The Twilight Samurai (2002) Tasogare Seibei
The Twilight Samurai (2002)
BDRip 1080p | MKV | 1920x1036 | x264 @ 12,7 Mbps | 129 min | 12,8 Gb
Audio: Japanese DTS 5.1 @ 1509 Kbps | Subs: English, Russian
Genre: Action, Drama, Romance
BDRip 1080p | MKV | 1920x1036 | x264 @ 12,7 Mbps | 129 min | 12,8 Gb
Audio: Japanese DTS 5.1 @ 1509 Kbps | Subs: English, Russian
Genre: Action, Drama, Romance
Director: Yôji Yamada
Writers: Shûhei Fujisawa (novels), Yôji Yamada (screenplay)
Stars: Hiroyuki Sanada, Rie Miyazawa, Nenji Kobayashi
Seibei Iguchi, a low-ranking samurai, leads a life without glory as a bureaucrat in the mid-XIX century Japan. A widower, he has charge of two daughters (whom he adores) and a senile mother; he must therefore work in the fields and accept piecework to make ends meet. New prospects seem to open up when Tomoe, his long-time love, divorces a brutal husband. However, even as the Japanese feudal system is unraveling, Seibei remains bound by the code of honour of the samurai and by his own sense of social precedences. The consequences are cruel.
IMDB - 38 wins + Nominated for 1 Oscar
I approached director Yoji Yamada's period film anticipating the usual brew of flashing blades, unfathomable codes of honour and majestic arterial sprays but found instead a gently melancholic and beautifully played story of unspoken love and ethical struggle.
Seibei (a mesmerising less-is-more turn from Hiroyuki Sanada) is a low-ranking widowed samurai with a senile mother and two daughters, working in the castle's stores and taking in piecework to get by.
Grief at his wife's death has led him to turn his back on violence but he is confronted with it nonetheless, firstly as a result of the return of a childhood friend for whom he has strong feelings and who is fleeing her abusive marriage and, finally, when the politics of the day overtake his clan and he is ordered to carry out an assassination.
Seibei's struggle is not for outward respect but to find integrity within a social order over which he has no influence, making the bursts of violence all the more jarring.
Yamada's film is rightly compared to Kurosawa's work and its thoughtful, lyrical tone and themes resonate powerfully.
(click to enlarge)
The Twilight Samurai (2002) Tasogare Seibei
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