Female Demon: Ohyaku (1968)

Female Demon: Ohyaku

Directed by Yoshihiro Ishikawa. Starring: Junko Miyazono

Reviewed By Michael Hauss

This film is a blood-soaked masterpiece of womanly revenge. The story of although not a virtuous or innocent woman, but a woman nonetheless who is pushed into this undesirable life because of the scar on her back, which is not merely a scar, but, a sense of pain, shame, and hate all manifested in that bodily mutilation. Oh, but, that scar does not detract a thing from the beauty of Ohyaku (Junko Miyazono), because she is a woman of exquisite grace, with skin so soft and inviting, that it’s as if the devil himself had granted her this divinely, but devilishly intoxicating form.

But, an easy life was never in the cards for Ohyaku, since the moment her mother decided to throw herself and young Ohyaku, off a bridge, into a raging river below. The fall from the bridge kills Ohyaku’s mother, but the young girl survives with a large scar upon her back and a multitude of ones inside her. Ohyaku, grows into a beautiful woman and becomes an attraction at a carnival, where she is a tightrope walker of amazing agility. One-night things get set in motion to forever alter the life of Ohyaku, which pushes her to the edge, from whence she can never return. In the crowd that night are two men, who will forever change the course of her life. First there is Shinkuro (Kunio Murai), who is in the crowd scouting her for a job, after meeting and falling in love with her, decides momentarily not to involve her in his plans of robbing the mint. The other man in the crowd Master Sengoku (Koji Nanbara), who will bestow pain, hurt and send Ohyaku, to the point of breaking, only to have her push back with a determined, almost unworldly determination for vengeance.

Come on Mr. Softee, I don't have all day!

Master Sengoku, the most important bureaucrat at the mint, has rapist designs on Ohyaku, whom he assumes is an easy mark, because of her being part of the carnival, and due to his social standing. Problem is Ohyaku, will have none of his groping, rapist, self-entitlement, escaping from him with the help of Shinkuro. When called on the carpet by the carnival owner, who tells Ohyaku, that he could have his head chopped off because of her insubordination towards Sengoku, demands her to return to visit Sengoku again that night. Ohyaku, tells the carnival owner, that, “I’ll no longer be a man’s toy, even if it kills me.” Ohyaku, goes on to say, “I’d like to kill all men who abuse women with power and money,” to which the old man says, “The child of a whore, should behave like a whore.”

Shinkuro, tracks down the drunken and hurt Ohyaku that night and they tell their stories of pain and anguish, the scar proving that she is the child of a whore and inside that scar her mother cries, because they share the same blood. Shinkuro, has also lived in a world of pain and rejection, including his lack of opportunities because of his being unable to bribe his way into a position and his mother killing herself for his inheritance. Shinkuro tells Ohyaku, “You see no one is without a scar on their body or heart. But, if you let it fester in your mind, you’ll never move forward." The pair falls in love and Shinkuro’s plan to rob the mint, is aided by an inside man at the mint named Hyoe Sakaki, a childhood friend of Shinkuro’s.

while you're up there, would you mind hanging the laundry.

Minokichi of Otowa (Tomisaburo Wakayama), a local boss, arrives and tries to dissuade Shinkuro from robbing the well-guarded mint, telling him, how twenty years ago, when he and his men attempted to rob the mint, how he lost everything including wife, kid, all his crew and his arm, telling Shinkuro you shouldn’t cross a dangerous bridge. But undeterred Shinkuro continues on with plans for the robbery, when is pulled off, successfully. But it seems the inside man Hyoe Sakaki, was only doing it to benefit the careers of Master Sengoku and himself, to bribe themselves into more important positions, so with a force of men,  they attempt to retrieve the gold from the robbers, which had been well hidden beforehand. After killing all the other robbers, they wound Shinkuro, and spare the life of Ohyaku. Taken back to the mint, after the bound Ohyaku is raped by Sengoku, Shinturo, then placed in a guillotine with a rope tied to Ohyaku’s hair while heat is introduced on the platform where she stands, her hair being the only thing holding the blade back from cutting Shinkuro’s head off. Sengoku, tells Shinkuro, that if he wants to live, and wishes to end Ohyaku's suffering, then tell them where the gold is hidden. Slowly blood pours down Ohyaku’s face from the weight of the blade, pulling her hair out, causing Shinkuro to tell them where he'd hidden the gold.  A moment after Shinkuro tells them where the gold is… the rope is cut and the blade comes down chopping off Shinkuro’s head, and the torrents of blood from his body starts cascades down onto the floor.

