Change Your Image
krilljp
Reviews
Fûrin kazan (1969)
Cool sengoku jidai movie
Lots of attention to historical detail, like the horned kabuto worn by Yamamoto Kansuke. Climactic battle (4th Kawanakajima)between the Takeda and Uesugi well worth seeing. Story told from the viewpoints of Kansuke and his overlord, Takeda Shingen. I liked this a lot more than the 1990 "Heaven and Hell," which retold the story of the rivalry between Takeda Shingen and Uesugi Kenshin, but from Kenshin's viewpoint. For example, the later movie seemed less accurate and more artsy (each side's soldiers all wore the same standard-color sashimono)in its depiction of the same battle.
The War Lord (1965)
Makes the middle ages so real you can smell them
This movie portrays feudalism in Europe in a very unglamorous light. Nobody is happy, from the lord in the castle (Crisagon, played by Charlton Heston sporting a dark-ages soup-bowl haircut) to the peasants he governs. Even Crisagon's exercise of his feudal rights when a peasant girl marries doesn't cheer him up very much or very long, since it leads to lots of trouble. The movie has lots of little touches that seem realistic: Crisagon's dedication to the duke who enfoeffed him and his simple faith; the peasants' mix of Christianity and Druidism, the motley armor and gear Crisagon's men have, and many others. The end of the movie was out of sync with these other bits, because I don't see how catapults could have been moved cross-country so fast, or why anyone thought catapults would be useful against the beseigers instead of against the besieged tower.