Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart to Hades

Ogami Itto was the shogunate's executioner; after his family was killed he gave up the office and became an assassin for hire. With him are his three year old son Daigoro and a baby cart with weapons hidden inside it. In this instalment he submits himself to torture in order to save a woman and takes a commission in return; the target is a provincial official, and hundreds of soldiers stand in the way. Kenji Misumi directs. It is the third film in the series. The source is the manga by Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima. The idea of the series is that father and son have taken the same road. Daigoro witnesses every killing and the film does not soften it; the child is not an assistant but part of the road. This instalment is the most cited of the series; the mass battle at the end involves hundreds of men and is among the largest engagements in the genre. The violence is exaggerated and stylised; the arterial spray is deliberately unrealistic and the manner later influenced western cinema. The background is Edo period politics: reckonings between clans, official inquiries, and the erasure of a family name. Tomisaburo Wakayama played Ogami in all six films and performed most of the fighting himself. Who it is for: viewers who like samurai films and manga adaptations. Who it is not for: the violence is very heavy, most of the women exist as material for it, and the context is incomplete without the series.