a lean and lushly atmospheric action picture that moves light and asks little more of its plot than to set the stage and keep out of the way; Kibagami Jubei must defeat the Eight Devils of Kimon, a team of ninja with an array of strange powers, and that'll do us for 90 minutes. the pervading air of gross misogyny in the film's treatment of its secondary lead, Kagero, however, gives a somewhat bitter taste to what should otherwise be a straightforward pleasure.

Watched in Japanese with English subtitles.

transcendental cinema that a mere star rating can only serve to diminish

a pretty decent "perhaps it is man who is the real monster" flick with the requisite paranoid mob, though no actual pitchforks or torches. its B-movie budget shows in places, Superman taking off looks pretty hokey, and the big chase scene goes on for about 5x longer than it needs to and gets pretty tedious, but the dialogue is often better than you'd expect from this sort of thing, George Reeves is terrific in both roles, and I like that Superman is presented in an almost entirely protective, mediatory role, his invulnerability emphasised above all, only throwing a punch when strictly necessary.

nifty