Hisatsu shigotonin

[mbarker]

This evening, there's a made-for-TV show on. It's Hisatsu Shigotonin 2013. I'll probably watch it, although I have to admit, I don't think the movies have been as good as the series used to be. But I enjoy trying to understand the story, and contemplating just why this particular genre scratches an itch for us.

See, hisatsu is "urgent letter" while shigotonin is "professional." "Call in the Professionals?" Something like that. It's set back in the jidaigeki or samurai era, with all the fun of swords and stuff. And the story goes that if you are in trouble, and there's no one to call, the authorities won't help, you have nowhere else to turn -- go to a certain cemetery late at night, in the dark, and bring whatever you can pay. If you are lucky, a voice will ask what you need, and tell you to leave your money. And then justice will fall on those who are doing wrong. Secret justice, in the night, when they least expect it.

The professionals are assassins for hire, but they'll only do it when the cause is just.

So at the start of the how, we usually see several people wandering around. The old series used to revolve around an old, cynical policeman, and most of the others were brought in fresh for each show. The movies -- the old actor has left but we have a young policeman, struggling hard, with his wife and mother-in-law giving him a hard time. There's a crazy painter, who keeps trying new foods. A young man who sews, quite poor. And a lady of the streets? Plus, of course, there will be someone, or a family, who is having trouble. The bad store owner is leaning on them, someone is bullying them, the evil overlord wants a night with the beautiful daughter, or something else is out of kilter. Typically, after enough struggle, someone gets killed or pretty nearly, and someone else stumbles into the cemetery, often carrying just a few coins, to tell the tale.

At which point, one of the secret workmen picks up the coins, and they get together and talk about it. Then they split up the pay, and go off to prepare. With great background music! Sharpening a long metal ice pick, that slides away in a bamboo flute, if I remember right. That's the artist. Who will get behind one of the bad guys, and slip that spike into them. We'll see an x-ray display of the spike getting close to the heart. Then he gives it one little tap, the spike slides into the heart, and as he slips it out, there's a gentle spread of blood from the stopped heart. Or the man that sews, sharpening a needle. But what he actually does is catch a bad guy in a loop of thread around their neck. Then he yanks it, and they die. The policeman? Usually he comes up near the head bad guy, often offering to help, and slips the short sword gently in. All this is very stylized, done against the backdrop of the music.

That's it. Simple story, with the world out of kilter, the appeal to the professionals, and then the restoration of justice. But most of them really ring a bell, still, even if the story is well-worn and the killings almost comical in their effects. I mean, the ice pick, the magical thread... They are a bit theatric or melodramatic. The short sword slipped in under cover, or sometimes the long katana used with skill, well, that's fine, but the others are a bit overblown.

Fun, anyway.

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Comments

[drammar.livejournal.com]

Sounds a little like a Japanese version of the A-Team.

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

Very similar actually. That same kind of outside the law, but good guys anyway feeling. But as I sort of expected, I didn't care for this show. Somehow in going from the series, which was one hour segments I think, to the two hour format, they've decided they need a couple or three plots, but then they try to link them up, and it just ends up muddled to my way of thinking. I think one bad guy, clearly laid out, works better.