I've always been a fan of Hong Kong movies; actors like Jackie Chan and Yuen Biao were among my favorites. My thought was that this part of the world mostly created movies that were filled with Kung Fu action mixed with comedy; this of course had a connection with what movies I was watching at that time. 

Early on in the 80's I got my eyes up for a different and darker genre of movies made in that continent. They didn't necessarily have the same degree of action, but the storyline was/is always intriguing. One of my recent favorites is Ichi the killer, a movie that will scratch your head for weeks.

As I’ve mentioned earlier, my dad was the supplier of movies to me and my brothers until they got old enough to rent movies by their own. The only problem was that most movies at that time never passed the national censorship (Europe) and either was cut to the extent that most of the plot didn't seem to fit together, or were banned all together. Horror movies and movies starring Stephen Seagal were always butchered. This was of course a situation that wasn’t tolerable by any movie fans, the solution was then to import the movies and trade them within a circle of movie fanatics. I guess this is much like the situation today, I reckon most of us trade movies among friends who have the same great taste.

My dad had a friend that had already in the 80's a collection of around 1000 original VHS movies, he bought anything that was remotely interesting or had some fuss around it. Once pops asked him if he had anything new, he was hoping that he had some western movies since that's still dad’s favorite genre, but instead he brought up a movie called Shogun Assassin. He did however issue a warning regarding the violent content of the movie, asking dad if he was sure that we could watch it. Dad of course laughed it away since we had watched Poltergeist and The Exorcist a couple of days earlier.

Again as I said earlier, my dad understood that kids who have a healthy amount of brain cells won't get crazy by watching movies with strong content. A wise man my dad.

Let's get back to the main subject Shogun Assassin, I have yet to meet a movie fanatic that hasn't seen or at least heard about this great film. There are so many interesting aspects about this movie that one starts to wonder why it hasn’t been embraced in a larger scale. Quentin Tarantino admitted that he got many ideas for Kill Bill from older Japanese movies, Shogun Assassin and the Lone wolf and cub series was one of them.

The title of the movie is pretty much right on in reflecting its content. The movie is actually based on the books and comics of the characters Lone wolf and cub. Lone wolf is the Ronin samurai that gets hunted by the paranoid Shogun who is all too aware of the skills held by Ogami Itto ("Lone Wolf"). Itto is the Shoguns official executioner. The Shogun orders a assassination of Itto and his family because he is afraid that Itto will stand in the way of his rule. The Shoguns ninjas manage to kill Ittos wife, but Lone Wolf escapes with his son and swears to avenge his wife’s death.

His son, Digaro, is of course "Cub". During the movie he learns about life through his father’s eyes who now lives as a paid assassin working and is always on the road. Lone Wolf has no intentions on raising a kid, he wants a man, so he gives Digaro the choice of either ball or sword. If he would choose the ball it would mean certain death, luckily he chooses the sword and travels with his father while he counts the number of kills that they've performed.

Throughout the movie they get hunted by the shoguns assassins as well as others who are eager to kill him and his son. One of the climaxes of the movie is when a lethal female ninja group is hired to hunt them down. This causes a big bloodbath where Lone Wolf kills anything in his way, and yes that also means women, there's no Hollywood sympathy in this movie. That's exactly what I love about it, he doesn't give long dialogues before killing, there are no overdone emotions, and he’s just a mean killing machine.

The last fight involves three brothers called "The masters of death" (much like The lords of death from Big trouble in little china) who are helping a outcast from his escape. This fight takes place on desert dunes and is one of the greatest swordfights to this date. Blood is spilled all over the sand while the hero kills everyone who dares to challenge him.

The interesting part of this movie is the fact that it’s actually two different movies cut and dubbed together. It’s based on Sword of vengeance and Baby cart at the river Styx, the result is the Americanized movie called Shogun Assassin. The most interesting parts of these movies are put together in a overdubbed and synthesized version that actually works very well. By synthesized I mean the soundtrack of the movie, it resembles a cross between Miami vice and Man hunter, I know that it sounds out of place in a Japanese sword movie, but believe me, it fits pretty good. Another cool thing is the dubbing of Daigoro ("dub"), he narrates the whole movie with the reflections of his father’s work, and it’s almost funny to hear him count along for each kill.