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| Illustration by Scott Morse |
I have no
idea why this is called The New Tale of Zatoichi, it stars the same lead
actor, continues a plot thread of the previous film. The only new thing about
it is that lead Shintaro Katsu is a bit thinner and has hair. Oh, and it's in
color. Maybe it's just the English title, the Japanese title is Shin ZatÅichi
Monogatari...new tale of Zatoichi. Well, screw that, I think they're just
making this up as they go along.
Back on point. This time we join Ichi after the last film where he's kind of just wandering. We spend some time with a childhood friend, beat up some thieves and move on. It's a good twenty, thirty minutes before Ichi's former master shows up. Master Banno, played by Seizaburo Kawazu, interrupts a fight between Ichi and Yasuhiko, played by Fujio Suga. Yasuhiko is the brother of Boss Kanbei from the previous film. The last player on the stage is Banno's sister Yayoi, played by Mikiko Tsubouchi, who of course falls in love with Ichi.
The stage is set for probably the best of the films so far. Ichi gets a chance to show his abilities early on, and has several fight scenes, each going up in scale until the final confrontation with the film's villain. There is some very good moments where Katsu gets to emote and he does it beautifully with head movements and flutters of his eyes, especially when he concentrates to do his trick of cutting up candles, he's eyes are fluttering, showing that he isn't concentrating on keeping them closed.
The fight scenes are the best in these movies by far, knowing when to be up close, and when to pull back and show it. I feel the jump to color really helps things a lot. I suppose my only complaint will go back to the one I've had from day one, the love interest. While this is perhaps the strongest relationship we've seen so far, Yayoi's declaration of love to Ichi still feels perfunctory. Like a check on a list, Love interest.
Director is Tokuzo Tanaka and he does a fine job. And we have Akira Ifukube back on music which is always a plus.
This is easily my favorite film in this series by far, even with the inclusion of Kanbei's brother seeking revenge it doesn't feel bogged down by the previous films, while Tale of Zatoichi Continues, certainly had that weight. With that, I'd like to take a step back and give compliment to Criterion. I bought the set of Zatoichi roughly a year ago, and only now am I actually watching through it. (Bad me) And it is a credit to the restoration team that watching it, it was hard to tell this was shot in the 60s. Yes the sets were obvious, but watching old movies, there is this look and feel that comes with worn/dirty film, you can tell it's age. Criterion did a beautiful job with this film, cleaning it up. It certainly doesn't look like it was only made a few months after previous film.
Back on point. This time we join Ichi after the last film where he's kind of just wandering. We spend some time with a childhood friend, beat up some thieves and move on. It's a good twenty, thirty minutes before Ichi's former master shows up. Master Banno, played by Seizaburo Kawazu, interrupts a fight between Ichi and Yasuhiko, played by Fujio Suga. Yasuhiko is the brother of Boss Kanbei from the previous film. The last player on the stage is Banno's sister Yayoi, played by Mikiko Tsubouchi, who of course falls in love with Ichi.
The stage is set for probably the best of the films so far. Ichi gets a chance to show his abilities early on, and has several fight scenes, each going up in scale until the final confrontation with the film's villain. There is some very good moments where Katsu gets to emote and he does it beautifully with head movements and flutters of his eyes, especially when he concentrates to do his trick of cutting up candles, he's eyes are fluttering, showing that he isn't concentrating on keeping them closed.
The fight scenes are the best in these movies by far, knowing when to be up close, and when to pull back and show it. I feel the jump to color really helps things a lot. I suppose my only complaint will go back to the one I've had from day one, the love interest. While this is perhaps the strongest relationship we've seen so far, Yayoi's declaration of love to Ichi still feels perfunctory. Like a check on a list, Love interest.
Director is Tokuzo Tanaka and he does a fine job. And we have Akira Ifukube back on music which is always a plus.
This is easily my favorite film in this series by far, even with the inclusion of Kanbei's brother seeking revenge it doesn't feel bogged down by the previous films, while Tale of Zatoichi Continues, certainly had that weight. With that, I'd like to take a step back and give compliment to Criterion. I bought the set of Zatoichi roughly a year ago, and only now am I actually watching through it. (Bad me) And it is a credit to the restoration team that watching it, it was hard to tell this was shot in the 60s. Yes the sets were obvious, but watching old movies, there is this look and feel that comes with worn/dirty film, you can tell it's age. Criterion did a beautiful job with this film, cleaning it up. It certainly doesn't look like it was only made a few months after previous film.
Next
movie is Zatoichi: The Fugitive.
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