Episode 275: SAMURAI REINCARNATION (1981) with Kris Montello and Blake Hester

Trylove

Featuring filmmaker/programmer Kris Montello and Something Rotten host Blake Hester!

SAMURAI REINCARNATION is a 1981 samurai fantasy action film written and directed by Kinji Fukasaku. Shiro Amakusa (Kenji Sawada) is the sole survivor of a massacre of Japanese Christians during the Shimabara Rebellion. Witnessing the devastation, Shiro renounces the Christian God and vows vengeance on the Tokugawa regime that perpetrated the massacre. Now in league with Satan, Shiro gains the power to resurrect the dead and assembles a team of the aggrieved undead to execute his plans, including disgraced samurai wife Gracia Hokusawa (Akiko Kano), the lustful monk Inshun Hozoin (Hideo Murota), legendary swordsman Miyamoto Musashi (Ken Ogata), and young ninja Kirimaru Iga (Hiroyuki Sanada). The movie follows Shiro’s group as he amasses a demonic force, pursued by Musashi’s rival, Jubei Yagyu (played by Sonny Chiba).

With noted Fukasaku Freak Blake Hester (of Something Rotten) and Kris Montello (filmmaker, Programming Manager for the Asian-American International Film Festival, and programmer for the Slamdance Film Festival), we’re picking apart this tokusatsu samurai freakout with a fine-toothed comb. How well does it work as an action movie? How do its historical origins make its transgressive violence hit even harder? How does it use Judeo-Christian imagery to tap into a specific Japanese social context? What does Fukasaku’s no-holds-barred iconoclasm bring to a demonic fantasy setting? That’s all in here!

Find Kris…

• At the the Asian-American International Film Festival in August 2024 at https://www.aaiff.org/
• On Twitter at https://twitter.com/kris_montello

Find Blake…

• At https://blakehester.rocks/
• On Twitter at @metallicaisrad
• On Something Rotten, the podcast he co-hosts about nihilism in video games https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/something-rotten/id1523064458
• On Trylove episodes about POSSESSION (1981), PULSE (2001), and BURST CITY (1982)
• On Letterboxd at https://letterboxd.com/blakedtfp/

Also do these things:

• Donate to help our friend and previous guest Nick Ransbottom get life-saving cystic fibrosis care: https://www.gofundme.com/f/get-nick-lifesaving-cystic-fibrosis-care
• “Street Fighting Man: Samurai Reincarnation Star Sonny Chiba Was a Kinji Fukasaku Favorite” by Hannah Baxter for Perisphere, the Trylon blog: https://www.perisphere.org/2024/04/05/street-fighting-man-samurai-reincarnation-star-sonny-chiba-was-a-kinji-fukasaku-favorite/
• Contribute to Perisphere, the Trylon blog: https://www.perisphere.org/perisphere-blog-post-guidelines/

#OfSwordsAndSorcery #DCP

Follow us on Twitter at @trylovepodcast and email us at [e-mail] to get in touch! Buy tickets and support the Trylon at trylon.org.

Theme: "Raindrops" by Huma-Huma/"No Smoking" PSA by John Waters. Closing audio: “Illusion” by Hozan Yamamoto from the SAMURAI REINCARNATION soundtrack.

Timestamps

0:00 - Episode 275: SAMURAI REINCARNATION (1981)

7:06 - What is it about Fukasaku?

12:19 - Militarized power and the historical context of SAMURAI REINCARNATION

20:34 - No good guys or bad guys — just a struggle for power

28:21 - How Fukusaku robs powerful institutions of their ‘honor’

42:23 - Where the movie slows down and how well it actually works as an action movie

57:22 - Japanese cultural context of Judeo-Christian imagery

1:02:59 - To All the Loves We’ve Tried Before: 1981

1:06:34 - The Junk Drawer