Japan, the 16th century: 20 years ago, ninja Shogen Shironai (Sonny
Chiba) killed lord Momochi to help lord Hideyoshi (Asao Koike) conquer
Momochi's realm. Problem is, the son of lord Momochi managed to make a
getaway with the Momochi dagger, which is said to carry the map to
Momochis' secret goldmine. Now Momochi's son Takamaru (Hiroyuki Sanada),
who has spent the years in China studying Shaolin Kung Fu, returns to
Japan to have his revenge on Shogen Shironai - and it doesn't take him
long to hook up with his old friends who all want to fight Shironai and
lord Hideyoshi. However, Takamaru also attracts the attention of Hanzo
Hattori (Isao Natsuyagi), a ninja master who has raised Otsu (Yuko
Ninagawa), and who now wants to use her to get the dagger from Takamaru -
which is exactly what Shogen Shironai and lord Hideyoshi want as well, by
the way, and before long and after many fights, Takamaru's friends are
decimated to just a handful, who now retreat with master Hakuunsai
(Tetsuro Tamba) to hone their martial arts skills, and get the second
Monmochi dagger, as the one Takamaru had only carried half the treasure
map. Otsu tries to steal the daggers but fails, and in failing she
realizes she's still in love with Takamaru, a love that's stronger than
her allegiance to Hanzo Hattori ... With the gold, Takamaru is able to
gather a small army, and his newly gathered martial arts skills give him
enough self confidence to attack Hideyoshi and Shogen Shironai out in the
open, but ultimately Takamaru and friends seem to lose - when Hanzo
Hattori and his ninjas intervene to turn the tide in their favour, and in
the end, good prevails over evil. An epic that, like most films
of its ilk, has its highs and its lows: On one hand, the plot is way too
convoluted - and unnecessarily so - to properly follow the action, and at
times, the buildup of tension is really destroyed by too much plot.
Furthermore, despite its complex storyline, the division of good and evil
is a bit too simplistic to really convince, so much so that after some
time you get bored rooting for the good times. Plus, the pop/funk musical
score of the film is at times hard to bear and seems to have little
connection to the onscreen goings-on. All that said, Shogun's Ninja is
still a pretty exciting movie, it's stylishly directed, features many an
action setpiece, and once the story takes off, the film is well-paced - at
least until the story crashlands again. In short: Don't expect too much
and you'll be greatly entertained, it's a good action movie, but at the
same time it's not one of the better epics to come out of Japan ...
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