2011 • Japan • Directed by Takashi Miike

While maestro Takashi Miike is best known outside of his native Japan for his provocative horror and action films, he’s turned his unique filmmaking style to many different genres throughout his extensive career. Among those, his 2011 Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai stands out as one of the most compelling samurai films of the 21st century.

When destitute samurai Tsugumo Hanshiro (Ichikawa Danjuro XIII, Blade of the Immortal) requests to use castle Iyi’s courtyard to commit ritual suicide, the Iyi clan’s senior retainer Saito (Koji Yakusho, Cure) thinks he’s merely bluffing to appeal to their pity and be granted charity. Saito tries to dissuade Hanshiro by telling him how he compelled another samurai who came to them with such a request to follow through with seppuku despite his clear desperation. But Hanshiro is all too familiar with that event, and reveals his true reason for visiting the Iyi domain, issuing a challenge to their integrity that will lay bare their lack of honor.

A hauntingly visceral update of the same tale that inspired Masaki Kobayashi’s 1962 classic, Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai is an intelligent deconstruction of the samurai myth that fully evidences Miike’s distinctive cinematic voice.