Everyone has to see this movie. Really. i have not seen any of the 27-ish other Zatoichi movies, i didn't even know there WERE 27 otherZatoichi movies. i just went to it cause i don't get many chances to see a samurai movie in an actual theater and i thought it might be cool. And it was $1.50 -- that always helps. so there was the usual sort of plot i was expecting for this kind of movie, and it had the requisite flashbacks, but there was more. much more. any movie that has: (spoileralert!)
- a masseuse (who is old and our titular hero and makes sly sexual innuendos at a older lady he meets!)
- a drag-queen geisha(who looks like Michael Jackson. really.)
- a drag-queen geisha sharing a bath with a bumbling compulsive gamblerwho then
- wants to be "pretty" and dresses up and
- scares the local gang of kids, and
- the greatest, longest, weirdest, stomp/kabuki/tap/Broadway musicalnumber where they tap dance in geta sandals (no lie!) and has to be like 5 minutes long,all in sub-titled letterbox, just makes this my kind of movie.
I'm going to buy it. if you ask nicely, you can borrow it.
