Product Details

• Actors: Tatsuya Nakadai, Etsushi Takahashi, Yuriko Hoshi, Naoko Kubo, Tadao Nakamaru
• Directors: Hideo Gosha, Kihachi Okamoto, Masahiro Shinoda, Masaki Kobayashi
• Writers: Hideo Gosha, Kihachi Okamoto, Akira Murao, Eizaburo Shiba
• Format: Box set, Black & White, Color, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Language: Japanese
• Subtitles: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
• Number of discs: 4
• Rating: Unrated
• Studio: Criterion Collection
• DVD Release Date: October 25, 2005
• Run Time: 420 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000AQKUFO
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #69,458 in Movies & TV (See Bestsellers in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "Rebel Samurai - Sixties Swordplay Classics (Criterion Collection)" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Surly scowls and flashing swords abound in Rebel Samurai - Sixties Swordplay Classics, a dazzling new box set from the Criterion Collection. The samurai genre is often compared with the Western, but three of these movies are closer to film noir; shot on a limited budget, they make up for limited production values with ingenious direction, punchy editing, and heated emotions. All four, however, are notable for their jaundiced view of the traditional samurai culture--the blind loyalty to their masters, holding honor above all, sacrificing self for the good of the clan.

Masaki Kobayashi's Samurai Rebellion, starring Toshiro Mifune (Rashomon, Shogun), is the most traditional of the four: Visually elegant and austere, it meticulously traces how a forced marriage leads to a family's collapse in a bloodbath. Repressed emotions erupt in honor-shattering violence as a father and son turn against the lord of their clan in the name of love. In the other three, the moviemaking itself reflects the upset in values. Hideo Gosha's Sword of the Beast follows an aimless ronin (a masterless warrior) who, pursuing gold, finds a new meaning in life as he battles killers from his own clan. "To hell with name and pride!" he shrieks in the first five minutes of the movie, mere seconds after a sexual dalliance in the underbrush. The story roars along, the visual style loose and dynamic, the characters far more gritty and rough than the stiff-backed soldiers of Samurai Rebellion.

Masahiro Shinoda's Samurai Spy fairly explodes with spectacular action sequences and dynamic editing; the politics are almost impossible to follow, but the story rips along as a handsome spy navigates a treacherous war, musing about life and death when he's not engaged in acrobatic swordplay. The final film, Kihachi Okamoto's Kill!, is as outrageous as its title. From the opening scene of a starving ronin stumbling out of a howling dust storm, Kill! pushes the complexity of clan politics to absurd proportions and discards stylized duels in favor of realistically brutal and clumsy butchery, backed up with a startling surf guitar soundtrack. Black humor abounds as wildly eccentric characters--including Tatsuya Nakadai as a laconic, Robert-Mitchum-flavored ronin--scrabble for food, sex, and some shred of dignity in a ravaged landscape. All four films will be a revelation to anyone who thinks the samurai genre begins and ends with Kurosawa. Each is mesmerizing on its own; as a package, they're a potent education. Essential viewing. --Bret Fetzer

Product Description

These four classic films, from four masters of Japanese cinema, turn a genre upside down, redefining for a modern generation the meaning of loyalty and honor, as embodied by the iconic figure of the samurai.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Four Samurai - serious, silly, sneaky and wild, August 27, 2006

By	Zack Davisson "All Good Things" (Seattle, WA, USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

"Rebel Samurai - Sixties Swordplay Classics" is a collection of four superb films, each highlighting a different style in the multi-faceted chambara genre, from a slow-boiling political powerhouse like "Samurai Rebellion" to the parody film "Kill!." The four directors showcased, Masaki Kobayashi, Masahiro Shinoda, Kihachi Okamoto and Hideo Gosha, are probably the greatest directors of samurai films aside from The Emperor Akira Kurosawa.

Of the four films, "Samurai Rebellion" is the greatest masterpiece. Toshiro Mifune is incredible as an aging samurai trying to maintain his honor and the honor of his family in an age that is no longer honorable. Director Kobayashi ("Harakiri") should rightfully take his place next to Kurosawa and Ozu in the pantheon of great Japanese directors. Masahiro Shinoda ("Double Suicide") gives us "Samurai Spy," a tale of intrigue deeply wrapped up in real Japanese history. It is almost film noir, with its twisting plots and shifting loyalties. Hideo Gosha ("Three Outlaw Samurai") in "Sword of the Beast" shows a bleak portrait of a samurai who comes to realize that honor is garbage and that he is nothing more than a pawn of bureaucracy. Finally, Kihachi Okamoto ("Sword of Doom") goes in an entirely different direction with the parody "Kill!," which is sort of the "Blazing Saddles" of the chambara genre.