Ohyaku, is given something worse than death, she’s sent to the notorious Sado island prison, to work in the gold mine. Once she's introduced into the men only prison, she is quickly accosted by a few of the men, until a man named Bunzo, steps forth to defend her, telling her, Buznzo (Koji Sekiyama), the iron-barbarian will take care of you now. Bunzo, even attempts to rape her, down the line, driven mad with her beauty, until she splits his skull with a rock, telling him that when and if she decides to give it to him, it will be her decision. The Jailer’s wife, notices the lovely Ohyaku and decides that she could sell her for a nice bit of money, but first wants to tattoo her exquisite skin. Ohyaku, decides she wants a large demon tattooed to her back, to cover her scar. The jailer’s wife, just like the men who encounter Ohyaku, wants her sexually and violates her after using a needle to paralyze her, which she plans on doing when Hyoe Sakaki comes to visit, because he has a rapist eye on Ohyaku also. But Ohyaku decides to play the jailer and his wife against each other by telling the jailer she want to run off with him and then telling the wife her husband wants to kill her and vice versa, this deception ending in bloodshed and eventually death for both. When all is said and done, Ohyaku sails off with Bunzo to pay a visit to the mint and Master Sengoku.

While women in Japanese films had been relegated to wives, mothers, daughter, prostitutes and victims for many years, this film while not the first to give a little female violent liberation, it is the one of the films along with the Red Peony series, you can point to that got the Pinky Violence genre kickstarted. Two more films would follow in this series, Quick-Draw Okatsu (1969) and Okatsu the Fugitive (1969), but were stand-alone films, that were not continuations of the previous films, with Ohyaku, even receiving a name change to Okatsu. The director of this film Yoshihiro Ishikawa, also directed the excellent Bakeneko: A Vengeful Spirit in 1968, and The Ghost of Otama Pond (1960), for Shintoho, where he was a writer, director and apprentice to the legendary Nobuo Nakagawa, on the legendary J-Horror films; Kaidan Kasane-ga-fuchi (1957), Black Cat Mansion (1958), and the definitive version of The Ghost of Yotsuya (1959). The exotic beauty Junko Miyazono, appeared in a host of films. besides the Ohyaku/Okatsu flicks, including Samurai Wolf (1966) Eleven Samurai (1967) and the first film in the Toei Delinquent Girl Boss series; Tokyo Bad Girls (1970). The legendry Tomisaburô Wakayama plays Minokichi of Otowa, but, is best known as Ogami Itto, in the Lone Wolf and Cub series of films. Wakayama was the brother of Shintaro Katsu, most famously known as the blind swordsman in the long running series of film and television shows based on the Zatoichi character.

A film of at times deep misogyny, that never attempts to hide this hate throughout the first three quarters of the movie, but, allows the Ohyaku character a chance to extract some revenge against not only the men in her life who wronged her, but also the bureaucracy that kept the social classes repressed and held those in lower classes in total disregard. Produced by Toei and released in 1968. Released by Synapse films on DVD with a beautiful black and white, English sub-titled print, audio commentary by Japanese film expert Chris D, trailers for all three films, and other goodies. 

Guinea Pig (1985)

Guinea Pig: Devil's Experiment (1985, dir. Satoru Ogura)

This "Guinea Pig" series reboot is a great idea!

Review by Goat Scrote

     Yes, this is the first one in the series that got Chas Balun in all that hot water with the FBI! 

     Although there are several repulsive scenes, “Guinea Pig” doesn’t even come close to living up to its reputation as an extreme shock classic. The entire thing is only 43 minutes long and there is no story to spend time on, yet it’s halfway through before actual blood flows. Since this movie seems to have no purpose for existing other than to showcase blood and guts, that means there is a whole lot of purposeless violent filler occupying screen time. With no context for the violence it just seems like a meaningless exercise in misogynistic torture fantasy. If that sounds like your thing, you may dig it. My personal reaction to "Guinea Pig" was boredom and distaste (not a good combination), except during the brutal finale which features artfully disturbing imagery and an outstandingly horrifying gore effect which is a must-watch for gorehounds and practical SFX nerds.

     Three men torture a woman, and she dies. There it is, the complete plot, in every detail. The abusers are anonymous and the victim never says anything. No one in the film is individualized or made into an actual character. There’s no explanation except that the project is claimed to be a series of experiments exploring the limits of suffering. Each “experiment” opens with a title card hinting at what kind of punishment they will inflict this time. This film is genuinely nothing but torture porn (and I use the term without malice), although they actually leave a lot of the worst of it out of view even during the gruesome and explicit final scene. They sacrifice quantity of gore for quality, which is usually the right trade-off.

     The movie presents itself as something which was obtained illicitly and redistributed, in a “Blair Witch” style marketing maneuver. Most of the time the perpetrators faces aren’t shown, which further lends to the feeling that we’re watching something we’re not supposed to be seeing. I suspect it was these facts combined with the plotless pseudo-porno presentation which confused certain drug-addled celebrities into mistaking “Guinea Pig” for a real snuff film.

