Sleepy Eyes Of Death 1: The Chinese Jade 1963 Based on the novel of the same name by Renzaburô Shibata, screenplay by Seiji Hoshikawa, directed by Tokuzô Tanaka. Tanaka was the assistant director on Rashomon and Sansho The Bailiff. As a director he directed 48 other movies and a fair bit of TV near the end of his career. He directed 3 of the Zatoichi films, Shinobi No Mono 4: Siege, another of the Sleepy Eyes Of Death series and many I don't know anything about.
There are 12 films in the series and they are packed in three 4 film box sets from Animeigo. Each film has it's own disc and there are some extras, including commentaries, a booklet, and other minor items. I haven't dug into the extras much at all.
That's Raizô Ichikawa, he was born in 1931 and died in 1969 of cancer. He was in 152 films from 1954 to 1969. You can find some on DVD and there are a good few on YouTube, occasionally they don't have subtitles on the latter.
Raizô plays Nemuri Kyoshiro, a sword for hire guy, as the movie starts he's attacked by a gang of ninjas. He slices them up and goes home. The Head of the Kaga clan is Lord Maeda and he's got a problem, he's been cheating the Shogun. There's an incriminating document in a jade statue, he wants it. Lord Maeda sends his adopted daughter Chisa to hire Nemuri and he takes the job.
Nemuri gets another job offer from Tomisaburo Wakayama, he's a fighter called Chen Sun who clobbers people with his mighty fists and breaks things with his mighty kicks. Chen has aligned himself with Lord Maeda's rival Gohei Zeniya. While the meeting is taking place some ninjas attack and Chen disappears. He leaves a note for Nemuri to meet him on an island. On the island Nemuri meets Gohei and learns about the statue and what's in it, he declines to help Gohei.
The rest of the movie is one battle after another other. The action is good, Nemuri gets to show off his Full Circle Cut twice, but we don't get to see a big battle between Nemuri and Chen. I see Tomisaburo returns in the 4th film so here's hoping. I was entertained by the movie and was glad to have picked up the DVDs. I'm looking forward to finishing the series.
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