Dir. Takeshi Kitano, 2003, Japan/Rest of World, 116 mins, Subtitles: English
Cast: Takeshi Kitano, Tadanobu Asano, Yuko Daike, Gadarukanaru Taka
Review by Paul Mallaghan
There’s something about Takeshi Kitano that shines through even his most brutal films: he is, at heart, a comic entertainer. For all the bloody, pensive, beautiful and elegiac moments in his work, he always keeps a wry sense of the comically absurd. It’s no surprise then that he has leapt into this story of a blind masseur/samurai with the kind of maverick eccentricity that at times feels like an unholy collaboration between Akira Kurosawa and Baz Luhrmann. Kitano himself says that the absurdity of his lead character is “.in itself preposterous enough for me to set out to make an all-out entertainment movie.” And boy does he mean it. A glorious farrago of blood soaked carnage, slapstick comedy, cross-dressing kabuki, CGI severed limbs, fearsome Ronin, and, incredibly, an all-singing, all-dancing routine reminiscent of a bawdy Bollywood number, this is Kitano’s most overtly crowd-pleasing movie yet.
Kitano plays Zatoichi, a wandering blind masseur and master swordsman; dispatching enemies with the blade he keeps secretly sheathed in his gleaming red cane. His other senses are so sharply honed he can judge the roll of dice simply by its thud on a bamboo table. He is twice as effective as Dustin Hoffman’s Rain Man as a gambling aid. In a story echoing Seven Samurai and Yojimbo, Zatoichi finds himself ridding a community of a gang of thugs extorting daily protection money. Staying with a local woman in return for a few chores and a decent massage, he falls in with a motley bunch of misfits. Shinkichi (Yaka), the woman’s nephew, is a lovable loser, and a superb comedy foil. The most hilarious moments usually involve him, particularly a great slapstick scene where he tries to teach three young neighbours “The Art of Combat”. After a successful night gambling Zatoichi and Shinkichi are entertained by two Geishas looking to avenge the murder of their family by the local gang ten years before.
An updated version of a popular string of Japanese films in the sixties and seventies, Kitano’s version of Zatoichi is vivid, imaginative and utterly modern. We are guided through the action by Keiichi Suzuki’s involving and catchy score, alternating between whimsical synthesiser tunes and percussive beats integrated with the images of workmen’s tools and peasants rhythmically splashing their feet in mud. At times it feels like Stomp goes Samurai. Zatoichi is violent, but despite the body count, the film looks and feels light. In a nod to Seven Samurai, a bloody fight scene plays out in the driving rain. However, unlike the muddy, oppressive torrents of Kurosawa’s film, here the water sparks crystals of light while blood runs bright red across a perfect golden sand beach.
The stark, gut wrenching violence of Kitano’s earlier Yakuza films is here stylised and slightly cartoonish. Frequently accompanied by comic relief, it still manages to be both graphic and shocking. Originally, Kitano had planned to use fake blood on the set (like the endless jets of dark brown goop used in splat fest Kill Bill), but having seen the effect as too disturbing, opted for computer effects instead, telling his CGI artists to produce fountains and flowers of shimmering dark red blood. Kitano clearly wants to distance us somewhat from the brutality.
There is an interesting flip side to Zatoichi‘s itinerant vigilante. Hattori plays Asano, an intense and deadly Ronin known throughout much of the film as The Bodyguard. Employed by the boss of the local gang as protection, The Bodyguard has an ulterior motive. He needs to raise money to fund an operation for his dying wife. The inevitable showdown between Zatoichi and Asano is slightly anticlimactic, but there is the sense that Kitano sees these two men as versions of the same person. It is perhaps the best example of moral complexity in what is really quite a straightforward film. Interestingly, when asked why Zatoichi doesn’t appear with the jubilant villagers in the final knees-up, he replied, “Because Zatoichi is a villain.”
Cool and original, vicious and hilarious, Kitano’s film lacks the self-conscious hipness of Kill Bill and never strays into smug irony or pastiche. This is innovative, violent and thrilling cinema, and the perfect antidote to the po-faced egomania of The Last Samurai.
