# Zatoichi (座頭市) (2003 film)
**Zatoichi** (座頭市) is a 2003 Japanese action period drama directed, written, edited, and co-edited by, and starring, [Takeshi Kitano](https://www.edgepedia.org/takeshi-kitano) (ビートたけし, credited as an actor as Beat Takeshi), a remake of the blind swordsman character created by writer Kan Shimozawa (子母沢寛) and made famous by [Shintaro Katsu](https://www.edgepedia.org/shintaro-katsu). Released in Japan on September 6, 2003, the film runs 116 minutes (some databases list 115), was distributed by Shochiku with Office Kitano, and won the Silver Lion for Best Director at the 60th Venice International Film Festival.[1](https://jfdb.jp/en/title/59) • [2](https://www.shochiku.co.jp/cinema/database/04579/) • [3](https://www.midnighteye.com/reviews/zatoichi/)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Director / writer / editor / star | Takeshi Kitano (Beat Takeshi), his first period drama (jidaigeki)[1](https://jfdb.jp/en/title/59) • [4](https://eigasai.cz/admin/fileGet.aspx?f=zdpgghhns&m=2) |
| Release / runtime | September 6, 2003 (Japan); 116 minutes (some sources list 115); R-15 rating in Japan[1](https://jfdb.jp/en/title/59) • [5](https://natalie.mu/eiga/film/141046) |
| Source | Original story by Kan Shimozawa; remake of the character played by Shintaro Katsu in 26 films from 1962 to 1989[1](https://jfdb.jp/en/title/59) • [6](https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/where-begin-takeshi-kitano) |
| Principal cast | Beat Takeshi (Zatoichi), Tadanobu Asano (Hattori Gennosuke), Michiyo Ogusu (Aunt Oume), Ittoku Kishibe (Ginzo), Yui Natsukawa (O-Shino)[1](https://jfdb.jp/en/title/59) • [7](https://eiga.com/movie/1222/) |
| Key crew | Cinematography Katsumi Yanagijima; music Keiichi Suzuki; tap dance direction The Stripes; costume supervision Yohji Yamamoto[1](https://jfdb.jp/en/title/59) • [7](https://eiga.com/movie/1222/) |
| Major awards | Venice 2003 Silver Lion (Best Director) and Audience Award; Toronto 2003 People's Choice Award; five Japanese Academy Awards in 2004[3](https://www.midnighteye.com/reviews/zatoichi/) • [8](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0363226/awards/) |
| Box office | Passed 2 million admissions in Japan, an unusual result for a Kitano film[9](https://ekr.chosunonline.com/site/data/html_dir/2004/01/19/2004011963061.html) |
## Spoilers
### Plot
Three parties with hidden agendas arrive on the same day in a post-town controlled by the yakuza boss Ginzo (Ittoku Kishibe) and the merchant Senjuya (Saburo Ishikura). The first is Zatoichi himself, a blond, blind master of iai (quick-draw swordsmanship) carrying a vermilion cane. The second is the ronin Hattori Gennosuke ([Tadanobu Asano](https://www.edgepedia.org/tadanobu-asano)), who has given up his post as a lord's fencing instructor and seeks work as a bodyguard to pay for medicine for his ailing wife O-Shino (Yui Natsukawa). The third is a pair of traveling performers, the siblings Okinu (Yuko Daike) and Osei (Daigoro Tachibana), whose shamisen conceals a mechanism for killing; they are hunting the "Pit Viper boss" who murdered their parents and stole their fortune.[2](https://www.shochiku.co.jp/cinema/database/04579/)
Zatoichi lodges with the vegetable seller Aunt Oume (Michiyo Ogusu) and her gambling nephew Shinkichi (Guadalcanal Taka), and learns of the Ginzo gang's extortions. Meeting Hattori in a tavern, each man recognizes the other's swordsmanship. When the siblings' revenge is revealed to point at Ginzo and his allies, Zatoichi fights on their behalf, cutting through the gang at a gambling den and eventually dueling Hattori and destroying the clan. In the epilogue, he exposes the true clan head, who has been posing as the old man at the tavern, cuts out the man's sight, and tells him to live the rest of his life blind before leaving town.[12](https://www.kinenote.com/main/public/cinema/detail.aspx?cinema_id=33601) • [1](https://jfdb.jp/en/title/59)
## Background: the character and the franchise
Zatoichi is a blind itinerant masseur and gambler who conceals a master swordsman's skill behind his cane sword (a shikomi-zue). The character originated in stories by Kan Shimozawa and became one of Japanese popular cinema's most durable heroes through the Daiei series starring Shintaro Katsu: 26 films released between 1962 and 1989, beginning with *The Tale of Zatoichi* (Kenji Misumi, 1962) and ending with Katsu's own 1989 comeback film, plus television series.[3](https://www.midnighteye.com/reviews/zatoichi/) • [6](https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/where-begin-takeshi-kitano) Katsu, who died of throat cancer in 1997, had made the role so completely his own that any successor faced an obvious comparison.[3](https://www.midnighteye.com/reviews/zatoichi/)
