Samurai ohne Schwert

A samurai gives up his sword and deserts his clan, a crime for which he is sentenced to an unusual punishment - make the morose kid of the local Lord smile in 30 days, or commit ritual suicide.

This is a film in three parts; the tonally opaque opening 20 minutes, the mid-section which is a series of comic skits as the hapless samurai (Takaaki Nomi) plugs vainly away at his task, and a final section that turns the genre slightly on its head.

The grubby, goggle-eyed Nomi is a far cry from the usual chanbara samurai. The visual predominance is kept throughout as Nomi says hardly a word in his downward spiral of diminishing dignity. Quite how he will regain that dignity is the journey of this protagonist. Sea Kumada, as his unforgiving daughter, gives a formidable performance as Tae, who excoriates her father for his failures, before rallying to his cause as he ganbarus through his thankless task. Hers will prove the most redeeming journey of all.

As you expect from Matsumoto, who is never afraid to take chances, some of the comedy works better than others. The timing is perfect and the elaborate set ups leading to brief execution and abrupt cuts away are stock of TV skit comedy here, but the transfer to the big screen works well. Three assassins brought in for, ahem, comic relief are rather flat and strained. The ending is less maudlin than it could have been, thanks to the astute reactions of Kumada.

The film is good fun with genuine laugh-out-loud moments. It has more heart than you'd expect, though the ending doesn't quite reach the heights it sets itself. It displays all the marks of Matsumoto, and fans of the Downtown star will not be disappointed.

...I watched this movie several years ago but yesterday somehow, I stumbled upon again; so I decided to put a few words about here. All are writing about the comedy intention of the Director and how funny (or not) the movie is but that is not the main point of the story. Is about a path to recover the Dignity in an intelligent and silly style. Persistence; Honor; Love; Solidarity; Humility and many more great Humanity values disguised as a light comedy/drama The Zen Buddhism finale worth the watching and put many extra points to the story.

Saya-zamurai is a strange movie. It is, strangely, at the same time its best quality and its biggest flaw.

The beginning almost lost me: we follow a pityful character - an old samurai, with no sword and almost decaying. He is followed by a child, plus burlesque assassins, introduced in a very-tarantinesque way, and with slash of blood copied from Kill Bill. On top of that, one of the first scene with the child (fetching medicinal plant) is badly shot and looks horribly false.

I did however go on with the movie and was happy to do that. With the next part and the challenge imposed on our main character - I won't say our hero!, the movie changed its tone and become a hell lot better. Not perfect, there is a part of repetition that the director tries to mitigate but could'nt fully because of the setting of the story. There was maybe some funny scenes typically Japanese that I did not get. But that part, a bit "Kikujiro"s Kitano" inspired, in its own way, deserves your viewing, until the end twist.

That tale of the redeeming of a shameful samurai and father manages to go over the comedy (visual comedy mainly) and reach a depth I wouldn't have believed only moments before. Reflection on what is a show, it does not limit to that as it will get you emotionally involved as well.

In conclusion, this movie is full of weaknesses but still manage to propose very good parts if you let it a chance.

I still don't know if I am the odd one out for adoring Matsumoto's films like I do. In any case, I am not alone. We saw it at the Festival International de Cinema Fantastic de Sitges and the room was crowded, laughing and crying like kids. I think Matsumoto makes cinema in capital letters. With very sparse dialog, the story is told mainly through the visual. In his third movie, he is not acting, but the direction is wonderful. The premise of the story was very similar to children stories, although aimed at adults. The magic, the fantastic... was all there. Like with Symbol, the audience laughed and laughed for more than one hour. I totally loved it, because on top of being very well made, it made me feel absolutely happy. We patientlly wait for his next one.

Matsumoto continues to explore his gaze at paternity, just like he did in in one of the two parts of 'Symbol' (2009). 'Scabbard Samurai' portraits paternity through the love of a girl that wishes the best for her father, a samurai that has lost all of its honor, despite odds being against hope. There's nothing sadder than the look of a kid watching their father being humiliated, over and over, and Matsumoto knows it.

Hitoshi Matsumotos's work as a director is unclassifiable, his movies do not belong to any particular genre, and Saya-zamurai is a good example of it. Despite the movie talking about such deep and transcendental topics, Matsumoto explores them from comedy to drama, from genuine laughter to inevitable grief, always with an interesting twist of embarrassment.