Thanks to reader Steve C. for requesting this week’s review. As always, for instructions on how to request the next review for this feature (to run in two weeks) see the bottom of this post.
As a moviegoer, I’ve long operated under the belief that “the more you see, the more you need to see.” I’ve often found that the great movies are almost never self-contained, but rather lead me to other great- or at least interesting- movies. One thing that this Reviews by Request feature has been good for so far is to turn me on to some movies I might otherwise have not considered, be they the story of a thinking dog or a British war epic. By contrast, I was planning on seeing this week’s requested film eventually. Aside from Kurosawa’s work, I’m pretty under-versed in Japanese samurai dramas, but I’ve always planned to catch up with the genre sooner or later. And one can’t really get very far in the samurai genre without seeing any of the Lone Wolf and Cub series. Thanks to reader Steve C., I finally had an excuse to get off my butt and watch the first film in the series, Sword of Vengeance, and I’m glad I did. Thanks, Steve!
The Lone Wolf and Cub series tells the story of Ogami Itto (played by Tomisaburo Wakayama), formerly the shogun’s executioner, who is framed as a traitor by the nefarious Yagyu clan. After his wife is killed, he flees with his infant son Daigoro, vowing to take revenge on those who wronged him. Until he is able to do so, he wanders the countryside, pushing his ever-present baby cart, carrying a sign on his back reading “child and expertise for rent,” offering his services as a ronin (or the short-term use of Daigoro) to any bidder who would hire him.
There are many tones in which this story could be told. In light of the series’ title, replete with animal imagery, I half-expected this to be a lighthearted epic, in which a samurai and his cute little kid got into all manner of adventure. What I got instead was one of the more despairing portraits of human nature I’ve seen in some time. Most films I’ve seen that deal with feudal Japan haven’t painted a particularly positive view of the period, and this is no exception. The world of Lone Wolf and Cub is full of violence and deceit, one in which the good exist to be trampled underfoot by the wicked. There’s no room for morality here- one can stand firm and die, or bend and survive.
Likewise, the action scenes in the film- the primary draw for samurai movie fans- don’t have the kickass charge of similar battles in other films of the genre. Oh, there’s 
plenty of swordsmanship- to say nothing of gore and dismemberment- but there’s a real desperation to it, with Itto fighting for his life against those who would murder him. He beats them because his skills are superior to theirs, but he gets no joy from winning. Everything he does it out of necessity, as when he submits to having sex with a prostitute to save her life and appease a pack of lecherous lowlifes. Even at the climax, when we discover that Daigoro’s baby cart hides an arsenal (a scene which in another film might be a major crowd pleaser), there’s no temptation to laugh at the cleverness of it all, because it’s the last thing on Itto’s mind, and ours too.
And through it all, there’s the face of little Daigoro, whose presence alone is an ironic commentary on the brutality around him. The world of Lone Wolf and Cub is no place for a man or woman of honor, let alone a small child, and Itto knows it. In the film’s most memorable scene, Itto contemplates killing his son to protect him from the horrors that lie ahead, and tasks the child- not even old enough to walk- to choose between the sword (life) or his toy ball (death- love how the two choices are flip-flopped to the opposite of what we’d expect). The child begins to lean toward the ball until the sunlight shifts in the house and illuminates the sword, which leads Daigoro in that direction instead. After the child makes his decision, Itto takes the child and says, sighing, “you would’ve been happier if you’d chosen to join your mother in her world.” But Daigoro chose life, whether he knew it or not, and so was born the legend of Lone Wolf and Cub, a legend I’m looking forward to catching up with sooner rather than later.
Previously on Reviews by Request:
Zulu (1964, Cy Endfield)
Baxter (1989, Jérôme Boivin)
So, what movie would you like me to review for the next installment of Reviews by Request? Let me know in the comments section below. To refresh your memory, here are the rules for requesting a movie to be reviewed: (1) it has to be a movie I haven’t seen, (2) it has to be available through Netflix, and (3) please only request one film. Other than that, anything is fair game. First to suggest a movie that qualifies gets their requested review. See you in two weeks!
