Bushido Man: Seven Deadly Battles

Japanese filmmaker Takanori Tsujimoto's brisk, deadpan, low-budget spoof of Asian action potboilers centers on what appears to be an archetypal stoic feudal warrior named Toramaru (Mitsuki Koga), who arrives to inform his master, Gensai (Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi), of his latest challenges. The setting turns out to be modern (or post-modern) Japan, where Toramaru, a follower of the "Cosmic Way," seeks to gain mastery of every possible fighting technique as he takes on reigning Japanese martial arts champs in battles ranging from formal kung fu, to sticks, to anything-goes Yakuza knife-dueling. Toramaru travels in a cheaply visualized Japan (including Yokohama re-imagined as a lawless criminal wasteland, after an apocalyptic earthquake) to honorably vanquish other fighters, along the way gathering top-secret scrolls as a reward, before a big "surprise" ending that features a Zen-like moral (there's also a running bit about eating thematically correct food before a showdown). Anchored more in drive-in/grindhouse chopsocky than the grandeur that the genre achieved in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, this Tarantino-esque outing should appeal to cultists who appreciate shoestring action-gore f/x achieved with a minimum of wire-stunt and CGI (or plot, for that matter). A strong optional purchase. (C. Cassady)