Father and son on a vendetta

Shogun Assassin (1980)

If you know how this movie was made everything should tell you this is nothing but cheap exploitation made for the dumb audience to get a quick fix of some sword swinging action. Robert Houston got the idea to re-cut two movies from the Lone Wolf and Cub series into one short action filled romp. Namely these two Lone Wolf and Cub: Sword of Vengeance (1972) and Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart at the River Styx (1972) with a tiny bit from the third one as well. All that dubbed into English and with a new swinging soundtrack. So it doesn't sound good on paper, but even in fear of getting some mortal enemies from the fans of the Lone Wolf and Cub series, this is better than the first two parts together. First of all this movie gets the setting up of the story done in a fast and effective way, unlike the original series where it tends to drag on for way too long. Second this movie adds a whole new dimension to the story with the narration by the Cub, which of course is done to explain some of the missing parts, but it actually works wonders for the depth of the characters. And the dubbing, it's one of the best I've seen in any movie dubbed from one language to another. Apparently they used deaf people to read the lips and try to guess what they were saying and then basing the dialog into words that fit the story and the mouth movements. Quite ingenious if you ask me and it works brilliantly. Now most of you who know me and my hate towards remakes and cheap copies are probably wondering how the hell can I like a movie like this which takes a piece of classic cinema art and "destroys" it. Well I see it as a remix, just like in music, most of the time they are not exactly great, but sometimes they can be even better than the original and this is one of those.

Anyway this movie tells the story of Shogun's decapitator, Lone Wolf, who with his son, Cub, seeks revenge on the Shogun who murdered his wife. The Shogun uses all his power to send out ninjas, warriors and assassins to stop the Lone Wolf, but a great samurai warrior with a vengeance on his mind is not stopped so easily. The story is very simple, but there's surprisingly much depth to the characters, mostly because there was so much material to go with I guess it was relatively easy to build strong characters out of those. There's no shortage of action and the body count goes absolutely crazy towards the end. But still there's drama and tragedy behind the showers of blood and decapitated heads. The movie is simply beautifully shot, some of the frames are works of art worth placing on your wall. Too bad the Brittish DVD I watched was from a print that had seen it's better days. There are also a few scenes that are just pure brilliance on the psychological side as well, for example the warming up scene after escaping the burning boat. And call me crazy, but I like the rather simple soundtrack too. Actually the only thing I don't like about this movie is that it credits only Robert Houston as a director while ignoring Kenji Misumi who directed the original movies. Sure Houston cut this version, but still some credit to Misumi who made the amazing source material would be welcome. Anyway I really like this movie and even though I've seen it many times by now it still works wonders. That's a sign of a true classic.
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