Intense, gripping, stylish and poignant

Expected more

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

THE TALE OF ZATOICHI CONTINUES / THE RETURN OF MASSEUR ICHI (ZOKU ZATÔICHI MONOGATARI). Viewed on Streaming. Restoration/preservation = eight (8) stars; cinematography = seven (7) stars; score = two (2) stars; choreography = two (2) stars. Director Kazuo Mori picks up the reins of an emerging franchise in a rushed follow-on film that is a pale imitation of the first outing (the original seems to have been released only a few months previously). The blind self-taught sword swinger who is a traveling masseur by trade (and provides rub downs only on fully-dressed customers!) continues to hang out in the same small village and effortlessly cuts down inept Yakusa gang members (while not slicing himself!), but conspicuously avoids Samurai soldiers who, of course, really know how to use their swords. For muddled/contrived reasons, the protagonist is chased all over the place by two warring gangs of Yakusa, a band of samurai, the police, and a besotted prostitute. (It's a bit of a challenge for the three interested viewers out there to distinguish between the tribes except that the Samurai are a bit better dressed and have cooler hair styles!) There are a fair number of disconnected scenes which look suspiciously like out-takes from the first film. Continuity is often lacking with a character's full costume changing from cut to cut. Cinematography (2.35 : 1, black and white) is good. The wide-screen format is fully utilized, there are a few interesting exterior tracking shots, a novel scene photographed so as to appear right at ground level, and nausea-inducing panning is minimal. Restoration/preservation is great. Subtitles are close enough. Signs are translated. Characters who survived in the original movie all seem to make a reappearance. Acting is fine (except for one silly addition), and actresses are given much more to do this time besides being part of the scenery. Choreography is again pretty inept with sword slashing mostly a joke made more humorous when stunt actors pause (for "dramatic" effect?) before falling over. This comes across as if performers are trying to make up their mind whether or not to collapse! There is an occasional glint of metal; so in this iteration some of the swords may be real? Score mostly employs a synthesizer and is undistinguished. A Daiei programmer not worth bothering with. WILLIAM FLANIGAN, PhD.

With continuity directly linking it with its immediate predecessor ( released only five months and three weeks prior ) , and also holding a perfect 100 percent score on rotten tomatoes, this beautifully photographed ( in high contrast black and white, like its predecessor ) Zatoichi film is as good as that film was, even if the end scene is too abrupt, although it also shows just how quickly and efficiently Zatoichi fights. A double-edged sword, pun completely intended.Hypnotically beautiful looking, I could easily tune out the plot, and just enjoy the visuals, and impressive swordplay. Sadly though, this second film is also the final film in this series to be shot in black and white, as the numerous continuation films were in colour.

I have seen the first Zatoichi film and I quite liked it. I thought that it would play out like the Yojimbo movies, he walks into a town and uses his methods to wipe out criminal gangs but it turns out that instead not only do you need to watch the first movie in order to know what is going on but I don't think even that way it holds up.So Zatoichi is going about his day job of traveling to towns to perform Masseur work and cutting anyone dumb enough to disturb the peace or stop him, despite his idea to use violence as little as possible. When he gets there and performs his work he finds out a secret I'm not sure what it is and for that he must die by the hands of this guy. While that is going on he builds a relationship with a woman (...Considering what happened in the last movie with you just walking off I know where it's going) and takes her away from a samurai who believes that she looks like a woman both the samurai and Zatoichi have fallen in love with.Okay, onto the things I don't like. Well the ending. It ends with Zatoichi fighting a crime boss from the first movie, not afterwards but just when it started. I would much rather seeing Zatoichi kick his ass and then leave. I mean during, really? They couldn't cut off the movie in any other way? How about when the people can't find Zatoichi they leave and we see him sitting where he was. I just think that this is one of the worst ways to end a movie.That and some plot elements just aren't explained. The samurai I was talking about earlier is Ichi's brother. My problem with it is that you don't know he's Ichi's brother until his last 2 scenes before the movie is over. Their mutual love of the same person is not foreshadowing, if that was the movie foreshadowing then it is the clumsiest foreshadowing I have ever seen. There is nothing and I think that it would have been a much better movie if they established this before making it the focal point of the last 20 minutes! Please, tell me this is nowhere near the best in the series.I should tell you what I liked. Well, I did like the story and I do think that this series despite the above paragraphs is a series worth following. That and the guy playing Zatoichi, while it is weird to watch a movie where the hero almost always has his eyes shut does seem like a good actor. The same thing can be said for all the main players.I all honesty, this isn't really that good of a film. Personally, I found the original and Zatoichi Meets Yojimbo to be better movies. Everything here just feels rushed, under-explained and abrupt. I just think at the end of the day, this is not worth it anywhere near as others even in the series, let alone the genre.

There were seriously 25 Zatoichi films made in the time span of 1962 to 1973. Another, almost equally as amazing fact is that the second movie, The Tale of Zatoichi Continues, came out the exact same year as the first movie did. Naturally it's shorter, clocking in at one hour and ten minutes. It's directed by Kazuo Mori, best known for directing other Zatoichi films, and is the last Zatoichi film in B&W.The plot of the second movie is way less engaging than the plot of its predecessor. This time we follow Ichi as he's tailed by a group of killers after learning a powerful political figure's secret as he was giving him a massage. It turns out the lord has some mental problems, and his retainers try to conceal this secret from people. There's also a subplot about Ichi's one-armed brother Yoshiro (played by Shintaro Katsu's own brother Tomisaburo Wakayama, credited as Jo Kenzaburo) who is actually a wanted criminal, and the film culminates with the face-off between the two brothers. There's also another subplot which has Ichi travel to a temple of the first movie's town to pay respect at the grave of the samurai from the first film. There he meets Tane (the girl from the previous movie) who's about to marry a carpenter.The Tale of Zatoichi Continues follows some continuity by taking place a year after the events of the first movie, which is constantly referenced. One thing we learn about Zatoichi is that he had a soft spot for a girl named Chiyo, who left him for his brother (who then killed her). There's also a prostitute who has an one-night stand with Ichi at one point in the film.The Tale of Zatoichi continues is nowhere near as interesting as its prequel, but there are occasional good sword fights to be found in here. This film is more action-oriented and you'll find yourself enjoying Zatoichi's ass-kicking escapades if you can suspend the disbelief that he's completely blind and yet unmatched in sword fights.Even though this movie is forgettable and doesn't have much going for it, I must say the visuals are superior to the first film's visual outlook. The sequel sports some nice shots of characters by the water and the fights are better. However, the music is kinda strange; at some points it loudly builds up, only to get interrupted by a sudden cut.Hightlight of the film: the sudden end where Zatoichi delivers a killing cut to a yakuza gang leader.