Kitano, born in Tokyo in 1947, was already an internationally established director whose *Hana-Bi* (1997) had won the [Golden Lion](https://www.edgepedia.org/golden-lion) at Venice; *Zatoichi* was his first venture into costume drama.[10](https://db.nipponconnection.com/ja/film/421/n-a) • [4](https://eigasai.cz/admin/fileGet.aspx?f=zdpgghhns&m=2) He deliberately avoided impersonating Katsu: his Zatoichi has bleached blond hair and a blood-red cane sword, departures from the shaven-headed original image.[11](https://shura.shu.ac.uk/15360/3/OBrien%20-%20Filmbites%20-%20Takeshi%20Kitano.pdf)
## Production and style
**Rhythm as a organizing principle.** The film treats sound and movement as structural elements rather than decoration. [Keiichi Suzuki](https://www.edgepedia.org/keiichi-suzuki)'s score grows out of the village's own noises: hoes striking earth, rain drumming, hammers falling are organized into percussion, so that field labor becomes a beat. The tap troupe The Stripes appears throughout as villagers whose synchronized work turns into dance, and the film closes with an exuberant ensemble tap number in which the whole cast, including characters who have died on screen, returns to perform.[13](https://sightlines.media/film/246/zatoichi-2003) • [14](https://www.seattlepi.com/entertainment/movies/article/comic-blood-soaked-zatoichi-aims-to-please-1150989.php) Time Asia reported that Kitano replaced traditional festive dance with hip-hop-influenced tap routines, and quoted the choreographer Hideboh, leader of the Stripes, saying "Takeshi has a special feeling for tap music."[15](https://content.time.com/time/quotes/0%2C26174%2C483348%2C00.html)
**Swordplay and editing.** Kitano, who edits his own films, applies his established elliptical method: violence is compressed so that fights resolve in a flash, with the instant before and the aftermath shown and the blow itself often elided. The blood is largely digital, and reviewers noted the stylized, manga-like effect of the staccato cutting.[13](https://sightlines.media/film/246/zatoichi-2003) • [14](https://www.seattlepi.com/entertainment/movies/article/comic-blood-soaked-zatoichi-aims-to-please-1150989.php) Kitano told Time that he gave Asano "all the cool ways of withdrawing his sword," and the magazine reported that, unhappy with Asano's fighting scenes in an earlier film, Kitano put him through three months of extra sword training before shooting began.[15](https://content.time.com/time/quotes/0%2C26174%2C483348%2C00.html) Kitano has also described the film's rain sequence as his homage to Kurosawa's *Seven Samurai*.[16](https://www.shuqi.org/asiancinema/reviews/zatoichi.shtml)
The production team included cinematographer Katsumi Yanagijima, a Kitano regular; costume designer Kazuko Kurosawa with supervision by [Yohji Yamamoto](https://www.edgepedia.org/yohji-yamamoto); and producers Masayuki Mori and Tsunehisa Saito. Production companies were [Bandai Visual](https://www.edgepedia.org/bandai-visual), Tokyo FM, Dentsu, TV Asahi, and Saito Entertainment with Office Kitano.[1](https://jfdb.jp/en/title/59) • [7](https://eiga.com/movie/1222/)
## Reception and awards
The film premiered in competition at the 60th Venice International Film Festival in 2003, where it won the Silver Lion for Best Director (Kitano's second major Venice prize after *Hana-Bi*'s 1997 Golden Lion) along with the Audience Award, the Open 2003 prize, and the Future Film Festival Digital Award; days later it took the People's Choice Award at the 28th [Toronto International Film Festival](https://www.edgepedia.org/toronto-international-film-festival).[3](https://www.midnighteye.com/reviews/zatoichi/) • [12](https://www.kinenote.com/main/public/cinema/detail.aspx?cinema_id=33601) • [17](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2003/sep/15/festivals.torontofilmfestival) It also won Best Film and the Audience Award at the Sitges Festival, where Keiichi Suzuki took Best Original Soundtrack.[18](https://sitgesfilmfestival.com/en/festival/historia/2003/awards)
