The Loyal 47 Ronin
An adventure film with Benshi performers. Sometimes considered the 'first Japanese feature film', it survives today as a compilation of scenes from various different 1910s adaptations totaling nearly three hours in length. The bulk of the content comes from the 1911 adaptation by legendary Japanese filmmaker Makino Shozo.
Shôzô Makino
Director
Casts & Crew
Also Directed by Shôzô Makino
Jiraiya is some sort of super-ninja with superpowers. He can fly, he can avoid detection by turning himself into a toad, and he has some sort of ability to vanish.
Raiden is a 1928 black and white Japanese silent film with benshi accompaniment directed by Shozo Makino and Sadatsugu Matsuda. It is a posthumous work by Makino and is the last film starring his son, Masahiro Makino, in his first role in a comedy film.
A tale of betrayal, murder and revenge.
Short version of the classic 47 Ronin story.
Lord Asano Takumi-no-Kami Naganori was charged with receiving a group of envoys from the Imperial Court in Kyoto. He was young and slightly inexperienced, so Lord Kira Kozuke-no suke Yoshinako was given the task of instructing Lord Asano in the customs of the ceremony. On the day of the reception, something went terrible wrong, and Lord Asano attempted to kill Lord Kira. For this, Lord Asano was order to commit seppuku. However, in violation of existing law, Lord Kira was not punished. The ruling Shogun Tokugawa Tsunayoshi eventually confiscated Lord Asano's land and dismissed the samurai that had served him so faithfully, effectively making them all ronin. Two years later, Oishi Kuranosuke Yoshi led a group of samurai loyal to Lord Asano in an attack on Kira's compound. Their aim was to capture and kill him.
In 1908, Director/Producer Shozo Makino (father of Japanese cinema) directed and produced the first dramatic film in Kyoto. “Honnô-ji Gassen” was shot at Shinnyo-Do Temple.
