SlaughterintheSnow

Slaughter in the Snow (1973)

This is the third and final installment in the Mikogami trilogy and follows Jokichi as he seeks his vengeance on the third and final boss responsible of the death of his wife and son. Well sort of. The third boss never shows up in this installment and since the series ends here we never get to see Jokichi gets his final revenge on the men that destroyed his life. It is preceded by The Trail of Blood and the Fearless Avenger. Here Jokichi is on his way to find the final boss, Kunisada, when he runs into another woman in trouble. He is forced to help her, which then brings him in conflict with another Yakuza gang. If that weren’t enough an assassin has been hired by Kunisada to stop Jokichi. His name is Windmill Kobunji (because of his unique dagger talents). In a strange twist he and Jokichi are forced to deal with the same gang, because Kobunji also helped a woman and has made himself a target. The alliance is only temporary, as they both know honor requires that Kobunji try and kill Jokichi at some point.

This is another solid entry to the series. The story is more of the same, but I’ve enjoyed the first two movies so that is a good thing. I was a bit surprised that they didn’t have any sort of recap to explain why Jokichi was after Kunisada. Not that you will be lost by not knowing that, other than as a helpful background why he would then send Kobunji after Jokichi. This is also the only movie in the series that has more than one main character, Jokichi that it focuses on. But Windmill Kobunji is such a cool character that is more of a plus than anything. Additionally this movie has a great ending that resolves the storylines of all the characters that Jokichi meets in only a way that a Samurai movie would. In the end my only real issue with the plot is that we never get to see Jokichi get his revenge. I don’t know if that was intended to be the outcome or if they had intended on making another entry to the series and just never did. Either way I was disappointed and felt like I was left hanging. I suppose the fact that I felt cheated in not getting an ending to Jokichi’s story is a testament to how engrossing and entertaining the series is as a whole.

The fight choreography here is maybe the best of the three movies. Not only do we get to see Jokichi’s reverse sword style, but also Kobunji’s nifty tricks with the dagger. The blood sprays liberally and the limbs are flying again. If you are a fan of Samurai movies and love the over the top fights and effects Slaughter in the Snow is going to be really satisfying for you. Again as with the other two movies the camera work is solid and the soundtrack is great! When you have a theme song that is immediately identifiable as this one is you are doing something right.

Even though the story isn’t finished with Slaughter in the Snow I still have to say I had a blast watching it. I recommend this one as well as the box set that contains the entire series. Head over to AnimEigo’s website for more information on where you can pick it up. The address is http://www.animeigo.com/

3 out of 4

reviewed by John Shatzer