musashi,” often considered the “Gone with the Wind of Japan.” Yoshikawa’s novel is one of my favorite novels of all time and I’ve read quite a few novels.  So if you get a chance or have some time read it you will not regret it.  Anyways, back to the show.

Like the two other series, Musashi’s story begins just after the great Battle of Sekigahara.  Musashi joined the battle because he always dreamed of becoming a strong samurai. In this series we learn that his father Shinmen Munisai had abused him when he was a child, constantly berating him as a useless weakling.  Such treatment instilled a tough will to become strong and powerful to surpass his father to prove he was no weakling.  The NHK series takes several episodes to show that Takezo was fueled by rage, leading a life filled with bloodshed and carnage. However, as the series progresses, at the end of each episode Musashi learns one valuable lesson after another that life is not a matter of brute strength, but also a spiritual path that involves the perfection of his sword techniques contemporaneously with the mind.

The initial episodes follow Musashi as he travels across the country challenging many fighters and their unique styles of fighting as he undergoes the rigorous training to become one with his sword.  After each episode the show retraces Musashi’s path through modern day Japan showing the viewer historical markers and other remnants of Musashi’s life.  Even better, we start to see Musashi’s unconventional tactics employed to give him an edge in his duels—like showing up two hours late to fights  wwhich infuriated his opponents thereby distracting them from the task at hand and more.

Joining Musashi in his travels are his childhood friend Matahachi, his starry-eyed lover Otsu, his disciple/adopted son Jotaro and the sagacious Zen monk Takuan.  Here NHK takes some interesting turns from both series we have previously watched; that is, it portrays Matahachi more as a comical character bumbling his way through life.  For instance, Matahachi is seen as an inept swordsman, but in the book this is not the case—he is in fact quite competent having fought and survived at Sekigahara. He, like anyone else, just looks bad when standing next to Musashi.  It reminded me of reading the original Sherlock Holmes stories describing Dr. Watson as an intelligent man—a physician. However, Watson is usually portrayed as a bumbling fool in most movies and TV episodes.

The first several NHK episodes also begin to raise the political aspect of the story, namely the struggle of power between the Tokugawa and Toyotomi clans.  If you have seen the TV miniseries “Shogun” or read James Clavell’s novel, you have heard of Tokugawa Ieyasu.  He was the first shogun of the Tokugawa Shogunate of Japan and ruled after winning the Battle of Sekigahara creating a dynasty that lasted many many years.  One issue persistently raised  throughout the series is the samurai way of life v.s. the political life.  The inevitable tension between the paths are represented by Musashi and Yagyu Munenori (another famous samurai). Musashi chooses the spiritual reclusive life free of politics to follow his Way of the Sword and true spiritual strength. Yagyu Munenori, on the other hand, leads a Machiavellian political and worldly life serving the shogun to gain power, rank and respect.  We will see how these two lifestyles play out during the series.

As the episodes progress, numerous themes and issues emerge but I have no intention of revealing them all in this post.  Here we are only going to go as far as our other two movies.

Be that as it may, I really enjoy the NHK series (and in fact have enjoyed every one I have seen).  Because NHK has fifty hours to work with instead of six-ten like the films, they can (and do) take their time to try and tell the tale of such an extraordinary life.

Next, we delve into the appropriate film sequels setting the second stage of Musashi’s journey through Japan.

 
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Posted by on April 28, 2011 in Movie Reviews

 

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Zen & Sword and Showdown at Hannyazaka–been having some internet problems lately.

24 Apr

Zen & Sword (1961) and Showdown at Hannyazaka (1962)

“The Way of the warrior does not include other Ways, such as Confucianism, Buddhism, certain traditions, artistic accomplishments and dancing.  But even though these are not part of the Way, if you know the Way broadly you will see it in everything.  Men must polish their particular Way.” Miyamoto Musashi, The Book of Five Rings, The Ground Book.

Now we are going to look at the first two installments of the five part series on Miyamoto Musashi starring Nakamura Kinnosuke as Musashi.  I must tell you at the outset that these films go into much more detail than the 1954 Mifune series—in fact it takes all of Zen & Sword (1961) and a good part of Showdown at Hannyazaka (1962) to cover the same ground as seen in the 1954 version. 

