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Zatoichi Meets the One-Armed Swordsman

1971 1h 34m Drama Action Adventure List
Tomatometer 0 Reviews 78% Popcornmeter 1,000+ Ratings
Zatoichi meets Wang Kang, a Chinese swordsman protecting a brutally orphaned young child. Despite the language barrier, the men forge a friendship until their enemies trick them into fighting each other.

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Zatoichi Meets the One-Armed Swordsman

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Christopher B In this 22nd Zatoichi film, Zatoichi Meets the One-Armed Swordsman is another great showdown introducing another legendary character who not being able to understand each other, ultimately leads to tragedy. The One-Armed man is played by Yu Wang and his martial artist abilities are a welcome addition as it adds some more variety to the battle sequences. This film must have one of the top body counts, as both Zatoichi and the One-Armed man go on a massive killing spree against all the corrupt samurai and lay waste to everyone who does evil. Ultimately it leads to a final showdown between the two and as Ichi says after the duel "If only we could understand one another's words, we wouldn't of had to fight one another". This film is an extremely violent and blood soaked film with tons of awesome battle scenes and some awesome death shots, it is also a good moral lesson. Rated 4 out of 5 stars 11/06/22 Full Review Audience Member A rare (I believe) international cross-over. A couple of interesting elements; 1) Wang Yu's Wang Kang character retains abilities unique to the wu-xia/kung-fu genre(s) of the time (mostly trampoline and backwards jumping), while everyone else adheres to the relatively grounded rules of this series of films. Had ninja been present, it would be a different story, but no ninja here. 2) Ichi doesn't speak Chinese and Wang Kang doesn't speak Japanese. It's logical, I just didn't expect it. Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 01/18/23 Full Review Audience Member This installment of the series may have the most action out of all of them. Zatoichi is dealing with a gang that is after him, while Chinese one armed fighter Jimmy Wang Yu is protecting a boy who interrupted a funeral procession. The funeral procession people want to kill the kid, and a simple misunderstanding makes the One-Armed Swordsman think Zatoichi has ratted the framed traveler out to the badguys. Lots of action and even some themes, such as Chinese vs. Japanese culture, and fiefdoms and their aggressive stance on murdering those who disturb funeral processions as they are sort of corrupt. Featuring an insane duel from both iconic heroes, Zatoichi Meets the One-Armed Swordsman is one of the best crossovers that cinemas has to offer. Rated 4 out of 5 stars 02/05/23 Full Review Audience Member I loved this action-packed battle between Zatoichi and Wang Kang, with its clever metaphor that if people or countries only didn't have language barriers, perhaps they wouldn't have to fight or be enemies. An essential entry in the series. Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars 02/24/23 Full Review Audience Member Zatoichi swordplay is unbelievable in this film yet the choreography of the battles of the one-armed swordsman is pretty lame. Not much to say about the story as well. Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars 02/13/23 Full Review Audience Member Don't bring a knife to a sword fight--A nice change of pace for the aging series!! Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 02/22/23 Full Review Read all reviews
Zatoichi Meets the One-Armed Swordsman

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Cast & Crew

Movie Info

Synopsis Zatoichi meets Wang Kang, a Chinese swordsman protecting a brutally orphaned young child. Despite the language barrier, the men forge a friendship until their enemies trick them into fighting each other.
Director
Kimiyoshi Yasuda
Producer
Shintarô Katsu, Yoshinobu Nishioka, Ming Huang
Screenwriter
Takayuki Yamada, Kimiyoshi Yasuda
Genre
Drama, Action, Adventure
Original Language
Japanese
Release Date (Streaming)
Nov 30, 2016
Runtime
1h 34m
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