#841: MISUMI, Kenji: Baby Cart In The Land Of Demons (1973)

MISUMI, Kenji (Japan)
Baby Cart In The Land Of Demons [1973]
Spine #841
Blu-ray

The first act of Baby Cart in the Land of Demons feels almost like a video game, as Itto Ogami and Daigoro confront assorted sub-bosses while collecting coins and enough data to lead them to their final target. But then the tone suddenly deepens, making this the Lone Wolf and Cub film most concerned with the spiritual dimensions of Ogami's quest.

On the road with Daigoro, Ogami encounters five different warrior-messengers who seek to test his ability in combat. Upon defeat, each messenger pays Ogami one hundred gold pieces for his services as assassin and passes along more information about his mission.

Ogami is asked to kill a Buddhist priest entrusted with delivering a secret document to the shogun and his associates among the treacherous Shadow Yagyu clan. Ogami tracks his prey to a temple and confronts him mid-meditation, but finds himself unable to kill him. Meanwhile, Daigoro must also face a crisis on inaction when he becomes mixed up with a pickpocket and refuses to give her away to the authorities, even when he is severely beaten as punishment.

Afterward, Lone Wolf is contacted by the governess of the Kuroda clan, who hires him to assassinate three more targets involved with the secret document: a five-year-old girl and her parents. He accepts and we go right back to the series' traumatized beginnings, with a nuclear family going under the sword.

This was founding series director Kenji Misumi's final contribution to the Lone Wolf and Cub series, and his second-to-last film before his death in 1975. By balancing its physical action with Buddhist musings on life and death, The Land of Demons encapsulates the vision of a director who made his mark on numerous legendary contributions to the samurai film genre, including the Zatoichi films, Nemuri Kyoshiro, and . . . Lone Wolf and Cub.

89 minutes

Color
Monaural
in Japanese
2:40:1 aspect ratio
Criterion Release 2016

Director/Writers

Based on the manga by Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima.

Screenplay by Koike.

Kenji Misumi was 52 when he directed Baby Cart in the Land of Demons.

Other Misumi films in the Collection:

#679a: The Tale Of Zatoichi (1962)
#679h: Fight, Zatoichi, Fight (1964)

#679l: Zatoichi And The Chess Expert (1965)
#679q: Zatoichi Challenged (1967)
#679s: Samaritan Zatoichi (1968)
#679u: Zatoichi Goes To The Fire Festival (1970)
#841: Sword Of Vengeance (1972)
#841: Baby Cart At The River Styx (1972)
#841: Baby Cart To Hades (1972)

The Film

A

Film Rating (0-60):

60

The Extras

The Booklet

Thirty-six page booklet featuring an essay and film synopses by Japanese pop-culture critic Patrick Macias.

Commentary

None.

Interview 1

With Koike, writer of the Lone Wolf and Cub manga series and screenwriter on five of the films.

L’âme d’un père, l’âme d’un sabre

A 2005 documentary about the making of the series.

Interview 2

In which Sensei Yoshimitsu Katsuse discusses and demonstrates the real Suio-ryu sword techniques that inspired the ones depicted in the manga and films.

Interview 3

With biographer Kazuma Nozawa about Misumi, director of four of the six films.

Silent documentary

From 1937 about the making of samurai swords, with an optional new ambient score by Ryan Francis.

Trailers

Extras Rating (0-40):

39

60 + 39 =

99

By Director

By Spine #