Bullet Points: Lone Wolf and Cub: Sword of Vengeance
Who starts a movie by chopping off a toddler’s head? It’s the wild beginning to a film series that will keep you guessing no matter what your background in samurai cinema might be. I have always thought of Japanese Samurai film culture as the predecessor to the American Western and maybe the most excellent of sub-genres. The Lone Wolf and Cub series is the perfect blend of period flick and bloody slicey-dicey flick. Itto Ogami, played by Tomisaburo Wakayama, is equal parts curmudgeonly Clint Eastwood, vengeful Charles Bronson, and as deadly with the sword as a dozen Highlander immortals. There aren’t many film series that have six releases and still leave you wanting more. Lone Wolf and Cub is most certainly one of a kind.
Synopsis: The story of a Ronin (i.e. a masterless samurai) who wanders the countryside of Japan with his small child, searching for the one’s responsible for murdering his wife.
- The Ogami Clan: The story is about Itto Ogami, the executioner for the Shogun. A rival clan of assassins plots to take down the Ogami Clan by framing them and hopefully taking their place in the very honorable position of Shogun’s kogi kaishakunin. They kill his wife in the process of the frame job and turn Ogami into the ultimate weapon of revenge. It’s every action movie lover’s dream!
- Spies, Assassins, and Executioners, oh my: There are three groups that are helping to keep order for the Shogun; the ninja spies, the assassins, and the executioner. It’s already known that the Yagyu, who are the assassins, are trying to take over the executioner game as well. It means that framing Ogami for going against the Shogun has turned him into a wanted man by anyone who might come across him on the road. It doesn’t stop Ogami, however. He still has two mouths to feed and revenge on his mind.
- Out of the Game: “I’ll hunt them to the ends of the earth.” There is nothing better than a man with a lust for revenge and the means to get it. The biggest difference with this series compared to your average actioner is that Ogami has something more to lose. His young son is with him the entire time, you know. Ogami might be out of the game when it comes to being an honorable samurai but being a honor-less assassin is even harder sometimes.
- Oh, the Bloodshed: Holy crap! There is no shortage of epic sword battles in Sword of Vengeance. Anyone who discovers Itto’s identity is instantly scared to death but when they attack in mass numbers they have the courage that ignorance builds in them. It doesn’t make them any more sword-proof. Ogami slices them open like the plastic wrapping on a bunch of little microwavable dinners.
- The Sword or the Ball: In one of my favorite scenes, Ogami lets his son choose between a sword or a ball. If he had chosen the ball then Itto was going to kill him and send him to live with his mother in the afterlife. You can see the disappointment on his face when the toddler picks the way of the sword.
- Village of the Damned: Ogami is hired by some samurai to stop an attempt on their Lord’s life by some vagabonds and scoundrels. I don’t know about you, but that alone sounds like reason enough to get wrapped up into a movie. Itto makes his way into the village and gets a little action before the bad guys finally decide to act on their mission to kill the Lord. Unfortunately for them, they need to take out the villagers before they leave and that means that Ogami is forcefully sprung into action and decimates the whole lot of them.
- The Demon Way in Hell: It finally comes time to lay down the Ogami law on the ruffians at the village and Itto doesn’t skimp out on the carnage. He uses every weapon in his arsenal to take out the ronin. Heads fly, legs are chopped off, and the sheer volume of blood spurted across the set could fill an Olympic size swimming pool.
The Verdict: I think that the Lone Wolf and Cub series is one of my absolute favorites of all time. Each of the films have a similar layout but they’re mainly differentiated by the foes that Ogami is forced to go against. Sword of Vengeance doesn’t have the most memorable of foes, but it gives us a great introduction to the character and his motives. It fills us in on just enough backstory to understand why he’s wandering around committing himself to these horribly dishonorable jobs just to make enough money to survive. Especially when he’s only looking to survive long enough to avenge his honor…which was already taken from him. Did I just confuse myself? No matter how you slice it, Lone Wolf and Cub: Sword of Vengeance is a fantastic movie filled with kickass performances and insane sword fights. It also might be the greatest comic book adaptation of all time!
