shogun assassin..1980..brutal revenge flick

this might just be the most brutal/cool revenge flick ive ever seen.
it came out in 1980 and i bet my mom turned me onto it in 1985...i was maybe 7 or so.
this was in heavy rotation when i was around that age...among the other cannon films and ninja movies.

before i go any further, thanks to humenseh for the reminder. pretty sure his avatar is lone wolf from the movie

www.imdb.com...

Long ago there was a great samurai warrior who served his Shogun honorably. The Shogun however grew paranoid as he became more and more senile. The Shogun sought to destroy all those who might stand to oppose his rule, and so he sent his ninja spies to the samurai's home. The ninjas failed to kill the samurai, but did kill his beloved wife. From then on, the samurai swore on his honor to seek out the Shogun and avenge the death of his love. The samurai roams the countryside with his toddler son taking on mercenary work for money until the final battle with the Shogun's three Masters of Death.
----------------

at the beginning when lone wolf finds his wife dead, he decides he is going to ruin the shogun. he puts his hanzo and a ball in front of his boy. if the boy was to pick the ball, he was going to kill him and go at it alone. of course the boy picked the sword so he and his father go rampaging together.....

the action is brutal but old school..sprays of blood and such.

trust me this movie is awesome.

also, at the end the lone wolf has to fight the shoguns 3 maters of death....in my opinion john carpenter took the idea for rain(one of the 3 storms from big trouble in little china) directly from this movie...if you watch it you will see. i will try to find a pic but you will see him in the trailer....



this is the into, audio only...its the boy, spelling it out...this sets the tone for the whole movie and by the audio intro alone you can tell its going to be the shizz



the master of death that imo was the base for rain, and also raiden




grovit factoid: this movie was banned in the united states..not for the violence as you would maybe think.
there is a scene where lone wolf and his boy are freezing so they cozy up naked next to a woman..for warmth.
the boy is looking at her nipple and starts to flick at it with his finger...not sexual..he was maybe 4...curious

There's a whole series of Lone Wolf and Cub movies. 'Shogun Assassin' was the 7th. All of them are awesome. When he breaks out the gat mounted hidden in the baby carriage I was like "Hell Yeah!" I want to go back and watch them all again now.
en.wikipedia.org...

a reply to: skunkape23

far out man.
thanks.
i knew it was a comic but i had no idea there were 7 films...
i watched shogun assassin a lot and i am getting ready to watch it in a few minutes...'
im on the hunt for the other 6 now.

I remember the samurai with the kid in a baby stroller in a movie called "Lightning Swords Of Death". Could this be the same movie? It was showing in the early to mid seventies. The movie was very graphic and IIRC, it spawned copycat violence.

a reply to: NightFlight

i dont know.
i just acquired the other 6 so let me check...

nope, unless its an american title to the movie cause the lone wolf pushes his kid around..
the titles are

sword of vengeance
baby cart at the river styxx
baby cart to hades
baby cart in peril
baby cart in the land of demons
white heaven in hell
shogun assassin

a reply to: NightFlight
Those films were released by multiple distributors under different titles.
Apparently "Lightning Swords of Death" was one of them. I believe I saw that one as 'Lone Wolf and Cub: Swords of Vengeance."

I found a reference to it in Wiki, but its not exactly what I remember.

en.wikipedia.org...

From WikiPedia, entry for Shogun Assassin:

Sequels[edit]
AnimEigo has released four sequels: Shogun Assassin 2: Lightning Swords of Death, actually the third film in the Baby Cart series, Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart to Hades; Shogun Assassin 3: Slashing Blades of Carnage, which is the fourth film in the Baby Cart series, Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in Peril; Shogun Assassin 4: Five Fistfuls Of Gold, which is the dubbed version of the fifth film, Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in the Land of Demons; and Shogun Assassin 5: Cold Road to Hell, the dubbed version of Lone Wolf and Cub: White Heaven in Hell, the sixth and final film in the series.