Part 2: Flower of Flesh and blood was the tape that freaked Charlie Sheen out enough to alert the FBI. Here's what Dennis Daniel said about the embarrassing event after he lent out the tape. Well, when I finished with it, I sent it to my pal Chris Gore at FILM THREAT. He ended up lending it to a friend who watched it with Charlie Sheen, of all people!  Sheen thought the shit was REAL!!! He contacted a friend of his in the FBI and before you know it, I got a call from an FBI Agent saying that it was a federal offense to send snuff films through the mail! We’re talking 20 years in prison!!!!  I had remembered that Chas told me there was a tape called THE MAKING OF GUINEA PIG, so the FBI said I had to give him the contact info for the person who sent me the tape and they needed to send that “MAKING OF” tape as well. So, I had to call Chas and tell him all this. Needless to say, he was not pleased. I actually called him on his birthday and he was having a fucking grand old time till I called him with the info. Remember, Chas was a California hippie dude of epic proportions…the fact that I gave “the man” info about him was not too cool…but I had no choice. He was my only hope to prove it was fake. It all worked out in the end but it really sucked at the time.

     It begins with a woman handcuffed to a chair and several men dressed in black beating her. They rub salt in her eyes. They club her with a bag full of coins while one dude chills in the background casually enjoying a soda. Some time later, they throw her on the ground and kick her while verbally abusing her. Next they torture her with pliers pinching and twisting her skin. The most absurd torture arrives when they spin her around a whole lot on an office chair. After way too much time lingering on that, they force Jack Daniels down her gullet, and spin her around some more until she pukes.

     The second most absurd "experiment" is when they torture her with headphones roped to her head, playing something which sounds like a perfectly ordinary Merzbow recording. This goes on until she is a drooling wreck. Around 22 minutes into the runtime it starts to get gory as they pull out her fingernails. She is tied up and asleep when they start pouring boiling oil on her arm with a cringe-inducing sizzling sound. That’s one seriously fucked up alarm clock.

     Next up is the maggot torture. They pour maggots on the burns and sprinkle a few on her face just for the hell of it. She seems to be unconscious through it all. Maggots are pretty fucking gross, and the thought of them eating the dead flesh on her arm is unsettling. The entire maggot scene is about getting under our skin with psychological creepy crawlies.

     For their next amazing trick, the torturers throw raw meat and real animal guts on the woman. The guys, mostly off-camera, giggle and breath heavily like masturbating morons. She is unconscious, and the gut-throwing goes on and on for what feels like a really long time. Finally she wakes up and screams. Again, it’s pretty gross to have guts all over you, but mainly I am bored at this point in the movie. If you've cooked chicken or turkey in your kitchen, you've handled things just as gross as this. Like the maggots, it's something a quick shower can take care of..

     Things get drastic near the end. They move on to surgical incisions and smashing her hand with a sledgehammer. It does look pretty realistic. For the finale, they chain her head down and shove a long needled into her eye socket sideways. The eye socket floods with blood and the eye is skewered until it pops right out. Fulci and Bunuel would probably approve. It closes with what appears to be her corpse, dangling inside a net in the woods.

     After it was over I felt all the emotional involvement of having watched a practical f/x demo reel. It was very hard for me to connect with this movie, since I couldn't see any purpose beyond serial-killer stroke material or showing off their gore effects prowess. I would've liked it better as a five-minute short, and I don't think anything significant would be lost that way. I know that they were doing their very best to present something deeply disturbing, but other than a handful of short sequences, I had to fight to avoid letting my attention wander.

Recommendation: Only watch the ending, unless you are a huge fan of torture porn and fake snuff.

Wilczyca AKA She-Wolf (1983)

Wilczyca AKA She Wolf

Directed by: Marek Piestrak

Starring: Krzysztof Jasinski, Iwona Bielska, Stanislaw Brejdygant
Review by: "Machine Gun" Kristin 

Boy did I want to like this one! The opening to similar to "Don't Torture A Duckling", with horrific images of animals eating one another. In this case, a bird picks at a dead, mutilated horse, that looks much too realistic. Matter of fact, there are many scenes of animal cruelty in this that are pretty questionable. Are they real? Are they not? Horses basically scream like crazy in one scene and a dog looks like he's really hurt. The rarity of this film makes it difficult to trace the origins of its creation, so we don't know for sure if there were any animals actually hurt in the making of this movie.

