Ukigumo
Sempai
- 15 Mar 2025
- 1,382
- 2,684
I watched a really good samurai film yesterday; 'Snow on the Blades'.
It's set at the transition between the Tokugawa and Meiji era and the Samurai have been abolished. Thirteen years earlier, the prime minister's palanquin guard is made to avenge his assassination after bungling his protection on the way to a meeting with the Shōgun . Only one assassin is still at large thirteen years later and the protagonist is seeking him. The back drop to all this is the Samurai are having to deal with their transition to becoming ordinary, and somewhat disliked citizens (after years of oppressing the peasants etc) and indeed having to adopt modern western ideas. The protagonist is anachronistic since he still dresses traditionally, retains his topknot and wears two swords. The inner and outer conflicts are played out really nicely and the often tortuously protracted, sentimental ending of most samurai films, is thankfully reduced.
It's set at the transition between the Tokugawa and Meiji era and the Samurai have been abolished. Thirteen years earlier, the prime minister's palanquin guard is made to avenge his assassination after bungling his protection on the way to a meeting with the Shōgun . Only one assassin is still at large thirteen years later and the protagonist is seeking him. The back drop to all this is the Samurai are having to deal with their transition to becoming ordinary, and somewhat disliked citizens (after years of oppressing the peasants etc) and indeed having to adopt modern western ideas. The protagonist is anachronistic since he still dresses traditionally, retains his topknot and wears two swords. The inner and outer conflicts are played out really nicely and the often tortuously protracted, sentimental ending of most samurai films, is thankfully reduced.