The movie I remember had no preceding title, it was just "Lightning Swords of Death". I remember it well as I took a first date to it in 74 or 75. It was her idea and choice... go figure.

a reply to: skunkape23

Yep, that was it. Saw it in 1974.

a reply to: skunkape23

hit me with some more knowledge man.
what other goodies you got tucked away?

snap man..
remember that bad ass 80's flick black rain with michael douglas and andy garcia?

the dude that played the lone wolf, tomisaburo wakayama played sugai

gonna have to watch that again

a reply to: Grovit

I love the Zatoichi series of samurai films about a blind samurai wandering the countryside of Japan. There have been remakes of them but are nothing like the originals.

en.wikipedia.org...

a reply to: NightFlight

can you hit me with a link of the ones you are talking about

im gonna get this one now...

its from 03 but it has beat takeshi. anything with him is awesome

www.imdb.com...

just saw your edit

i didnt know blind fury with rutger haur was based off this...

im getting schooled

thanks a lot man...i love this stuff

a reply to: Grovit
Man...I've seen so many kung fu films it's all a blur.
I remember seeing one called "The Stoned Master" that was a hoot.
There was this old man that could totally kick ass with his pipe, which he smoked constantly.
He caught a couple of young hoodlums trying to rob him and basically held them as prisoners and forced them to learn his techniques. They hated him the whole time. Every time they tried to escape he would whoop them down with his pipe...laughing the whole time, and make them train harder.
At the end some bad guys show up and the two, formerly young criminals, side up with the old man and kick bad guys asses left and right.
I've dug around online, but can't seem to find it.

a reply to: skunkape23

gonna start looking.
ive seen a ton too but there are so many.

maybe you can help me with one...pretty new in the world of martial arts films...

i have wanted to see this since it came out and i can not find it anywhere

nagurimono: love and kill...2003

www.imdb.com...

its a blood sport type martial arts competition movie that was put on by the people that owned the mma org pride fc.
this movie had all the best guys from that promotion.

its killing me not to have seen it cause kazushi sakuraba(my favorite fighter of all time) is in it
also, don frye, quinton rampage jackson, vanderlei silva and others...
i have never been ale to pin it down...

if you have a line on that, that would be awesome

there are no trailers or clips on youtube or nothing

the stoned master is not listed on imdb either.
must be obscure

ive seen so many but dont even know what they were called.

in the early 80's cable was just hitting it big and there were come and go channels.
we had an old analogue cable box with a dial on it...

i dont know how my dad figured this out but he figured out how to take an index cars and cut a v notch into it, then stick it into the box, between the frame and dial and get all the cable channels of the day.

i remember being like 6 or 7 and turning the channel and getting nothing but fuzz of the colored squiggly lines...start moving the index card around and when you hit the right spot the channel would come right in...
we did that for years..
thats how i saw all the cannon films and the olds chool shaolin vs wu tang stuff.
of course vhs from the video store too but most of it we watched that way.

then we hooked the vcr up to it and used to buy loads of blank tapes and record them.
you could change the speed or write speed on our vcr and we could fit 3 full movies on 1 tape.

we had hundreds of tapes with 3 movies each on them...
obscure stuff like band of the hand and gymkata...

over the years they got ruined from moves and crappy storage...heat and such..

it was killer though man....i was like 6-9 or 10 and i thought it was the best thing in the world.

i watched and taped so many bad ass movies.

a bunch of troma stuff. toxic avenger...

i miss that stuff

a reply to: Grovit

I never knew there were movies. I am a fan of the manga though.

I found a clip from "Nagurimono," but it seems to be hard to find.
www.dailymotion.com...
I'm more into the old Shaw Brothers/Hong Kong stuff from the 70's.
Early Jackie Chan was some good stuff, too. Seen 'Fearless Hyaena?'
Here's a scene of him beating a bad ass with "crying baby" style.

I'm guessing none of you guys are Wu-Tang Clan fans...






Movie is sampled extensively throughout this album

a reply to: Grovit

Great movie! I got into it on the back of listening to the Wu Tang Clan and Clan remixes.

About 10 years ago, the UK began seeing all these cheap stores and they had dozens of classic/obscure Kung Fu movies. I'd buy them by the dozen.

I've just spent ages trying to locate a couple of mixtapes that have dialogue from Shogun and Pulp Fiction over tracks by Al Green, Wu Tang, Biggie etc. It's gonna bug me all day now.

ETA - the mixtapes are 'Grindhouse basterds' by DJ Wick-It and 'The Green Album' by Omar Saar. Both good mixes but i was wrong about the second one having the Wu on there.

a reply to: skunkape23

i love the old stuff too.
im just a mma nut and it bothers me i cant find it.

ive seen all the old jackie chan flicks.
of course the original drunken master is my favorite..
with sam the seed...

hell yeah i like the wu tang clan..
since we are on them, they have a new cd about to hit

en.wikipedia.org...:_A_Better_Tomorrow

On October 3, 2014 it was announced that the album will arrive December 2, 2014