I chose to watch "Wilczyca" solely based on the poster artwork. I know, I know, that could totally go either way. I know I was definitely duped by the Giallo film, "Eyeball". The poster is crazy! So of course, how bad could it be? Well, it stunk! haha. I've even done a past review here on TOG for it. Here in "Wilczyca", we're in Poland, which is unusual within itself. I don't know of too many Polish horror films in particular. They certainly run the gamut on insane poster artwork though. I guess I should've let that be a hint as to the incoherent storytelling I was about to suffer through. I actually did some reading of other reviews after I watched it, which I never do because I don't want to influence my opinion of a film before I start writing. In "She-Wolf's" case, I had to because I had no idea what was going on. There is so much regional, political back story that I didn't understand the events taking place much. There's a pretty concise review on Braineater that explains the plot completely. Even so, it still doesn't save this movie.

From what I could dig up research wise, those who are familiar with the Polish language have pandered the subtitled adaption to be pretty inaccurate in some spots. I'm just thankful that there's any attempt at a translation. I've watched a few movies in the past, (such as a VHS copy of "Cristo Te Ama" which is a 1970s drug infused Mexican exploitation film), that had no subtitles at all, so I had to sort of connect the dots based on visuals only. Apparently in "She Wolf", there's a scene where he refers to somebody as a "bumpkin", which is a goofy word to use within itself, but he actually meant something more complementary than that. Pretty funny. The main character, Casper is completely unlikable, scratch that, no one is likeable! hahaha. He beats his wife Myrna, who lays dying after after a botched abortion (scandalous!) in the opening scene. Casper's been away for months and has just come back. She says that she'll die like a bitch! Whoa! What a thing to say! Turns out, she's a bitch indeed-a dog, er, werewolf! She's even clutching a wrapped up paw from a wolf! Ewww! I guess the best thing to do when your husband is an asshole that beats you and then leaves you for months at a time, is to just pick up witchcraft to pass the time. I mean, hell, it's the 19th century, what else are you going to do? In a later scene, Casper's brother describes Myrna's bizarre behavior, while they're pulling her rough looking casket in the terrifyingly snowy backdrop. Other reviews of "Wilczyca" have described the drenched in snow scenery as "beautiful", but personally it creeped me out. It seemed like the most depressing place to possibly be. While they're burying her, the older brother (I forget his name), starts whittling a wooden steak and says nonchalantly that Casper has to hammer it into his dead wife's heart. Ughhhhh.

From here, the movie draaags. They introduce some more unlikable characters such as Juliet, who is played by the same actress as Myrna. I actually did not notice that until towards the end when Casper realizes it himself. The print of this I watched was pretty grainy, so that may have been why I didn't notice. Or maybe, I just didn't really care, haha. I'm sure there's more I could say about the actors, but I guess if you can't say anything nice, you probably shouldn't say anything.

Besides the beginning scene, the steak hammering and the real or not animal cruelty, the gore in this is pretty minimal. They basically save it all for the end of the film, which is a pity, because it's hard to say if anyone's even made it that far. Thankfully the film clocks in at about an hour and 38 minutes, so it's not excruciatingly long. "Wilczyca" has received some mixed reviews from what I could dig up. People seem to either love it or hate it. I can't say that I hated it, but I don't think I'm going to be watching it again anytime soon. It definitely did its job in creeping me out, but probably not in the way that the filmmakers intended.

RATING: 👨🏻👨🏻 2 mustaches!

Watch if you dare!

Buy if you'd like (scroll down!)

Take a gander at my buttons/pins I make!

Spine (1986)

SPINE (1986)

Directed by John Howard and Justin Simmonds

Review by Michael Hauss

     Since I’m on a roll of watching shit-on-video releases, I figured one more go at it wouldn’t retard my fucked up brain any more than seeing Thor all naked in "ROCK AND ROLL NIGHTMARE"  (1987) already did. All this to appease the savage editor Erok Hellhammer here at Theater of Guts, who keeps recommending these shit-fests for me to review, saying “it takes a special and I emphasize Special kind of person to understand these types of films.” Erok would go on to save his ass by saving that I was the “Jerry Warren” of the film reviewing world, pretty solid compliment right there I’d say.

     This 1986 shot-on-video (aka 'shit-on-video' or SOV) boasts a nutbag who goes around killing and exposing the spines of nurses, hence the title. The lead in this film, R. Eric (don’t call me Aldous) Huxley, plays slasher Lawrence Ashton and I'd swear it's actually old’ Bocephus himself, Hank Williams Jr. This dude could be his twin.

Hank Jr.'s evil twin demonstrates the "do's"
and "dont's" of the swinger lifestyle.

     The film is, on the technical side, a piece of shit which has the camera shoved right up the actors' asses or in their faces. The sound is like listening through a set of cans with a string through them, the way Alfalfa, Spanky, Buck Wheat and I used to call each other back in our gang days.

     Back to Hank Williams... I mean, R. Eric. He has this psycho thing down pat. He does a lot of emoting and acting angry, but also tries to be the cool composed spree killer we’ve grown to know and love, like Jason but without the hockey mask. Or that fucknut from SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE (1988).

These bitchin' shades are my hockey mask,
and this luxurious mane is my tragic deformity.

