Makino Masahiro had an incredibly long career, directing films from 1926 to 1972, and returning as a supervising director for one more, in 1990. I've seen a handful of his films from different decades. They are usually professionally made, though their quality varies.
I'd love to like this one. The gorgeous color palette of this Toei production brings to mind Kinugasa's Jigokumon (Gates of Hell, 1953). During the opening credits we see our mountainous setting, with different shades of green and blue - all very pleasant to the eye. Throughout the the film we get to enjoy nice visuals. Whether it's a crowd scene where women in different-color kimonos run synchronized, or a battle scene where the hero (Okawa Hashizo) is wearing bright red ornaments, this film looks very nice.
What it can't do, however, is tell a story. The opening itself does a poor job introducing the characters, and it only gets worse from here. It's the year 1696. The film opens with Okawa's character Kogenta kidnapping Oshina (Okawa Keiko), to be his bride. Again, the setting looks so romantic, that we are viewing a kidnapping storyline in a way too romantic light. Kogenta is the prince of the Heike clan. For one reason or another, this clan has lived in seclusion in the mountains for hundreds of years. They only come out to snatch brides. Romantic.
Before the wedding, Oshina tells the clan her tragic story. Her father was killed in Edo by the Shogunate, because he refused to sell a shamisen, that was their family heirloom. After hearing this, Kogenta swears revenge on these monsters. Now, a director like Kobayashi Masaki or Imai Tadashi could have made something out of this premise. How stupid would it be to go to war, for something as mundane as a musical instrument?
Alas, Makino's surface-level film-making can not find such depth or social commentary to its narrative. Instead, Kogenta travels to Edo, and meets his identical doppelgänger. As you do.
The plot-line of this film does not make any sense. It feels like either one hour of stuff got cut out - the film is a mere 90 minutes, the typical length for a jidai-geki - or this whole thing is based on some centuries old story. A story, that is weird because it is centuries old. So besides a couple of good scenes, few good actors, and beautiful colors, this is a pretty rushed, unimportant and skipable film.
