Shura-yuki-hime: Urami Renga (1974)

Director:

Toshiya Fujita

Writers:

Kazuo Kamimura (story)
Kazuo Koike (story)

Genre:

Drama | Thriller

Plot:

Lady Snowblood is caught in the politics of 19th century Japan.

Plot Keywords:

Black Death | Female Warrior | Good Versus Evil | Dark Heroine | Severed Hand

Cast

Meiko Kaji	...	Shurayuki-hime (Yuki Kashima)
Juzo Itami	...	Ransui Tokunaga
Kazuko Yoshiyuki	...	Aya Tokunaga
Yoshio Harada	...	Shusuke Tokunaga
Shin Kishida	...	Seishiro Kikui
Tôru Abe	...	Terauchi Kendo
Rinichi Yamamoto	...	Inspector Maruyama
Kôji Nanbara	...	Toad
Shosuke Hirose	...	Shiba Yutaro
Shunsuke Mizoguchi	...	Sekiguchi Eizo
Akira Hamada	...	Okada Takichi
Hiroshi Ishiya	...	Yoshizawa
Mizuho Suzuki	...	Narrator
Shoichi Hirose

Also Known As:

Lady Snowblood 2: Love Song of Vengeance

Runtime:

89 min

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Germany:16 | Canada:18A (Ontario) | Canada:16+ (Quebec) | Australia:MA

Company:

Toho Film (Eiga) Co. Ltd.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003)

Lackadaisical return for the female assassin

The original Lady Snowblood has its place secured in history as one of the very best Pinky Violence/Female Samurai movies out there. This sequel, however, is not likely to be so fondly remembered; and the reason for that is mainly that it just isn't good enough. It just seems like the scriptwriters couldn't really think of an interesting idea to follow the original up with and so decided to just dump the title character into a largely unrelated plot and just hope for the best. The film has basically made the same mistake that befell the excellent Female Convict Series a year earlier in 1973; that being putting the character into a plot involving rebelling against the Government. The film picks up sometime after the events of the first film and Lady Snowblood is a wanted criminal. After giving the police the slip a couple of times; she is eventually captured. However, she is later rescued by the secret police; who offer the assassin a chance for redemption by helping them get rid of some rebels.

The film gets off to a good start. We are treated to a couple of well done action sequences that see Lady Snowblood chop up some enemies; but once the plot kicks into action properly, things slow down a lot and it gets very boring at times; a very unwelcome change from the original which remained engrossing for the duration. Toshiya Fujita, the director of the original film, takes the reins again and does another very good job in terms of the visuals. The film looks delicious and the fight scenes are all very well choreographed. Unfortunately there are not as many nice visuals as in the first film. The bulk of the film really lacks action and the fight scenes only really take place at the beginning and end of the film, which is a shame. Still, the scenes we do get are very good and there's some memorable gore; which includes limbs being lopped and a very well done eye gouging sequence. Still, this is not nearly as great as the original film and while it is least worth a look; I think many fans of the original will be disappointed.