A part of this view­ing list: Cri­te­rion Col­lec­tion Spine #15: Hiroshi Inagaki’s Samu­rai II: Duel at Ichi­joji Tem­ple.

Unin­ten­tional Mifu­ne­fest con­tin­ues with the cre­pus­cu­larly spec­tac­u­lar Samu­rai II: Duel at Ichi­joji Tem­ple. Even as a mid­dle por­tion of a tril­ogy this film is strong enough to stand on its own. The lack of firm res­o­lu­tion might have been a prob­lem back in the ‘50s but would fit right in with con­tem­po­rary pro­duc­tions and the viewer is given enough back-​story to feel com­fort­able. Musashi is gone ronin as a train­ing exer­cise to hone his abil­i­ties and to gain the nec­es­sary cul­tured bear­ing that will enable him to be a true samu­rai. The focus on char­ac­ter devel­op­ment is just as strong as in the first film, but since Musashi has pro­gressed far­ther along the road to mas­tery there are glimpses of the man­ner in which he will become a legend.

Right from the start we are pre­sented with the prob­lem that Musashi will strug­gle with through­out the film. It is a con­tin­u­a­tion of his strug­gle from the first film to con­trol his strength. A monk he meets at the begin­ning states that he is true strong, and that a true samu­rai lives a life of chivalry, which is all that sep­a­rates him from a com­mon thug. So while Musashi has con­trol of a sort over his power, he as yet does not pos­sess the wis­dom to know when to use it, or when to take another path. The peo­ple who take him under their wing all pro­vide the puz­zle pieces for his advance­ment. After offend­ing an entire fenc­ing school and killing the brother of its mas­ter in a hasty duel, he retreats to the geisha side of town and learns to appre­ci­ate music, sumi-​e and the ben­e­fits of still­ness. Mean­while all of the sup­port­ing char­ac­ters con­tinue their machi­na­tions and quests, Otsu and Akemi are oppo­site sides of a coin when it comes to their unre­quited love of Musashi. The viewer is intro­duced to the main antag­o­nist, the ambi­tiously skilled fencer Kojiro Sasaki, who clev­erly manip­u­lates the Yosh­ioka school as a way of test­ing Musashi’s strength.

The Yosh­ioka school pub­licly pro­claims Musashi a cow­ard, which pulls him from hid­ing. They agree to terms and the mas­ter Sei­juro will duel Musashi at the pine tree of Ichi­joji Tem­ple. Most of the action takes in twi­light, and can be seen as some­thing of a reflec­tion of obscured moti­va­tions of many of the char­ac­ters. Although the duel has been arranged in pub­lic and fairly, 80 or so Yosh­ioka stu­dents have planned from the start to ambush Musashi on the road to the tem­ple. He catches wind of this from Kojiro-​by-​way-​of-​Akemi and decides to pay them a lit­tle visit. Then starts the ass-​kicking. There is an excel­lent shot, a pan over the swamp [water is another reflec­tion of feel­ing in this film] while we here the death cries of Musashi’s ene­mies in the dis­tance. After killing most of the ambus­caders, Musashi runs into Sei­juro [who has finally man­aged to free him­self of the retain­ers who tried to restrain him], and they fight. Musashi gets Sei­juro at his mercy fairly quickly, but instead of killing him out­right, he finally real­izes that chivalry means always tak­ing the high road. He spares Sei­juro and hits the high road with Otsu; even­tu­ally set­tling in the mountains.

He still isn’t a samu­rai how­ever, since he nearly rapes Otsu when his repressed feel­ings burst forth. There is yet another shot of a rush­ing moun­tain stream inter­cut with this sequence. Ashamed of his behav­ior, and con­vinced that Otsu is angry at him, Musashi leaves once again to con­tinue his train­ing and strengthen his dis­ci­pline and wis­dom. Kojiro is still out there, and waiting.

• My review of Samu­rai I: Miyamoto Musashi.
• My review of Samu­rai III: Duel at Gan­ryu Island.
• Cri­te­rion Essay by Bruce Eder.
• The Cri­te­rion Con­trap­tion Review.