Anyone fan of the samurai genre is probably planning to pick up these four DVDs individually, and this box set allows you to get them all for a bit cheaper. For Criterion Collection releases, they are surprisingly bare-bones, being only the movie with few extras, but at least they are available and looking beautiful. The box itself is annoying, only opening on the bottom as opposed to the side like most boxes. This makes it hard to access the DVDs, as you have to pull them all out in order to get the DVD you are searching for.

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent mix, November 12, 2005

By	David Chatenay (San Francisco) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The four movies in this boxset are quite similar, and yet very different. They all talk about samurai life, honor, betrayal, the cruelty of chambellans and vassals. But the ways to tell the stories are very different.
"Samurai rebellion" is a great tragedy, with a top-notch Toshiro Mifune as a retired swordsman, a shakespearian final battle, and a great plot. The oral arguments are as sharp as the sword fights.
"Sword of the beast" is a very good thriller, with a ronin on the run after being used by his master in a power grab.
"Samurai spy" is centered around spies, with a twisted plot, double crossings and deceptions a-plenty, and a captivating intrigue.
And for me, the gem is "Kill!", which skillfully moves between tragedy and comedy, has hysterical moments of slapstick combined with a solid storyline, and mixes the traditional samurai movie codes with western influences: highly recommended.

33 of 44 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars What you'll get..., October 13, 2005

By	Low-Ranking Reviewer "tell it like it is" (US of A) - See all my reviews

I don't have my copy yet, so this is not a review. But this potentially great 4-film set will include:

* SAMURAI REBELLION (imdb score: 8.4/10, 303 votes)
Anamorphic Widescreen
Excerpt From 1993 Interview with director Masaki Kobayashi
Original Theatrical Trailer
Text/Photo Galleries
Essay by Japanese film historian Donald Richie
In Masaki Kobayashi's SAMURAI REBELLION, a formerly loyal Bushido warrior revolts against his tyrannical lord when the royals claim his unwilling daughter-in-law as a mistress. Although his quest for justice is futile, the swordsman refuses to accept the command without a fight. Theatrical release: December 1967. Winner of the FIPRESCI Award at the 1967 Venice Film Festival. Toshirô Mifune and Tatsuya Nakadai also appear in many of Akira Kurosawa's films.

* SAMURAI SPY (imdb score: 6.8/10, 47 votes)
Anamorphic Widescreen
Video Interview with director
Text/Photo Galleries
Essay by film scholar Alain Silver
Director Masahiro Shinoda weaves a complex, twisty narrative in the aptly named SAMURAI SPY, which follows war- and subterfuge-weary warrior Sasuke Sarutobi (Tetsuro Tamba) as he gets drawn into one last mission, tracing a wily defector named Koritama. Defying the genre conventions of samurai films, Shinoda's story is full of noir-ish intrigue and double-crosses. It takes place in a world where none of the characters, not even samurai, are what they seem.

* SWORD OF THE BEAST (imdb score: 7/10, 10 votes)
Anamorphic Widescreen
Text/Photo Galleries
Essay by japanese film and pop culture authority Patrick Macias
After killing one of his own clan's ministers in a reform plan gone awry, proud samurai Gennosuke (Mikijiro Hira) flees his former comrades and, thoroughly shaken, goes to live alone in the wilderness in SWORD OF THE BEAST. There he falls in with a group of illegal miners and a master swordsman named Yamane (Go Kato), who eventually shows him how to recapture his lost honor. Director Hideo Gosha is a master at shooting swordplay, but here he handles the more interior, emotional moments with just as much skill.

* KILL! (imdb score: 7.1/10, 80 votes)
Anamorphic Widescreen
Original Theatrical Trailer
Text/Photo Galleries
Essay by film historian and culture critic Howard Hampton
Two scruffy swordsmen, Genta (Tatsuya Nakadai) and Hanji (Etsushi Takahashi), are the focus of Kihachi Okamoto's black comedy, which is loosely based on the same novel that inspired Kurosawa's SANJURO. Genti, a weary ex-samurai, and Hanji, a former farmer and aspiring warrior, arrive in a small town and promptly get sucked into a dispute between a brutal, corrupt clan leader and a group of brave but hapless rebels. Full of dark, irreverent humor as well as plenty of action, KILL! keeps up a quick pace, and features music by Masaru Sato (who also composed YOJIMBO's terrific score).

audio is in mono, with improved english subtitles. available 10/25/05. imdb scores as of 10/14/05. all info obtained from other websites.