    The thing about this film is that it actually has a very good exploitation actress in it. She deserved much better than this fate. The actress Janus Blythe appeared in a number of low budget exploitation and horror films including Ruby in the Wes Craven classic "THE HILLS HAVE EYES" (1977). She would follow up that film with a small part in the gooey but fun exploitation flick "THE INCREDIBLE MELTING MAN" (1977) and would appear again as Ruby in the sequel "THE HILLS HAVE EYES PART 2" (1984). Unfortunately, Janus would see her on-screen career end in 1991, but not before she accepted a part in this stinker. I could see the producer of this film saying to Janus, “We’ll give you one hundred dollars for the three-day shoot, free Shoney’s down on route 6 for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and book you into the Motel 6, and, We’ll leave the light on for you!”

Motel 6? I've hit the big time at last!

    I'm not sure how they got an actress with any credits at all to appear in this mess, but some notable hacks have slunk to SOV appearances. Erok Hellhammer’s favorite actor Michael J Pollard appeared in "SLEEPAWAY CAMP 3"(1989), and there's porn star Amber Lynn’s star turn in "THINGS" (1993).  The rest of the cast seems to have no other credits to speak of as far as I can ascertain except R. Eric Huxley, who has a few credits listed besides this. Surprisingly, not in any biopics of Hank Williams Jr.

     John Howard, one of the two directors listed on this film along with Justin Simmonds, does have a few other directorial credits on his resume. He has some porn credits and did a handful of films starring Linnea Quigley, including "SCORPION" (1986), "STALKED" (1986), "AVENGED" (1986) and FLASH (1987), which need further investigation.

"Is it that much fun to hurt someone / Oh please tell me why, dear!"

     The killer, all decked out in his reflective aviator glasses and brandishing a switchblade knife he strokes at times, is killing only nurses. He hog ties them and as they struggle, the rope from their feet to their neck tightens and it strangles them. Then he knifes them a bunch of times and cuts the back open to expose the spine. The killings are all related and identical except when the killer raped one of the women. Each murder scene has the name “Linda” written in blood on a wall. 

Alice in Bondageland.

     The police and forensic units in this film are laughably generic, and it’s like the actors who played the cops had no clue on how to author the parts. It's as if they were children playing a game of Cops and Robbers. The police presence is nil and the crime investigation units consist of one or two guys. The police struggle with finding the name of the suspect until their computer spits out the name of Lawrence Ashton. I mean damn, couldn’t the makers of this film watch an episode of Streets of San Francisco, Quincey, or Police Story, to figure out how police procedure and crime scene investigations go? 

The crime computer says she was killed by
someone named Bocephus, and it's never wrong.

     Carrie Longan (Janus Blythe) and Leah Petralla (Lise Romanoff), whose home the killer has invaded, are in danger from this bloodthirsty maniac. Will the fuck-nuttedly stupid police get there in time before he kills two more nurses? Better yet, who cares?

     This movie makes the SOV "555" (1988) look like it belongs in the horror hall of fame. It is just plain awful, no two ways around it. R. Eric Huxley turns in a decent enough performance but the rest of the cast just stinks the place up, including Janus Blythe. Even at seventy-three minutes this film was overlong and taxing on my brain. I think in closing that if I didn't hate Hank Williams Jr. so much then I may have enjoyed this a bit more. Shit, who am I kidding, I hated it as much as old Hank... not more, but damn close. 

This is spinal tap.

Lone Wolf and Cub Series Roundup

LONE WOLF AND CUB

By Crankenstein and Goat Scrote.

     Lone Wolf and Cub, "the greatest team in the history of mass slaughter", slice and dice through bamboo and bone with a razor-sharp Dotanuki sword. They have chosen to wander the earth as demons, sworn to kill for a price. Ogami Itto carries his 3-year-old son Daigoro in a weaponized baby carriage forging a legendary trail of butchery and existentialism.

     There are six incredibly bloody movies in the “Lone Wolf and Cub” series, aka the “Baby Cart” series, aka Kozure Ōkami (“Wolf With Child in Tow”). In the Deep Red catalog they were available separately under various confusing titles like “Lightning Swords of Death” (which is a dubbed edited version of Part 3).
    The films are based on the manga of the same name(s) written by Kazuo Koike with outstanding art by Goseki Kojima. The manga author wrote most of the movies as well and gets story credit on all of them, with Tsutomu Nakamura co-writing on the final two films. There are other movies based on the manga and even a couple of TV shows.

