This story sees Wang Gang, a one armed Chinese swordsman, travelling through Japan; he is pleased to meet a Chinese family but things take a tragic turn when their young child accidentally blocks an official procession
an offence that means instant death. Wang Gang steps in and saves the boy but that leads to the samurai in the procession massacring most of those present including the boy's parents. Shortly afterwards Zatoichi, the blind swordsman, finds the boy with his dying father and agrees to look after him. Not long after that they meet up with Wang Gang although it is hard for them to communicate as he speaks no Japanese and Zatoichi speaks no Chinese. The three of them eventually take shelter with a local family. While Zatoichi is out the samurai attack and it is assumed that he betrayed them. He does what he can to put things right but unable to talk to each things could easily end in tragedy.
This was a solid samurai film with lots of sword fighting but not too much blood. The story is simple but effective; the bad guys are definitely bad and the good guys have an enjoyable degree of ambiguity. Shintarô Katsu and Yu Wang did fine jobs as Zatoichi and Wang Gang respectively; I particularly enjoyed the scenes where they try to converse but only misunderstand each other. Having not seen other instalments in this film series I can't say how this compares but as a stand-alone film it is rather fun; lots of action and some laughs.
These comments are based on watching the film in Japanese and Chinese with English subtitles. In the version I saw it was obvious which language was being spoken as the Chinese dialogue has italic subtitles.
This was a solid samurai film with lots of sword fighting but not too much blood. The story is simple but effective; the bad guys are definitely bad and the good guys have an enjoyable degree of ambiguity. Shintarô Katsu and Yu Wang did fine jobs as Zatoichi and Wang Gang respectively; I particularly enjoyed the scenes where they try to converse but only misunderstand each other. Having not seen other instalments in this film series I can't say how this compares but as a stand-alone film it is rather fun; lots of action and some laughs.
These comments are based on watching the film in Japanese and Chinese with English subtitles. In the version I saw it was obvious which language was being spoken as the Chinese dialogue has italic subtitles.