Review of Zatoichi Meets Yojimbo

The title is kind of misleading. In some translating, the title reads as Zatoichi Vs Yojimbo and others as Zatoichi meets Yojimbo. The blind swordsman Zatoichi (Shintaro Katsu), whom real man is Ichi. Zatoichi return to a village of his past, only to find it besieged by Eboshiya Yasuke's oldest son, Masagoro and his evil Kobotoke Clan. A huge embezzlement scheme is on, as the Kobotoke Clan is scheming to skim gold from the federal treasury. Toshiro Mifune is Imperial Shogunate Secret Agent Sassa Daisaka employ by the gang mostly spends most of his days drinking. Yojimbo spends far too much time moping around and the film made out Yojimbo to be a slave of the system. He acts as the son's Yojimbo (bodyguard). He longs to be with a local whore who's been forced into the sex trade by a debt she owes the merchant. What misleading by the title is that Toshiro character isn't the one from the original Kurosawa movie, yet the film tries to make homage to those films. Also this movie doesn't even follow close to the storyline from the other Zatochi's films. Viewers who went to see the film to see the film tied up the loose ends of the previous films would be disappointed. At 155 minutes, it's longer than any of the Zatochi films that came before yet Ichi is barely on film here. Ichi is caught up in the middle of a rivalry between two gangs who are led by an at-odds father and son. After becoming indebted to the father for springing him out of jail, Zatoichi goes to work for him as a bodyguard. Ichi meets the son's yojimbo. Naturally, the two begin as adversaries, before forming a kind of strange fellowship and an uneasy alliance to find out where the money is and take it for them. The script is bog down by the pacing from time to time as both characters have agendas within agendas what to do with the money. The plot is needlessly complex, involving many characters and twists. The exchanges between the drunk, yelling Yojimbo and quiet Zatoichi are consistently amusing and funny. The film misused the time by adding too much local plot points with Eboshiya Yasuke's two sons. It's amazing that they found the time to have Ichi and Sassa fight in the same scene, but it happens in the last five minutes of the movie and only lasts for one minute. From all the Zatoichi films, it's not too bad, just not that great. The film may benefit from a second viewing so you can get a better grip on the characters' various (sometimes changing) motivations, but But a single viewing will very much need you to pay attention. All of this is a setup for Mifune and Katsu to go at each other hammer and tongs, each playing serious mind-games with the other, culminating in one serious bad-ass sword fight. Ichi's fighting skill is incredible, with his sword-grip in inverse manner; this, combined with his keen ear and sense of smell and proprioception, renders him a frighteningly formidable opponent. While Mifune's fighting style is brutally efficient, yet at the same time stunningly graceful. There is no wasted motion in his sword strokes as he attacks with lighting-quick strikes, but at times it looks like he's just wildly hacking at anything that moves. His blows are ruthless and powerful, and he rarely requires more than one or two strikes to bring down any foe. Sadly it's only a minute. The cinematography is gorgeous. The colors on this release are pretty vibrant. It's weird seeing Toshiro Mifune in color still. Leone based his style on these types of movies on these Japanese noodle westerns. There's almost no music until the last reel when we get some nice cues from Akira Ifukube, it seems recycled from another film. The subtitles of the newer DVD are wonderful. It provide a simple translation of dialogue and Japanese text that appears throughout the film, which is also color coded to display when more than one person is talking on screen. The other set of subtitles will provide background information to some of the Japanese terms. If watching—get the newer DVD version.