The first film, Sword of Vengeance, kicks off with Hanzo irritating his superiors by refusing to swear their tow-the-line oath of purity when everyone's dealing in dirty money. Using his own brutal tactics, Hanzo ignores the status quo and sets his sights on Kanbei, a thuggish killer escaped from prison who's terrorizing the streets and whose mistress meets her match in Hanzo's long, deadly "blade." Unfortunately his interrogations uncover information that hits a lot closer to home than he realized.
With the second film, The Snare, directorial chores switch over to the fearless Yasuzo Masamura (Blind Beast) with nary a change in tone. This time out he's ignoring a likely death sentence for his insubordination and turns his attention to the death of a young girl whose recent, sloppy abortion puts him on the trail of a seedy prostitution ring and a sect of holy sisters who have no compunction about using young virgins to make a fast buck.
Finally Hanzo enters what feels like perverted Scooby Doo territory with Who's Got the Gold? as he learns of a female "ghost" who leads him to a hidden cache of gold stashed in a riverbed. Unfortunately such nuisances as corrupt millionaires and rampaging ninjas get in his way as he tries to uncover the secret of this presumably stolen loot. The mildest entry, this take from director Yashio Inoue offers tons of action but noticeably scales back on the sadism and outrageousness.
Certain to never be remade by a Hollywood studio despite the rage for all cinematic things Japanese, the Hanzo films are bursting with deviant invention and a slew of nasty gadgets certain to delight all fans of the samurai-splatter antics from Lone Wolf and Cub. Politically these are fairly consistent with the Clint Eastwood cop fantasies from the period, casting a suspicious eye on bureaucracies filled with compromised paper-pushers who have no idea what it takes to get results on the streets. As with any good crime films, the pace is fast and furious with a delirious funk score keeping things hopping right from the stylish opening credits. It's not for all viewers, but anyone who can get past the basic novelty of the protagonist's biggest asset is in for a wild and entertaining ride.
As with its fellow Japanese cult series like Lone Wolf and Lady Snowblood, Hanzo first bowed on American home video from Animeigo in a series of VHS and laserdisc releases that were disappointingly bland and misframed. Fortunately those complaints are corrected and then some with Home Vision's stunning widescreen DVDs, which boast exceptional, eye-popping colors and perfect detail. All of the stylish lighting and peculiar visual details come through with magnificent clarity, and the Japanese mono audio (with optional English subtitles offering a new translation) sounds perfectly crisp. Extras are rather sparse, consisting of trailers for each film (complete with taglines sure to annoy any member of N.O.W.) and liner notes by Patrick Macias and Michael Raine, who cover the basics about the film's cultural climate and trivia tidbits about the talent in front of and behind the camera.
For more information about Hanzo the Razor Collection, visit Home Vision Entertainment. To order Hanzo the Razor Collection, go to TCM Shopping.
by Nathaniel Thompson
