I just came back from eating pizza and am now watching The Tale of Zatoichi. Zatoichi is a cool, calm, and very skillful blind masseur-turned-samurai who can kick anybody's ass with his sword and super hearing+sixth sense. The movies were made in the 60s, but this classic warrior with superhuman fighting skills despite his handicap has inspired many modern-day movie heroes, like the ones in Blind Fury and Daredevil.
I'm usually not one to understand movies that happened before WW2, but apparently, my mom used to watch Zatoichi movies obsessively when she was pregnant with me. What does this mean? It means Zatoichi is quite possibly the first man to have ever entered by subconscious. Maybe even before my dad did. So he's special. These movies are special. Plus they have fucking awesome fighting scenes.
The Zatoichi series is my favorite. I have never watched a series of movies, so many times. During one particular stay in Japan, a friends kid watched one of the older movies I had. (He had only seen the Beat Takeshi re-make.)
The fight scenes are great, but the humanity and comedic storylines make it endearing.
Of them all, my favorite scene is the final one in Zatoichi Challengeed. Acting/Storyline/Visuals with the snow falling etc.
Posted by: vagrant | March 14, 2007 at 05:04 AM
The Zatoichi series is amazing. It's almost impossible to find a single sequel that is as good as its predecessor, yet Zatoichi films are consistently excellent. At least as far as I've seen. Speaking of which, does anyone know how I can get ahold of #14? It's not available in the US.
The owner of a ramen shop in town grew up watching the Zatoichi tv series which is just now being released on dvd in the US. He says they're good-- the pacing is faster by necessity, otherwise they're just like the movies. I've been waiting to see them for myself until I've got all the movies. One thing at a time!
Posted by: el Dopa | March 15, 2007 at 01:04 PM