VeteranLight I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

Huievest Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

PiraBit if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

Mandeep Tyson The acting in this movie is really good.

chaos-rampant The first part of the trilogy was setting up the story, visually resplendent but leaves you out in the open. In this second part the direction is solidified. Musashi is set up to choose between the way of the sword or love for the girl Otsu, while having to face his nemesis, foreshadowed for the closing chapter. What puts me off this second chapter, which I rate the lowest of the three, is that we had a set of characters in the first film, and suddenly we have another set of characters. The film revolves around his feud with the Yoshioki school.So in a way, this loose narrative foreshadows the third chapter. As it emerges in this second film, the film is not one long epic split in three parts. Neither is each of these first two films self-enclosed. The narrative is a loose stitching together of episode and digress, thrust and feint in many directions; observant viewers will notice the same in the elliptical shooting mode.I will not say more about this as a film since we are still halfway there, instead let's look at some context around the film, here on the fluidity of self.--This is a core precept of Buddhism, which features prominently in the films; Musashi receives key lessons by monks, his journey is one of self-realization, internal abating of ego.This fluidity is seen in the transmission and establishment of Buddhism in Japan over several hundred years through several attempts, several travels of Japanese monks in China. Both notable Zen schools in Japan were initiated by monks of the Tendai sect who had been to China. The film's main two centerpieces take place outside Buddhist temples (one is referenced in the title, the other is Sanjusangen-do), both belonging to Tendai. The Sanjusangen-do, a marvelous structure, is also famous for housing one thousand and one statues of the thousand armed Kannon, the boddhisatva of compassion. The little wooden statuette that Musashi is seen carving in spots is of Kannon.Now simply saying that the self is illusory sounds weird, metaphysical or philosophical at best. Buddhists have many of the same lofty words as we do, about 'void' and 'self', but whereas we're accustomed to theoretical construction and analytical philosophy (we love words in the West), they resort to words as a last means of describing a practice—also evident in Musashi's own writings where he stresses experiential appreciation.So when they say 'void', they don't mean a generality but something which can be felt, has been felt, as one feels the temperature of water. When they say 'self', they mean when a single thought arises while you're washing the dishes.It's a pain in the ass to talk of it, because how can you say exactly how warm it is? It either is to you or isn't. Stick your hand in. Zen Masters (as well as Musashi whose 'Way of strategy' is Zen-flavored) knew this, which is why they loved paradox, urged silence or beat and kicked their students when they asked logical questions. The point is to know for yourself. A similar thing happens to Musashi in the first film when he is tied by a Zen monk from a tree, a fictional event.This monk, Takuan, existed; though his interactions with Musashi in the film are fiction, presumably he did know Musashi. He wrote on this business of illusion and nonself using sword metaphors, because the writings were intended for Yagyu Munenori, sword instructor to three shoguns and with Musashi the most famous swordsman in his day. Munenori briefly appears in the third film.Munenori and Musashi both wrote books with background in all this. Both are still being widely read in the martial arts and business worlds, by people looking for insights on real or metaphorical war.Musashi's first four books comprise technique and strategy. The last one and shortest, Book of the Void, which is held in separate esteem, probably because of the portentous title, is where Musashi speaks of the Zen void as deeper principle—it should be the most interesting but isn't, Musashi's practical conveyance falls short. No, it's the books on strategy that deserve study once you look past hand-to-hand combat, at least for our purposes here.Suffice to say, both Zen and Musashi urge direct observation of mind instead of general reasoning. Suffice to say, from the perspective of Zen a Kannon statue is no more sacred than the piece of wood it was carved from. And that the act of carving is the manifestation of self, this can be practically observed in the carved image—is it sloppy, elegant? This is important. So neither spoken word, nor teachings in a book, nor sacred image, nor Zen or not Zen, but observation of the mind behind. I'm going to wrap this in the third post.

