Nomi faces a daunting task in Hitoshi Matsumoto’s SCABBARD SAMURAI
SCABBARD SAMURAI (SAYA ZAMURAI) (Hitoshi Matsumoto, 2011)
Friday, July 6, Film Society of Lincoln Center, Walter Reade Theater, 165 West 65th St. at Amsterdam Ave., 212-875-5601, 3:30
Saturday, July 14, Japan Society, 333 East 47th St. at First Ave., 212-715-1258, 1:00
www.subwaycinema.com/nyaff12
Having given up on life following the death of his wife, wayward samurai Nomi Kanjuro (first-time actor Takaaki Nomi) roams nineteenth-century Japan with an empty scabbard, running away from confrontation while accepting the verbal wrath of his extremely embarrassed nine-year-old daughter, Tae (Sea Kumada). After surviving three fanciful and fantastical — and far too silly and stylized — attacks by a trio of oddball bounty hunters (Ryo, Rolly, and Zennosuke Fukkin), Nomi is arrested and brought to a castle where the boy prince has not cracked even the hint of a smile since the recent death of his mother. Nomi is faced with the 30-Day Feat — every day for a month, he has the opportunity to try to make the prince smile. If Nomi fails, he must commit a very public seppuku. And so begins a comic series of events in which the dour Nomi, who barely ever speaks, turns into a kind of dark clown, but it’s clear that it’s going to take something very special to end the prince’s dilemma. Written and directed by Hitoshi Matsumoto (Big Man Japan, Symbol), Scabbard Samurai is an offbeat, charming black comedy about going on with life after experiencing tragic loss. Nomi is forced to try to make the boy prince smile, yet Nomi does not smile himself, rejecting his future even through the taunts of his daughter, who is very much alive and wants a more satisfying life. The inclusion of the three bounty hunters, who form a kind of Greek chorus, is unnecessary and detracts from the story’s otherwise more serious themes, but Scabbard Samurai is still an entertaining film that continually takes surprising twists and turns. Scabbard Samurai is screening July 6 at the Film Society of Lincoln Center and July 14 at Japan Society, a copresentation of the New York Asian Film Festival and Japan Cuts.