Samurai

Samurai Assassin is a slow and steady film, but I mostly liked it overall. It's about a complex historical event that mostly focuses on an assassination attempt, particularly leading up to it, and the ferocious battle it culminated in. It condenses quite a lot into just two hours, and had narration which helped. Some may find it overbearing or even intrusive, but I fear I would've been lost without it, in all honesty (and admitting that at the risk of sounding stupid).

There isn't tons of action, but the action there is here delivers (much like the similarly bleak Harakiri, which could be called a samurai movie, but not really an action movie). Also, Toshiro Mifune is fantastic, in the lead role (as expected, seeing as he never seemed to phone it in).

Samurai Assassin is a tricky film. It tries to balance neatly between the chambara and jidai-geki. As a jidai-geki it falls close to Masaki Kobayashi's amazing masterpieces Seppuku and Samurai Rebellion in its resemblance of an ancient Greek tragedy filled with tragic irony and a sense of inescepable doom. On the chambara front it takes a while to deliver but when it does, it's all guns blazing; the final fight in the snow ranks as one of the greatest battle sequences in 60's samurai cinema.

What hampers Samurai Assassin is both the very convoluted plot (even by jidai-geki standards) and the narration that should have been skipped altogether (especially in the ending). The plot although well constructed may suffer under close scrutiny. Of course nothing a little suspension of disbelief can't solve. Still, it devotes too much time and detail to subplots and flashbacks that ultimately detract from its goal: building momentum for the final confrontation (both physical and emotional). Tsuruchiyo's backstory for example is spread over 30 minutes and while it gives a solid foundation to the character, you can't help but wonder what it has to do with the first half hour. It all clicks together at some point but it would have benefited immensely from tighter plotting (20 could have been clipped). Less detail, narration and names-dropping, more visualization.

No matter. Samurai Assassin is still a decent film with some memorable scenes. It starts to pick up steam after the 70 minute mark and finishes on a spectacular note. The final battle in the snow is a marvel to look at and features some top notch swordfighting, with Toshiro Mifune simply owning every frame with his impeccable physical skills. It's a very bleak and ironic ending however; there's no valliance or social status to be gained for Mifune's character. I don't want to spoil it any further cos it's easily the best part of the movie.

Okamoto, a great chambara director of the 60's, was well on his way to bigger and better things. Just one year later, Sword of Doom would go on to become one of the best Japanese movies of all time. Three years later, the thoroughly enjoyable Kiru! would add some tongue-in-cheek spirit to Okamoto's often nihilistic style. Still, Samurai Assassin is a welcome addition to his ouevre that might not be excellent and thus not a good entry point to both Okamoto and the jidai-geki but it's recommended to genre fans.

Samurai Assassin is a complicated story but easier to follow than director Okomoto's excellent Sword of Doom made a year later. While it is clear that the band of assassins is seeking revenge on an official for an earlier purge on the assassins' clans, we never learn about the original reasons for their enmity. Historically, the disagreements concerned relations with foreign countries who were seeking to open up Japan to trade, but this is never alluded to in the film. The driving forces of the story, and they are good ones, are Niino's (Mifune) ambition to achieve full samurai rank and the paranoia of the leaders of the assassin band. These two forces interact nicely as the plot unfolds. Eijiro Tono (the innkeeper who befriends Mifune in Yojimbo) does his usual terrific job as the merchant who helped raise Niino and tries to protect him from meeting a tragic fate. Highly recommended for samurai and Mifune fans.

I discovered this little gem by chance and liked it instantly. Samurai Assassin is one of those great samurai movies that provide more than just some sword action - they are also a glimpse into a very different but fascinating culture and time. If you like those "silent" passages (means no fighting action) of movies like Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai, Samurai Assassin is a treasure for you to discover. Great piece with great acting and production.

Everything about this movie is powerful! The acting, the direction, the music and the cinematography are Japanese cinema at its best! I usually don't like narration but the narration in this film is awesome. The only thing I can compare it to is the sound of an Uzi being fired! Mifune, at his best, conveys brilliantly the complexities of the samurai/ronin mentality! The film moves frantically through time! Sometimes it is hard to tell past from present but the entire production is so well done that it all makes perfect sense if you just pay attention! This is one of the most brutal Japanese films I have ever seen. The final confrontation takes place in a snow storm and the comparison between the softly falling snow and the bloody battle it is falling on is chilling and surreal! Unlike some of these older films the transfer to video is clear as a bell with easy to read (if a bit hurried) subtitles.