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Title

Lady Snowblood (修羅雪姫Shurayukihime)

Review

Lady Snowblood, which stars Kaji Meiko, Kurosawa Toshio, Daimon Masaaki, Okada Eiji, and Nishimura Ko, is an action drama set in Japan during the beginning of the early Meji period somewhere between the years of 1868-1900. During this time period Japan is trying to transition from the isolated feudal society to likes of more modern nations of Americas and Europe. The modernization of Japanese military affected the Japanese people by requiring all able body Japanese men to join the military. The conscription is what causes the main character, Yuki, to follow a painful life of retribution.

The movie follows a woman named Yuki Kashima (Yuki: translation-snow), who is born only for the purpose of revenging the death of her brother and father. Yuki’s older brother and father are killed unjustifiably by conmen trying to profit of the scare of the impending conscription. After murdering her family and withstanding hours on rape and torture, Yuki’s mother, Sayo, is taken away by one of her captors of the to be his slave. Sayo puts up with the man until he puts his guard down where she extracts her revenge by putting a blade in his back. While searching for the other henchmen who destroyed her life she is captured by the police and is put in prison. Knowing she will never be released for murder, she hatches a plan to create a child that will be able to rectify the injustices set upon her by the remaining murders. Yuki mother soon dies after naming her child and imploring the newborn to dedicate her life to that of revenge. Although hesitant to act out in violence at first, she is tempered into a lethal assassin through her brutal martial training by her caretaker, the warrior priest Doukai. After completing her training, Yuki obliterates all in her path of retribution.

This movie was based on a manga of the same name and was published in the early 1970’s. Meiko Kaji does a wonderful job portraying the tragic character Yuki, whose emotionlessness stare would spook the hardiest of solider. The backdrops are beautiful and juxtapose the horrible carnage that is depicted throughout the movie. For example there is a scene where Yuki is making her first assassination attempt and takes out her first four men in a snowy empty street. The blood spurts from the target’s wounds sprinkle the freshly fallen snow and Yuki’s stark white kimono to create a wonderful piece of art. The scene is not only gorgeous but also is used to depict her sprit becoming completely tainted by the gore created as the result of her obligation of revenge. It is not surprising that Quentin Tarantino paid homage to this wonderful movie by creating the Kill Bill movies, with Volume One in particular. I enjoyed this film immensely. I would definitely recommend this movie to anyone who is a fan of action and or Japanese films. ~ Will McLain

Review Date

Reviewed November 2013