Meitô bijomaru

Orphaned Shôtarô Hanayagi has been raised by the noble Ichijirô Oya, who has had him trained as a swordsmith. In gratitude, Hanayagi gives his benefactor the sword he has forged. However, it breaks in battle. Oya is disgraced and under house arrest. An imperial favorite offers to plead on behalf, if Oya will give him his daughter, Isuzu Yamada, in marriage. Oya refuses to sell his daughter and the bad guy kills him and flees. Miss Yamada asks Hanayagi to forge her a sword to kill her father's murderer. He studies under a great swordsmith, who is killed by ronin, leaving Hanayagi and his fellow apprentice, Eijirô Yanagi, to accomplish this task. However their master died, telling them that no sword should be forged that will not serve the Emperor. Can they succeed?

Kenji Mizoguchi's movie is mostly a straight potboiler with a truncated script and a cheaply shot battle scene (the erratic way that squibs go off betokens this, as does the sword fighting), and poorly coordinated special effects. Clearly there was no money for extra takes. Where it is fascinating is in the scenes of forging and tempering steel, with flashes of light and the bell-like sounds of hot, ringing steel. It's not enough to make this a great movie, or even a particularly good one. However, given this was shot in late 1944 and released in February of 1945, I'm sure Mizoguchi was glad to have the work.