Zen & Sword (1961) and Showdown at Hannyazaka (1962) introduce us to Takezo, what Musashi used to be before he was locked in an attic for three years.  Again Takezo sides with the Toyotomi at Sekigahara, and as a result finds himself on the losing side of the historic battle.  He and his friend Matahachi (Kimura Isao) manage to escape the slaughter although Matahachi is wounded in the leg.  They stagger across Akemi (Oka Satomi) who makes her living with her mother Oko (Kogure Michiyo) by robbing the corpses from Sekigahara of their armor and anything else of value.  Oko decides to seduce Matahachi, which she does first by skillfully sucking the gangrene from his blood, and then just by  . . .

Back in their home village of Miyamoto, Matahachi’s fiancée Otsu (Irie Wakaba) is questioning just what has happened to Matahachi and Takezo.  Matahachi has a mother that is a real jerk, the old Osugi (Chieko Naniwa) who blames Takezo for every fault of her son and for luring him away and ruining the reputation of their “illustrious” farming family—which in my opinion is merely a delusion of grandeur.

Takezo decides to return when Matahachi elopes with Oko and her daughter and he is not welcomed with open arms to say the least.  The victorious Tokugawa have thrown up checkpoints to catch Sekigahara stragglers, of which Takezo eminently is one, yet he remains determined to deliver the good news of Matahachi’s failure to get himself killed to the villagers.  When Takezo breaks through the checkpoint things take a turn for the worse.  An overzealous local samurai Tanzaemon (Hanazawa Tokubei) presses the farmers into service to capture Takezo and during the ensuing manhunt; Takezo is forced to kill several people, which does not exactly bode well for his public relations.

When things really get out of hand, priest Takuan (Mikuni Rentaro) intervenes and captures the “beast,” and saves his soul in the process of saving his skin.  The wild Takezo surrenders to the Buddhist only to find himself strung up from a tree where he is told to contemplate the meaning of life.  After several days in the tree, Otsu is unable to bear the sight of the poor man dangling and frees him so they can both escape the village.

The transformation of Takezo has now begun, as has the development of love in Otsu for him and vice versa.  We also see Takezo beginning to value life but without any comprehension of what it means to have a worthy existence.  Takuan, having recognized the urge to truly live, takes him to a castle and locks him up in the attic where Takezo is forced to read great works and contemplate his future.  The ghosts of Takezo’s fallen family also appear during his extended stay and implore him to make their existence meaningful by leading a worthy life.  Meanwhile, Otsu is waiting the entire time for Takezo to fulfill his promise to come back for her, even if it takes a “thousand days” and it does.

At this point we flow into Showdown at Hannyazaka which begins when, after spending 3 years of study in solitary, Takezo is brought before the Clan Lord and made an official Samurai.  At the meeting, Takezo receives his new samurai name from the Lord that he will forever be remembered by: Miyamoto Musashi.  As he leaves the castle, Takuan gives Musashi a quick current events summary for the past three years telling him that he is about to join 100,000 other unemployed samurai (ronin) as he travels Japan seeking to develop his sword skill. 

The first stop for Musashi on his quest to master the sword is in the town of Nara near Kyoto to “learn” from the Hozoin Priests about their fabled spear fighting technique.  While visiting the Hozoin Priests, Musashi encounters a group of rogue ronin who have been terrorizing the locals.  Musashi decides to meet this renegade group at Hannyazaka Pass, for a fight to the death.  Little does Musashi know that the spear wielding priests have used him as bait to help rid the town of these criminals by killing them off.  The film ends with Musashi screaming about his role in the battle and the compassion the priests show the butchered ronin by placing prayer rocks on their corpses.

Musashi’s journey to Hozoin is an example of the additional detail the five part series explores since none of these events appear or are even mentioned in the Mifune/Inagaki version of the Musashi story, even though the battle at Hannyazaka Pass is considered one of Musashi’s greatest feats.  The films differ in other ways as well i.e. they are not Mifune centered and allow for the development of the people around Musashi, which plays a material role in his development as a samurai and a human being.  Of the two series discussed so far, I prefer Zen & Sword (1961) and Showdown at Hannyazaka (1962) any day of the week over the Mifune/Inagaki films—though many critics will disagree with me on that call. 

Next time we’ll take a look at the NHK series and compare the telling of Musashi’s tale with the films we have discussed so far and see where that takes us.   

 
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Posted by on April 24, 2011 in Movie Reviews

 

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