Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #84701 in DVD
• Released on: 2002-12-23
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: NTSC
• Original language: English
• Running time: 104 minutes

From Amazon.com
There's cheese-ball fun to this 1979 misfire, an American-Japanese coproduction made to cash in on Shogun-mania. Richard Boone (in his last role) plays the real-life Commodore Perry, who ended centuries of Japanese isolation by signing a treaty with a resolute shogun (Toshiro Mifune) in 1854. Against the historical backdrop is the fictional adventure of a Yankee officer (a stiff and stilted Frank Converse) who pits American gumption against samurai swordsmanship to recover the sacred Bushido Blade. Sonny Chiba's dynamic presence as a warrior prince helps energize the rudimentary fight choreography and the low budget shows through in undernourished set pieces. But the pace never lets up, and helping distract from Converse's crippling lack of charisma are the solid supporting cast, among them half-Japanese female samurai Laura Gemser, imprisoned sailor James Earl Jones, and Mike Starr as the burly bosun who bonds with a sumo wrestler in a tussle that bridges cultural and verbal barriers. --Sean Axmaker