Message from jschilp

[Anonymous]

On the recommendation of a colleague, I watched "The Sword of Doom" directed by Kihachi Okamoto. A 1965 film about revenge that turns from a mission to a way of life, this film not only showed the artistry of camera work of the time but also allowed viewers into the training schools and challenge events of 1860's Japan. I was most surprised at how the pre-battles & extremely slow posturing and positioning was a key element in certain climactic scenes. Often these scenes were silent, heightening the tension as we waited for Ryunosuke to strike. I'm glad it wasn't as fight oriented as some films of the day happen to be. Instead, there was character development and a place in history as the film took us to three specific events in the last days of the Shogunate period. If I was to pity the main character here, the film missed that mark. His brutal sense of vengeance and his need to slay those in his path derive a sense of deserved punishment in the end as he continued to attempt to attack the ghosts of former victims. Instead, I felt even more for the wife of his last opponent to whom he was supposed to gracefully lose. He promises her this before he takes advantage of her physically. When he kills her husband the next day, she vows to run away with him since she has nothing left in the village. Over two years, she raises Ryunosuke's boy and they live poorly but she hates him for ruining her life. If Ryunosuke had lost as he promised, maybe he wouldn't have faced all those ghosts in the end but of course, then we wouldn't have this film.
At any rate, I was pleased by the artistry, use of camera angles, silences employed, and scenery used as backdrop for the story. Being stuck with many films recently that have no concern for plot, "The Sword of Doom" has opened my perspective to a different genre of film.