     Director Kenji Misumi helmed four of the films and also directed both the “Zatoichi” and more demented “Hanzo the Razor” series. Buichi Saito steps in to direct the fourth film, and Yoshiyuki Kuroda the sixth. Eiichi Kusumoto is responsible for the fight choreography for the series. The stoic Ogami Itto is played by Tomisaburo Wakayama and his son Daigoro by Akihiro Tomikawa. Daigoro's gestures and confused look never come off like an annoying "child actor", he's very natural and does an incredible job. Yagyū Retsudo, the Lone Wolf’s mortal enemy, is portrayed by various actors throughout the series.

Wait, I thought you said no real weapons
around kids, where's my agent!

     The six “Lone Wolf and Cub” (LWC) films were compressed into the five-movie “Shogun Assassin” series, all awfully dubbed with ridiculous swishing blade noises added in! In the 80s and 90s in the US you could only find the dubbed truncated abomination “Shogun Assassin”, which is 12 minutes of the first movie and about half of the second movie squished together into a new story. The movie still managed to attain cult status and go on to be showcased in “Kill Bill 2” (2004). These movies are that good. You can butcher them like one of the Lone Wolf’s victims, and they will still keep kicking your mind right in the face like armless ninjas.

It's only some minor edits, we'll be up kicking ass again in no time.

    In the overviews of each of the movies, we've tried to leave major plot points unspoiled as much as possible. Body count numbers are courtesy of allouttabubblegum. Every one of these movies is exceptionally bloody and there are severed limbs by the bushelful. All six movies are highly recommended, and the 2nd and 4th movies are our favorites of the series.

     Crank Comments: I reviewed parts 1, 2, and 3. I avoided “Shogun Assassin” like the plague. LWC 1 and 2 were not only beheaded for grindhouse audiences to easily digest but neutered and appallingly dubbed by some cringeworthy talent (like Sandra Bernhard and Lamont Johnson). I do have fond memories of seeing the poster in various early 80's video stores, moving toward the horror section to rent "Zombie" for the 20th time. I’m not opposed to bad dubbing, but it feels wrong to me that this particular piece of chopsocky re-edited bullshit is so widely acclaimed even though it’s actually robbing us of so much of the original movies! I admit I have the rottencotton “Shogun Assassin” t-shirt, because it’s the only availably merch connected to one of my favorite Japanese series. I can watch the Baby Cart movies repeatedly, they never get old to me!

     Goat Notes: A series of six samurai movies churned out in the space of 2 years, featuring a pre-kindergarten child actor? I used to walk past the LWC series back in the VHS age, browsing for martial arts movies, and turn up my nose. I envisioned a cheap, sanitized Kurosawa knockoff aimed at little kids. I never suspected what I was overlooking. I watched all six and reviewed #4 - #6. These movies are not at all what I expected, they are some of the most blood-soaked films I've ever seen. Every one of them is beautiful, ultra-violent, and viciously entertaining!

PART 1

Lone Wolf and Cub: Sword of Vengeance (1972)

     Kozure Ōkami: Kowokashi udekashi tsukamatsuru

     “Wolf with Child in Tow: Child and Expertise for Rent”

Gore Score: 10/10

Body Count: 62

Retsudo Yagyu, professional meanie.

It sure doesn't look like gold.

     “LWC: Sword of Vengeance” is the first in the series. I decided to review each sequel individually since I'm obviously not a fan of the mixtape version of the “Baby Cart” films. In the Deep Red catalog, the first film easily gets a 10 out of 10 on the gore score and according to Chas "will make you howl with unabashed glee". This film doles out geysers of crimson splatter. Arteries spray like garden hoses. That samurai sword is sharp, and limbs get separated and bounced off the walls. The erratic but tranquil score by Hideaki Sakurai really sets the tone effectively. “Sword of Vengeance” is just a superior film on all levels.

Somebody get me a band-aid,
I got a thousand ouchies!

     Ogami Itto is the Shogun’s Decapitator. His job is to assist a person who's committing seppuku (ritual suicide by self-disembowelment), one of the most honorable deaths in Japanese culture. He is framed by Yagyu Retsudo of the Shadow clan as part of a bid to seize more power. Itto’s wife and the rest of the Ogami household are slain, except for his son, and Itto is accused of plotting to kill the Shogun. They show how corrupt the authority he works for is, so that we can admire his conviction to quit and walk the barren lands in the form of a demon ronin, slaying any target for the price of 500 gold pieces. 

Tough love.

Choose death!

     Enemy clans make things difficult for father and son, who travel wheeling a stroller armed with an array of secret deadly weapons. The narrative swings back and forth like a pendulum as we find that the killer who decapitates a child in the opening scene has a conscience after all. There is a lot of honor and symbolism in the cultural mythology of this film and kind gestures are not overlooked. There's a brilliant scene at a sauna riddled with the most hideous scumbag rapists and criminals where Ogami Itto takes a situation of shame and turns it into glorious beauty.