Boba_Fett1138 "Miyamoto Musashi" was already a great movie but this movie is even a better one on basically every front.This movie is part of a real trilogy, that follows one story and one main character. It's therefore also best to watch these 3 movies in a row, to appreciate it best. All 3 movies closely follow each other, in which the first movie is being really used as a movie to set up things, while this second movie is mostly being used to build up to its climax that will occur in the third movie.This time the movie flows better because the story gets used better as well. Like mentioned earlier, the first movie was still being mostly a setup movie for the series. In this movie we actually get to see more epic moments and fights, as it follows the further travels of Musashi Miyamoto, on his way to become a master-swordsman. Its story and different characters all work out nicely, as things also gets developed more, with its drama and romance.There are a couple of really great fight sequences, of course mostly featuring Toshirô Mifune. It makes the movie often exciting to watch, as does the overall look for the movie. The movie benefits from its beautiful natural environments, as well as some nicely done studio work. Using color wasn't quite that common yet for '50's Japanese cinema, since it was quite costly and not as advanced yet as in the western world. However color had always worked out nicely for these three movies and it helps to make the movie a really great looking one. You also have to give credit for this to the movie its cinematography, done by Jun Yasumoto, who strangely enough worked on just the first two movies but didn't shot the third and final one.A movie that really has everything in it.9/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

Cosmoeticadotcom Hiroshi Inagaki's 1954-1956 three part color film, The Samurai Trilogy, is unlike many filmic trilogies for the very fact that it is, indeed, one exactly five hour long film, and not three separate linked films, for the first two films have no real endings. In this way it has much in common with The Lord Of The Rings trilogy. However, whereas those three are separate films, more or less, their source work is not. Yes, J.R.R. Tolkien's book is often printed in three separate volumes, but it is one work. This three part film is also derived from one singular literary work, from Eiji Yoshikawa's 1935 novel Musashi, loosely based upon the real life 17th Century Japanese folk hero, the samurai Musashi Miyamoto, who penned a classic book called The Book Of Five Rings. That all stated, the landscapes of Japan and sheer numbers of extras in this film are far more impressive, visually, than the CG crap that the Lord Of The Rings films spewed. Overall, The Samurai Trilogy is a good film, but while the narrative story gets better and tighter with each succeeding film, the visual quality of each succeeding film worsens on The Criterion Collection's three disks, both in the original film stock and the poor transfers.If nothing else, this film, The Samurai Trilogy, can be seen as a sort of training ground for the great Toshiro Mifune to try out and perfect a wide range of acting styles and characters within character that he would unleash on the film lovers of the world throughout the rest of his career, be it in his films with Kurosawa, or long after. And, if a film can be said to have allowed something like that to happen, then its merits are certainly more than its flaws, melodramatic or not. But, even on top of that, a film like this acts as a sort of entrée into the greater and deeper art put out by the aforementioned masters, and allows those great works of art to be more greatly appreciated, for contrast can clarify what the mists of the ineffable do not. In such a spirit, thank you sensei Inagaki.

foxfirebrand This comment about the "Samurai Trilogy" starts on the page for Miyamoto Musashi (Samurai I). My first viewing of the second episode was memorable because I got to take the train into town all by myself, and view it in a Tokyo theater. The first episode had just been shown on base, in a sort of cultural exchange, and my parents saw it and were pleasantly non-outraged-- I was a 9-year-old samurai-movie addict, and they believed enthusiasm beyond a certain intensity should be curbed. It was the same conflict as comic books some few years earlier. Technicolor was a big deal back then, especially in Japan, and it became the issue on which my viewing of "swordfighting movies" was decided-- the ones in color were historical films worth viewing, and even had something to teach. The black-and-white ones shown in Irumagawa and surrounding villages-- I had to sneak off to see. Ichijoji no Ketto (Duel at Ichijoji Temple) shows Miyamoto-san's achievements, while barring no holds on the issue of what they cost him. The romantic subplot continues, though its development in the western sense (toward union, wedded bliss) is thwarted at every turn. The issue is always a conflict between love and duty, and each deferment of gratification spells out a new step in the redefinition of the national character that is being mapped here. Again, some of the importance of all this is lost, even to modern Japanese audiences for whom the issues are long settled-- at the time, though, they were cliffhangers. A new character is introduced, Kojiro Sasaki who will emerge in part 3 as a rival for Musashi-- his equal except for certain features in their respective character. By the way, the score is excellent and haunting-- it extends like a symphony through all three parts, and has a leitmotif "hook" that will cause your ears to pick up in recognition, perhaps years from now, when you hear it again.