Ibun Sarutobi Sasuke (1965)

Ibun Sarutobi Sasuke: Directed by Masahiro Shinoda. With Hiroshi Aoyama, Jun Hamamura, Osamu Hitomi, Minoru Hodaka. The legendary samurai Sasuke Sarutobi gets caught in a web of political intrigue, deception and espionage during the early 17th century.

“It has it all really… Crime, the theme of violence, an ambiguous but honest protagonist that borders cynicism (and somehow victim of circumstance), a complex plot with crosses and double-crosses, well-defined characters with sharp motives that are unclear to the viewer, moral ambiguity, expressionist low-key lighting, unbalanced frames, disruptive shots, and even an u0026#39;urbanu0026#39; feel (though in old Japan), voice-over and a femme fatale! Add ninja action and a political comment on cold war and its meaningless dehumanizing nature, and you get a smart, entertaining, beautiful, thought-provoking film.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eShinoda masters the visual medium to create something new, different. The viewer experiences the insecurity and anguish that good noir delivers (I guess that other reviewers could not manage this). And still there are sword-armed samurai in it!”