Tatsuya Nakadai is no stranger to Samurai films, having played in Ran, Yojimbo, and Sanjura among the almost 100 films he has done. This film is based upon the same book as Sanjura.

Tatsuya Nakadai plays Genta, a yakuza that travels from town to tow. He meets up with Hanji (Etsushi Takahashi) a farmer who wants to be a Samurai. Reminds you of the farmer in the Magnificent Seven who wanted to be a gunfighter.

They get caught up in a local fracas that pits seven samurai against a lord taking over the town. It is a one-sided fight, to say the least.

You will find some Kurasawa in here, as well as some Clint Eastwood as "the man with no name"; along with some very funny dialog. All of this will serve to keep you glued to the action until the very end.

This is an excellent Japanese action picture just chock full for fighting, killing and samurai stuff. That's fine with me, as I like that sort of film a lot. However, I don't particularly remember the film being THAT funny and it is certainly not a comedy. I am writing this because based on some of the other reviews, I person might assume that to be the case. Action--YES. Comedy--NOPE.

However, I could see the parallel between this movie and the Zatoichi series. Our hero, Ichi, is always looking to help the little guy in trouble and he, too, did bad early in life and is always striving to undo this through good works (like the lead in KILL).

Well, I'm not sure what to think. While watching the movie I thought it just didn't make any sense, but the two reviews up here now say it's a comedy, so it's possible that it's just making fun of bad samurai pictures. But really, nothing is much more than mildly amusing in the movie. So if it's a Wet Hot American Summer-styled parody then I'll just say I didn't really get it. Because the story makes just as much sense as the purposely senseless story of that movie. But that still wouldn't make it all that funny, in my opinion. But I think the movie would be more fun if you go into it thinking of it as a parody.

Still, I didn't really mind the senselessness that much, I just sort of went along with the flow, and Tatsuya Nakadai's performance alone is enough of a reason to see the movie.