I haven't read the original manga series that this film is based on so I don't know how close the film is to its original source.
The story is simple, young Jirô gets his family killed, falsely accused of the murders and starts investigating into who and why his family was murdered.
He quickly realizes that he is a foundling and the people responsible for the killings has very dangerous agenda.
This film is basically a action melodrama where the director/screenwriter tries to fit in as much storyline as possible in the shortest amount of time.
Therefore the viewer served a very long, confusing, erratic storyline that sometimes doesn't make any sense at all. Political intrigues that hardly gets explained(yes I saw the 132 min with original audio), characters that comes and goes without explanation.
Something must have been edited out, is there a TV -series version somewhere? Who knows.....
But the action sequences are very visually striking and surreal, as if the animators wants to capture the fleeting moment of combat(or if they all were high on drugs which would explain the bad storyline) that split second when you enter a duel and only one can survive.
Personally I prefer Jûbê ninpûchô/Ninja Scroll (1993), Rurouni Kenshin (2000), Samurai chanpurû/Samurai Champloo(2004–2005) etc but this should be seen by future viewers because of the amazing fighting sequences.
Remember that this film was made in 1985, and the animation in some cases still holds up.
The story is simple, young Jirô gets his family killed, falsely accused of the murders and starts investigating into who and why his family was murdered.
He quickly realizes that he is a foundling and the people responsible for the killings has very dangerous agenda.
This film is basically a action melodrama where the director/screenwriter tries to fit in as much storyline as possible in the shortest amount of time.
Therefore the viewer served a very long, confusing, erratic storyline that sometimes doesn't make any sense at all. Political intrigues that hardly gets explained(yes I saw the 132 min with original audio), characters that comes and goes without explanation.
Something must have been edited out, is there a TV -series version somewhere? Who knows.....
But the action sequences are very visually striking and surreal, as if the animators wants to capture the fleeting moment of combat(or if they all were high on drugs which would explain the bad storyline) that split second when you enter a duel and only one can survive.
Personally I prefer Jûbê ninpûchô/Ninja Scroll (1993), Rurouni Kenshin (2000), Samurai chanpurû/Samurai Champloo(2004–2005) etc but this should be seen by future viewers because of the amazing fighting sequences.
Remember that this film was made in 1985, and the animation in some cases still holds up.