At the 27th Japanese Academy Awards (2004) it won Best Music (Suzuki), Best Cinematography (Yanagijima), Best Lighting (Hitoshi Takaya), Best Sound Recording (Kenichi Horiuchi), and Best Editing (Kitano and Yoshinori Ota), with nominations including Best Film, Best Supporting Actor (Asano), and Best Supporting Actress (Michiyo Ogusu).[8](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0363226/awards/) • [7](https://eiga.com/movie/1222/) Commercially it was a hit: the Chosun Ilbo reported that it passed 2 million admissions in Japan, an exceptional figure for a Kitano film.[9](https://ekr.chosunonline.com/site/data/html_dir/2004/01/19/2004011963061.html) On Rotten Tomatoes it holds an 87% Tomatometer from 122 reviews and an 88% audience score.[19](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/zatoichi_2003)
Critics divided over the tonal mixture. The critics consensus on Rotten Tomatoes calls it "colorful, rich with action and wonderfully choreographed"; the Seattle Post-Intelligencer's review described "more reinvention than remake," praising the musical thread while noting awkward shifts in tone; and some reviewers found the closing tap number, running several minutes, an abrupt break from the genre.[19](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/zatoichi_2003) • [14](https://www.seattlepi.com/entertainment/movies/article/comic-blood-soaked-zatoichi-aims-to-please-1150989.php) • [20](https://chanpon.org/archive/2003/10/22/23h59m50s.html)
## Legacy
Kitano's film revived a dormant franchise for audiences who had never seen the Katsu originals, and demonstrated that festival recognition and broad genre entertainment could coexist in the same film. Its most cited innovation is rhythmic: the redirection of choreography from swordplay into communal dance at the close, and the integration of everyday labor sounds into the score.[13](https://sightlines.media/film/246/zatoichi-2003) Kitano did not make a sequel; his next period film, *Kubi* (2023), premiered at Cannes two decades later.[10](https://db.nipponconnection.com/ja/film/421/n-a)
## References
1. [JFDB – Zatoichi (座頭市), Japanese Film Database](https://jfdb.jp/en/title/59)
2. [Shochiku Film Database – 座頭市](https://www.shochiku.co.jp/cinema/database/04579/)
3. [Midnight Eye review: Zatoichi (Jasper Sharp, 2003)](https://www.midnighteye.com/reviews/zatoichi/)
4. [JAP festival catalog – Zatoichi](https://eigasai.cz/admin/fileGet.aspx?f=zdpgghhns&m=2)
5. [映画ナタリー – 座頭市（2003年）](https://natalie.mu/eiga/film/141046)
6. [BFI – Where to begin with Takeshi Kitano](https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/where-begin-takeshi-kitano)
7. [映画.com – 座頭市 作品情報](https://eiga.com/movie/1222/)
8. [IMDb – The Blind Swordsman: Zatoichi (2003) Awards](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0363226/awards/)
9. [Chosun Online – 『座頭市』レビュー (2004)](https://ekr.chosunonline.com/site/data/html_dir/2004/01/19/2004011963061.html)
10. [Nippon Connection – 座頭市 / About Takeshi Kitano](https://db.nipponconnection.com/ja/film/421/n-a)
11. [O'Brien, Filmbites: Takeshi Kitano (Sheffield Hallam University)](https://shura.shu.ac.uk/15360/3/OBrien%20-%20Filmbites%20-%20Takeshi%20Kitano.pdf)
12. [KINENOTE – 座頭市(2003)](https://www.kinenote.com/main/public/cinema/detail.aspx?cinema_id=33601)
13. [Sightlines – Zatoichi (2003): analysis](https://sightlines.media/film/246/zatoichi-2003)
14. [Seattle Post-Intelligencer – Comic, blood-soaked 'Zatoichi' aims to please (Sean Axmaker, 2004)](https://www.seattlepi.com/entertainment/movies/article/comic-blood-soaked-zatoichi-aims-to-please-1150989.php)
15. [TIME Asia – Quotes of the Day, September 8, 2003](https://content.time.com/time/quotes/0%2C26174%2C483348%2C00.html)
16. [Shuqi.org – Asian Cinema: Zatoichi review](https://www.shuqi.org/asiancinema/reviews/zatoichi.shtml)
17. [The Guardian – Takeshi beats field in Toronto (2003)](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2003/sep/15/festivals.torontofilmfestival)
18. [Sitges Film Festival – Awards 2003](https://sitgesfilmfestival.com/en/festival/historia/2003/awards)
19. [Rotten Tomatoes – Zatoichi (2003)](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/zatoichi_2003)
20. [Chanpon – Zatoichi commentary (2003)](https://chanpon.org/archive/2003/10/22/23h59m50s.html)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Franchise and series entries as standalone works › Action, thriller, and crime series film entries › Entries released in the 2000s › Released 2000 to 2004*
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