     There's another brilliant scene with a bouncy ball and a sword stuck in the floor, where Daigoro is required to choose his destiny: An immediate merciful death at the hands of his father; Or to “live at the crossroads of Hell” and leave piles of mutilated corpses in his wake. We know Daigoro chooses the sword, otherwise he would be in the afterlife with his slain mother.

PART 2

Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart at the River Styx (1972)

     Kozure Ōkami: Sanzu no kawa no ubaguruma

     “Wolf with Child in Tow: Baby Cart of the River of Sanzu”

Body Count: 37
Gore Score 10/10

     During the second film we're waist-deep in the blood trail left by Ogami and son. A new foe, Sayaka, and her band of face-shredding Shadow clanswomen find out Itto beheaded one of their allies (in the first film) and they want vengeance. They show their prowess to a foolish ninja by whittling him down into doggy bag sized chunks.

Oh crap, I'm pissing blood!

     This sequel gets intense fast as father and son battle female assassins at every turn. Little Daigoro almost gets his tiny head ripped off by a frisbee straw hat containing razorblades. Sayaka does an amazing trick and nearly stabs Itto in the throat. He almost has her until she pops out of outfit like a Holly Hobby doll and disappears backwards into the brush.

The Citizen Kane of wall paper decoratives

     To impress a group of samurai, Itto sails that famed sword of his across the room to instantly kill a silent hidden intruder. This is one of my favorite moments in cinema history!

     Smiling women pull knives out of big Daikon radishes to stab at the baby cart, narrowly missing the kid's neck! Even though the bodycount is the lowest in the series, there is tons of grisly violence. There's an incredible showdown at the finale. The stern killer poses in the sand dunes and awaits the arrival of his enemies, three brothers known as The Gods of Death armed with iron claws, flying clubs, and chainmail fists.

     Does Ogami even slightly flinch or sweat a drop? FUCK NO!

     The last "death god" gets very poetic about his neck wound before his jugular bursts and red poster paint soaks the dirt. This film sets the pattern for father and son to travel down the road at the end, to journey to the next adventure.

PART 3

Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart to Hades (1972)

     Kozure Ōkami: Shinikazeni mukau ubaguruma

     “Wolf with Child in Tow: Baby Cart Against the Winds of Death”

     aka “Shogun Assassin 2: Lightning Swords of Death”

Body Count: 72

Gore Score 10/10

     Unlike most sequels, these were shot during a short time period, so the characters haven't aged much even though we're three movies in. This film has a great crooning theme song at the end with lyrics, one of my favorites of the series.

Trepanation gone disastrously wrong.

Itto loves disco.

     “Hades” starts off on the river with the Yagyu clan lurking, waiting to strike again. A new group of lazy perverted samurai (known as Watari Kashi) show up and attack a woman with blacked-out teeth, but are soon set straight by Kanbei, a samurai who earns Ogami's respect. He faces Ogami in the forest and demands a fight. Before they go to war, Ogami mentions that he and his son live as demons prepared to venture to the netherworld and this inspires Kanbei, the insecure warlord.
     In one scene a prostitute bites off the tongue of her pimp, and he dies from the wound almost instantly! 

Some goons known as the Boohatchimono show up to collect the murderous prostitute, but Ogami and son find a kinship with her. The Boohatchimono are outcasts with no shame or justice, so they may be worse then the Yagyus. Speaking of the Yagyus, they show up later in droves during an epic horse battle between one man and child armed with a machine-gun baby stroller!

     Ogami faces an endurance test, spun around upside down in a basket while being drowned and beaten by the group of outcasts. He does this to make that prostitute he protected, feel something of value, this is clearly his style, to let himself be tortured to save a woman's integrity.

     This time, unlike in Sword of Vengeance, it doesn't work to his benefit, in fact the water torture scene was more of a temporary setback, than what comes later. This bit of unnecessary humiliation leads to a job and a new target for him to slay. The moments with Diagoro communicating with nature are some of the best scenes. 

     The actor that plays the long haired gunman with rat-like features plays an entirely different character in the first film. The pacing is a little slow toward the middle, but stick it out because the ending goes completely insane and that's when the body count really starts to rack up! The gun battle at the end has severed heads and a rain of shredded toes and feet, so make sure you stay awake for the final scenes!

PART 4

Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in Peril (1972)

     Kozure Ōkami: Oya no kokoro ko no kokoro

     “Wolf with Child in Tow: The Heart of a Parent, the Heart of a Child”

     aka “Shogun Assassin 3: Slashing Blades of Carnage”

Body Count: 84

Gore Score 8/10

     This is a fantastic movie. It’s fast paced, gory, and fun as heck. This was my first exposure to the LWC series and it whetted my appetite for more. Like a lot of the LWC movies I suspect there are lots of cultural references I don’t get, yet the story is still accessible and the emotional underpinnings are universal. The fight scenes are creative and frenetic and every aspect of the movie comes together in near-perfection.

