Among the many famous 16th-century samurai who made the leap from myth and ukiyo-e to early cinema screen was sword-master Miyamoto Musashi, previously depicted in prints by Kiniyoshi Yoshitoshi and others slaying an array of grotesque creatures including giant bats, giant lizards, and the mythical tengu. This imagery informed his first screen depiction in Miyamoto Musashi Taiji No Ba, which showed him combatting the mythic white ape of the mountains.
A samurai purchases a new sword only to find it is already dull. When he returns to the dull looking merchant to complain, something quite unexpected happens.
This is the story of a samurai who falls on hard times due to misunderstandings and follows the plots of his enemies.
Set in the Edo period, the film deals with two brothers falling in love with the same girl. Sadly, only 12 minutes of footage survive.
The legendary tale of the forty-seven samurai and their mission to avenge the death of their master.
A samurai comes to the aid of his uncle in a duel.
A samurai returns to his homeland after a three year absence and finds his fiance is now one of the prince's concubines.
Ryôma Sakamoto unites the Choshu and Satsuma clans and paves the way for the Meiji Restoration.
Date Mosui, a young samurai, one day gets a scolding from a nameless ronin that sets him thinking about what life is all about and his ways of living. His frined, Ando Kichinosuke, is alarmed at Mosui's despondency and invites him to his house as his little sister Tsuyu and he try to cheer him up.
A farmer walking in the woods is frightened away by a shapeshifting fox, who then disguises himself as a samurai and makes his way to a temple, haunted by a young shapeshifting tanuki whose various attempts to frighten the fox/samurai away fail. The young tanuki telephones his father, and they join forces against the samurai.
The boozy mercenary of the title, based on the actual historical figure of Naoyuki Ban (1567-1615), attempts to rid a haunted castle of spooks.
Araki Mataemon was a very strong warrior, and his feud against the samurai Kawai Matagorō is one of the most famous in Japan. Matagoro killed Gendayu, the little brother of Mataemon's brother in law, Watanabe Kazuma. Becoming a murderer out of jealousy for a childhood friend, Matagoro fled in another domain, using friends of his father and his lineage linked to Tokugawa Ieyasu. It was somehow a complicated matter, as it seems at that time, a law from Toyotomi Hideyoshi allowed a little brother taking revenge for his elder brother, but not the reverse. After some years, the lord of Kazuma and Mataemon found a way, and they were allowed to take revenge for the murder. They fought and killed Matagoro and just one other samurai who was helping the culprit. It seems at that time, Kazuma was Mataemon's only assistant.
The story of Dangonosuke, a boy samurai rescuing a woman from a villain is told comically.
The sequel to the 1935 film Great Bodhisattva Pass
A short documentary detailing the forging of a katana.
The vassals of the Asano clan, who surrendered the castle & became wanderers, deceive the enemy and the public, wait for an opportunity to avenge their master and his family.
An umbrella maker with a shopping addiction finds himself in dire straits when his debts force him to consider selling his attractive, desirable daughter to a suitor she doesn't love.
In 1701, Lord Takuminokami Asano has a feud with Lord Kira and he tries to kill Kira in the corridors of the Shogun's palace. The Shogun sentences Lord Asano to commit suppuku and deprives the palace and lands from his clan, but does not punish Lord Kira. Lord Asano's vassals leave the land and his samurais become ronin and want to seek revenge against the dishonor of their Lord. But their leader Kuranosuke Oishi asks the Shogun to restore the Asano clan with his brother Daigaku Asano. One year later, the Shogun refuses his request and Oishi and forty-six ronin revenge their Lord.
The life, adventures and exploits of warlord Date Masamune the One-eyed Dragon: his early youth as an aggressive warrior, the battles he won until subduing almost all his enemies, the lonely comprehension of knowing that he actually can not take over the whole country because he was born too late.
Near the end of the shogunate in Japan, Katsura Shogoro and his fellow samurai from the southwestern domain of Choshu enter the dojo of Saito Yakuro, the famed Shindo Munen Ryu swordsmen of Renpeikan in Edo. Katsura is initially not welcomed by the other, senior dojo followers. Undeterred, he focuses on improving his skill not only in swordsmanship but also learning how to repel the foreign British and American ships that threaten their domain.