After releasing one of the very best entries in the franchise with the sinister Zatoichi's Revenge, Zatoichi and the Doomed Man is one of the weakest films about the blind masseur. It tells how Zatoichi gets arrested for illegal gambling and meets a prisoner who is about to get sentenced to death for crimes he claims he didn't commit. He asks Zatoichi to help him by meeting his boss as well as his sworn brother who could clear his name. Zatoichi is first reluctant to help but once he does, he realizes that the prisoner got set up by his two friends and tries to set things right.
Despite being one of the weakest entries in the franchise, Zatoichi and the Doomed Man still has a few positive elements to point out. The pace of the film is rather quick as the story unfolds coherently and the set of characters is introduced step by step. This film certainly isn't boring. An interesting element is the idea to include an impostor who claims to be Zatoichi to get alcohol, money and women which adds some situation comedy to the film. The landscapes are particularly interesting in this film as Zatoichi travels to the ocean for the first time in his life and as the final duel takes places in an abandoned fishing village in the dunes which looks gorgeous.
There are a couple of elements that weigh that movie down. First of all, the sword fights are particularly wooden, especially since Zatoichi doesn't have to face a respectable opponent this time around. The idea of his opponents to use trenches and fishing nets to trick the lowly yakuza in the final fight sequence is the only remotely interesting element about the fight scenes in this film. The impostor who claims to be Zatoichi seems intriguing at first but quickly becomes very annoying as his only purpose seems to be to bring some comic relief in form of silly slapstick scenes. Aside of Zatoichi, most characters remain either shallow or are unnerving, like the woman who claims to know him and follows him around to give him useless tips. A final element that bothered me was the fact that the fate of numerous characters and side stories isn't even explained at the end of the movie. Maybe the makers of the movie believed some of the characters to be so generic that the viewers wouldn't even care about their fates which is strange but turns out to be accurate in my book.
In the end, Zatoichi and the Doomed Man is an entertaining and fast-paced entry in the franchise but ultimately overtly humorous and just not memorable. Collectors and fans of the franchise might appreciate the film for its atmosphere, locations and the sympathetic lead character but those who aren't too familiar with the blind samurai definitely shouldn't start their journey with this movie.