A winning strategy.

I am soooooooo scared.

    This fourth entry opens with battle, blood, and boobs, and pretty much continues that way. The half-naked killer wears tattoos on her breasts and back designed to startle her foes. She makes mincemeat of a group of attackers to show us right away what a badass she is.

It's all fun and games...

     The Lone Wolf, Itto, accepts the commission to kill Oyuki, the breasty lady with the tattoos and swords. Oyuki is a swordswoman who served Lord Owari and then deserted for reasons unknown. Itto slices apart crowds of enemies on the hunt for her, uncovers an old foe who is supposed to be dead, and strikes a blow against the clan which betrayed him, all while keeping the Cub alive.

Come at me, bro.

     Things only get more complicated when he finds his quarry and discovers Oyuki to be far more honorable than the people who hired him to hunt her. At the climax Itto purees his way through an entire army using his famed Sui-O sword technique until he's facing Retsudo Yagyu himself. Many, many limbs are lost along the way. Moral of the story: Don’t piss off the deadliest man in the world.

Titty clutching tat

I said NO WIRE HANGERS

Gonorrhea flare-up

...she's really obsessed with my cawk.

PART 5

Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in the Land of Demons (1973)

     Kozure Ōkami: Meifumado

     “Wolf with Child in Tow: Land of Demons”

     aka “Shogun Assassin 4: Five Fistfuls of Gold”

Body Count: 80

Gore Score 7/10

     This is not as furiously-paced as part 4 but the movie is still brutal and bloody. Five deadly messengers test Itto’s strength. Each one carries 100 gold pieces, 1/5 of the payment for a very special job. One of the men calmly delivers a message while he slowly burns alive!

     The abbot of Sofuku (ha!) temple has double-cross the Kuroda clan. This revered man is actually the head of a secret order of ninja spies, allies of Itto’s mortal enemies the Yagyu. Itto is contracted to kill the abbot and return the documents to Lord Kuroda. It turns out the abbot has wizardy holy-man powers and Itto can’t or won’t draw his sword to cut him down.

I accidentally swam into your sword, bro.

      A servant of the Kuroda clan arrives with a new job, piggybacking on the first job. The completion of the first assassination will put Itto in place to execute his second set of targets: An entire family, including a 5 year old child. It’s merciless but the reasons make sense in the context of the difficult situation.

     Retsudo Yagyu is still around making trouble as an ally of the abbot. He wear an eye patch after his last fight with Itto. Itto manages to pull some serious special-ops shit to complete his mission, and then fights an army wearing nothing but his underwear. The crimson really starts to spray when fights a second army at the end, and he really lives up to that whole Decapitator thing.

This helmet is way too tight.

All demons are issued Sam Elliot mustaches in Hell, you didn't know?

PART 6

Lone Wolf and Cub: White Heaven in Hell

     Kozure Ōkami: Jigoku e ikuzo! Daigoro

     “Wolf with Child in Tow: Now We Go to Hell, Daigoro!”

     aka “Shogun Assassin 5: Cold Road to Hell”

Body Count: 155+ kills!!!

Gore Score- Infinity

     The series racks up its highest body count yet with a satisfyingly slaughter-happy final entry. Young Daigoro manages an impressive number of kills with babycart gadgets, but it’s only a fraction of the host of enemies swept aside by Itto’s ruthless blade.

The size of Itto's scrotum demoralizes his foes.

Santa is furious with you.

My special weapon is Brillo Pad hair.

     Itto is declared a wanted criminal by the Shogunate. A manhunt begins and old enemies converge on LWC looking for revenge. There are assassins everywhere, using every trick and technique in their personal arsenals. An evil wizard of the Spider Demon clan stalks and taunts the duo, brutally slaying every person who shows LWC kindness on the road. Later the wizard rapes his own sister in front of their father, series arch-nemesis Retsudo Yagyu! Dysfunctional doesn't even begin to cover it.

I call this move Snoopy Snowcone style

     Three half-living killers, strengthened by martial-arts sorcery, are sent by the one-armed ronin Gunbei (a survivor from the fourth film). They fight in perfect unison, and do not fall even after being riddle with gunfire.

Itto explores bondage

     An army of Yagyu clan warriors surrounds LWC, led by Retsudo, who has a lot of anger issues at the moment. Itto battles an army of skiing ninjas, cuts one of them in half and uses the baby cart as a sled to kick butt. Retsudo has made his own combat sled armed with heavy artillery, and they battle their way down the mountainside.

Gandalf was a pussy.

I'll never be a sex symbol

     This wild movie ends this cycle of the epic revenge tale but doesn’t wrap up the overall story. The original manga series comes to a startling yet almost inevitable conclusion. My ultimate fantasy version of this movie series would have ended the same way, but in any case these are really entertaining movies and I wish they had made more.