Customer Reviews

Aikido's M.Saito Jo

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This DVD has 6 sections. BUT you can not access via DVD technology. You must watch it through in order.

Section 1. One man techniques with Jo; Assorted strikes, Defensive counters and Combinations. The 28 Jo Kata is quickly demonstrated.(Don't blink)
Section 2. 2 person Jo attacks and counters. Some really awesome moves. Lots of variations.
Section 3. The 31 Jo kata. Performed from 2 angles. The fontal veiw is of little use because of speed.

The first 3 sections are B/W achival silent film footage. Which is old and very over exposed and the speed is fast. It would be hard for a person with little to no experience to learn the form. If you have forgot the form like me it is possible to pick it up again.

Section 4. A talk about Aikido and O'sensei. Some still photos. Basically a waste of time.

Section 5. Color video; 2 person demonstrations of moves and exercises. All empty hand. Some Atemi demos. These are good but only done once. There is a voice over which tries to give the name of the move but it is not timed correctly.

Section 6. Is very poor quality of M. Saito teaching a workshop on sword. You can not really hear anything nor make out anything worthwile.

I gave this 3 stars because....it is the only JO dvd on the market. I forgot it over 7 years ago and really want to re-learn it. It also has some good demonstrations. M Saito is truly masterful with the Jo and of course with Aikido. But the quality of this DVD doesn't allow it to really shine.

Aikido Saito's Empty Hand DVD
Aikido Saito's Jo DVD
Aikido Saito's Sword DVD
I wasn't expecting a great deal from "lost footage", but to say these are "high quality" is way off the mark. The first 10 minutes (approx.) of each DVD consists of 2 short films in B&W showing various aikido techniques. These are old, grainy and look like they have been copies from old film stock to VHS and then to DVD. As old historical footage of Saito Sensei, they are interesting and worth viewing.

The annoying problem with these three DVDs is that the second and third sections of each DVD are identical. The only parts which are different are the first 10 minutes in B&W, which do indeed concentrate on Sword, Jo and Empty Hand as claimed in the titles.

The second section is in color, again old, grainy, but is taken from old professional video stock so that it is relatively clear. It is a documentary type section showing training at the Iwama dojo and demonstrating a number of techniques. This is the longest section at about 30 minuets, interesting and worth viewing, but I don't need three copies of it.

The last section is an old home video of Saito Sensei teaching bokken. The video is very bad, breaking up in parts and the audio is virtually inaudible, which makes the section fairly pointless since Saito Sensei is trying to describe subtle differences in position which you can neither see properly on the old video nor hear explained. I definitely don't need three copies of this.

I would have been happier getting one DVD for the same price with the 6 historically sigbnificant B&W short films and the old documentary section and a bit of honesty about what is actually on the DVDs.

It's a old flim that they put on a DVD, it dooes not look good at all. Don't but it.