Shinobi: Heart Under Blade

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Shinobi: Heart Under Blade

Shinobi theatrical poster
Directed by Ten Shimoyama
Written by Novel:
Futaro Yamada
Screenplay:
Kenya Hirata
Starring Yukie Nakama
Joe Odagiri
Erika Sawajiri
Music by Taro Iwashiro
Ayumi Hamasaki
Cinematography Masashi Chikamori
Editing by Isao Kawase
Distributed by Shochiku
Release date(s) September 17, 2005 (Japan)
February 6, 2007 (USA
Country Japan
Language Japanese

Shinobi: Heart Under Blade is a 2005 Japanese ninjutsu romance film directed by Ten Shimoyama and written by Kenya Hirata. The story is an adaptation of the novel, The Kouga Ninja Scrolls by Futaro Yamada, which depicts the clash between two ninja clans, Iga and Kouga, and the fated love between Koga Gennosuke (Koga) and Oboro (Iga). The theme song of this movie was the #1 hit, HEAVEN, by Ayumi Hamasaki. This movie won both best actor and best new actress awards at both the Kinema Junpo Awards and Yokohama Festival in 2006 according to the Internet Movie Database.

On February 6, 2007, Funimation Entertainment released the film in the United States. The contents of the DVD is a 2-Disc Set with the main movie available in Japanese and a new dub from Funimation themselves. The 2nd Disc contains Special Features and making-ofs. All of the films are subtitled in English.

Also a manga and an anime called Basilisk are based on the same novel, and bear the same character names as in the novel and the movie. Although their characters in the film are highly altered from both the original novel and the manga/anime series.

Contents

[edit] Plot

Set immediately after the Japanese Warring States Period (Sengoku period), Iga and Koga, two ninja clans that produced powerful ninjas for warlords, have been waging a vendetta against each other over hundreds of years.

Around 1614, Tokugawa Ieyasu, the highest ruler of Japan and the founder of the Tokugawa shogunate , perceived the threat posed by the ninjas of Iga and Koga. Attempting to consolidate his reign, he deliberately stirred up the feud between the two clans by inviting them to choose their five best ninja warriors to have a fight to the death.( see the list of their 6 top ninjas of Iga and Koga - see below "Who are list of Ninjas of Iga and Koga" ) Designated as the leaders of the two clans respectively, Koga Gennosuke (Joe Odagiri) and Oboro (Yukie Nakama), who were secretly married, are unwillingly embroiled in the political plot. Hence, they have to make a difficult decision between their love and clans.Initially, being peaceful and knowing the preciousness of life, they tried their utmost to prevent this meaningless and brutal fight by questioning the shogunate's motives. After the deaths of all their comrades during several fights, however, they gradually accepted their inevitable fate.In the last fight, Koga Gennosuke chose not to defend himself and allowed his lover Oboro to kill him, thus letting the clan of Iga "win". Meanwhile, Tokugawa Ieyasu sent his armies to exterminate ninja villages. To accomplish Gennosuke's hope of saving the villages, Oboro implores Tokugawa Ieyasu not to destroy the villages and, as a show of her sincerity, blinds herself, thereby destroying her most powerful weapons, her eyes (which possessed the power to destroy an enemy from within the minute they make eye contact with her, a technique called 破幻之瞳, literally 'the iris of annihilation'). Moved profoundly by Oboro, Ieyasu withdrew his armies and issued an injunction to protect the ninja villages. According to the movie, the ninjas of the villages lived on peacefully. Their descendants continue to live today.

[edit] Main characters

The list of six top ninja of Iga and Koga.

Koga

Iga

[edit] Cast

[edit] External links

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