Great

Tenchu!

What a great movie! The great Shintaro Katsu and the equally great Tatsuya Nakadai starring in the greatest of many great films by great director Hideo Gosha. Okay, I'm probably overusing a word here, but I really think this is the best chambara I have ever seen. It tells the story of the rise, betrayal and redemption of Okada Izo (Katsu!), a killer for Tosa clan, one of the "loyalist" factions of the late Tokugawa period.
The film is quite long, but so densely plotted and deftly paced that nobody could honestly complain about it.
The real revelation, though, is Katsu, at this point in his career worn-out and overweight looking - theoretically. In practice his portrayal of a man torn between his wishes and best intentions and the social structures and personal flaws he cannot escape is possibly the best showing in his career. He's (and, yes, I know, cliché) nearly tearing the screen apart with energy and tenseness and a fragility manly-man actors seldom dare to show.

The only thing this movie needs is a decent European DVD release, so one could watch this masterpiece in an appropriate way and not as a crappy looking VHS-copy. 

Darling of the day:

"Sorry, gotta go!" (Izo, after nearly killing an innocent he has mistaken for his victim.)



EDIT: Added darling.