Zatoichi

Theatrical Release Date: 2004 07 23 (USA - Limited)

UPC: 786936790597

Studio: Miramax

MPAA Rating: R   Contains:[Graphic Violence]

Summary: Beat Takeshi Kitano directs and plays the title role in this tribute to the wildly popular "blind swordsman" of Japanese cinema who was the hero of more than 20 movies and a television series from the early '60s to the late '80s. In Kitano's version, Zat?ichi wanders into a town harassed by criminal gangs, and helps two geishas take revenge on the men who murdered their parents. His mission leads him to a final, bloody confrontation with the gang's mastermind and his hired assassin (Tadanobu Asano), a swordsman with a reputation as lethal as Zat?ichi. ~ Tom Vick, Rovi

Category: Action

Awards: Grand Jury Prize - Silver Lion – Venice International Film Festival Film Presented – Sundance Film Festival Film Presented – Toronto International Film Festival

Features: Behind-The-Scenes Special
Exclusive Interviews With Crew

Zatoichi

Format: Blu-ray

Release Date: 09/15/2009

Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1 Theatre Wide-Screen

Audio: DTHD null, DD5.1 Dolby Digital 5.1, DD2 Dolby Digital Stereo

Runtime: 116 Minutes

Sides: 1

Number of Discs: 1

Language(s) English,Spanish

Subtitles: English,Spanish

Tom Vick

Beat Takeshi Kitano's Zat?ichi is an artfully crowd-pleasing riff on the samurai action film. Zat?ichi , the beloved hero of a long-running series of genre flicks (which still play regularly on American television), is the perfect match for the impishly violent screen persona Kitano has developed over the course of his film career in films like Fireworks and Brother. With his eyes closed and sporting a knowing smile, he dispatches baddie after baddie in a spray of digitized blood. Kitano the director is fully aware that he's dealing in pure pulp and he revels in it, injecting genre conventions with the visceral, yet stylized, violence his fans have come to expect. As an actor, he clearly relishes the role of Zat?ichi, who roams the country posing as a blind masseur, but who is, in reality, the most dangerous swordsman in the land. Even better, he tops the whole thing off with a tap dancing curtain call involving the entire cast that nods to the joyful exuberance of Bollywood and ends the film on an irresistibly upbeat note. A pop-culture creation, Zat?ichi, as played in the original films by Shintaro Katsu, has become a mythic figure almost on a par with characters from ancient legend. With this vastly entertaining addition to the series, Kitano proves himself to be just the right man to carry on the tradition. ~ Tom Vick, Rovi

Cast and Crew: Michiyo Ookusu  Actor 
Takeshi Kitano  Director 
Takeshi Kitano  Screenwriter 
Masayuki Mori  Producer 
Keiichi Suzuki  Composer (Music Score) 
Tsunehisa Saito  Producer 
Chieko Saito  Executive Producer 
Takeshi Kitano  Actor 
Tadanobu Asano  Actor 
Michiyo Okusa  Actor 
Yui Natsukawa  Actor 
Guadalcanal Taka  Actor 
Daigoro Tachibana  Actor 
Yűko Daike  Actor 
Ittoku Kishibe  Actor 
Saburo Ishikura  Actor 
Akira Emoto  Actor 

Country: Japan