Bushi no Ichibun (Love and Honor) (2007)

79% of critics liked it
(19 reviews)
83% of users liked it
(2,082 ratings)

Yoji Yamada's torchy Japanese drama Love and Honor (aka Bushi no Ichibun) follows the heartbreaking plight of Shinnojo (Yoji Yamada), a young man employed as a "food taster" for the imperial family. Shinnojo's position comes to a sudden and tragic end when he consumes poisoned fish intended for the… More Yoji Yamada's torchy Japanese drama Love and Honor (aka Bushi no Ichibun) follows the heartbreaking plight of Shinnojo (Yoji Yamada), a young man employed as a "food taster" for the imperial family. Shinnojo's position comes to a sudden and tragic end when he consumes poisoned fish intended for the clan leader and is forever robbed of his sight. Forced to give up his job, Shinnojo thus heads home and sinks into a deep and seemingly inescapable depression. Contemplating suicide, Shinnojo is only stopped by the love of his wife, Kayo, who insists that she will also commit seppuku if he proceeds. Begrudgingly, he agrees to relinquish his self-destructive thoughts, but financial problems from his unemployment linger on. With no other recourse, Shinnojo must send Kayo off to the clan bursar to appeal for monetary assistance. Nothing, however, can prepare him for the bursar's demand for his wife's body in exchange for monetary help -- or for his wife's sudden complicity in this arrangement. Rei Dan, Mitsugoro Bando, and Kaori Momoi co-star. ~ Nathan Southern, Rovi

Rating, Runtime: PG-13, 2 hr. 1 min.
Directed By: Yoji Yamada
Written By: Shuuhei Fujisawa, Yoji Yamada, Emiko Hiramatsu, Ichiro Yamamoto
Genres: Romance, Art House & International, Classics, Drama

In Theaters: Nov 2, 2007 Wide
On DVD: Nov 11, 2008
Studio: The Bigger Picture

Critic Reviews

Jason Anderson, Globe and Mail
A very satisfying tale that emphasizes one of the genre's key themes: The deepest wound a samurai may suffer does not come from any blade.
Kevin Thomas, Los Angeles Times
An impeccably made classic Japanese period picture in which a nobility of spirit is tested amid the most beautiful of settings, revealing the harshness and hypocrisy of a feudal society of the utmost formality and rigidity.
Don Willmott, Filmcritic.com
the movie has only one sword fight, and it consists of only three or four swings of the blade, but don't let that dissuade you. You won't be bored.
David Parkinson, Empire Magazine
Feudal honour is challenged by love with overwhelming consequences. Even die hard Zatoichi-ites will admire the deftness of Yamada's masterly direction.
Trevor Johnston, Time Out
It's a satisfying story, played out in decorous period surroundings of the classic warrior tale but Yamada's 79th film lacks any hint of surprise or excitement.
James Mottram, Film4
Intricate, artfully constructed and utterly assured, Love And Honour is essential viewing for anyone who has seen Yamada's earlier samurai films. If you haven't, don't miss the chance to see what is a finely tuned example of the genre.
Wendy Ide, Times [UK]
The storytelling is all rather flat, as is the lighting. And the duel, when it finally comes, is something of an anticlimax.
Peter Bradshaw, Guardian [UK]
A fervent, sweet-natured tragic romance.
Tim Evans, Sky Movies
Gently paced and delicately played, give this long enough and it becomes a compelling watch that eventually rewards any moral aspirations with a splendid Zatoichi-style scrap that manages to stay its welcome.
Matthew Turner, ViewLondon
The third in director Yoji Yamada's Samurai Trilogy is an enjoyable, well acted drama, with a superb climactic swordfight and a plot that seems to have been lifted straight out of Hollywood melodrama.
Rich Cline, Shadows on the Wall
Veteran director Yamada continues to examine issues of duty and loyalty, sharply using matter-of-fact period detail and deep characterisations.
Joseph Proimakis, Movies for the Masses
dyskoleyetai na kratisei ypo elegho toys melodramatismoys tis, kai sto deytero miso tis se krataei men me sfigmena ta heria ap' tin agonia, katorthoma, omos, poy den eimai sigoyros oti einai kai toso dyskolo, otan s' ehei paei os ekei me ta sagonia tentom
Louis Proyect, rec.arts.movies.reviews
Final installment in samurai trilogy that features a blind swordsman in an utterly distinct fashion from the Zatoichi movies--a far more vulnerable and far more believable hero.
Simon Abrams, New York Press
Thanks to its focus on internal struggle and domestically confined drama, Love and Honor is the wilting lily of Yamada's trilogy, albeit an exceptionally satisfying romance.
Marc Mohan, Oregonian
Gracefully directed, deliberately paced and intentionally free of the action you'd expect from a samurai film, all of which makes its climactic confrontation that much more effective.
Jeff Shannon, Seattle Times
It's an exquisitely crafted melodrama, moving with stately grace toward an understated yet forceful quest for revenge.
Bill White, Seattle Post-Intelligencer
The film is void of action until a final duel that is staged with a believability that makes the supernatural skill displayed in most blind swordsman films seem preposterous.
Wade Major, Boxoffice Magazine
Love and Honor is a welcome affirmation of Yamada's determination to maintain his historic workload, even while in his 70s.
Matt Pais, Metromix.com
Might work as a short story but as a full-length makes for a long, slow round of watch-checking.

Read all 19 critic reviews

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Featured Audience Ratings

Luke B

Love and Honor is even greater than Yamada's previous films Twilight Samurai and Hidden Blade. He has perfected his style of serene and subtle tales of ill-begotten samurai. Here we find a lord's poison taster left blinded after eating some out of season shellfish. What… More
Love and Honor is even greater than Yamada's previous films Twilight Samurai and Hidden Blade. He has perfected his style of serene and subtle tales of ill-begotten samurai. Here we find a lord's poison taster left blinded after eating some out of season shellfish. What follows is a web of lies, slowly broken down. Each time the truth surfaces, things get a little worse. Like the films pace, the lies start as small, with Kimmura's wife saying that the fireflies have not yet come out, probably to stop him from missing such beautiful sites. Yamada even manages to make the audience appreciate the littlest insect, as a blind Kimmura is, unknowingly, pestered by a butterfly. It builds to a wonderfully tense climax and an excellent and underplayed duel. The visual lyricism and subtext of the dialogue is wonderfully scattered in the film. Despite the film's gloomy goings on, it is never a depressing film. In fact, it has an excellent sense of visual humour that works surprisingly well. Yamada has left it late in life, but his recent samurai trilogy rivals some of Kurosawa's classics.
Sanjaya &

A very very Japanese movie.. It shows us the real faces of the Japanese in the past... The story was ordinary, but the directing was pretty good... So it was a pretty good movie.. But for me, Takuya Kimura act wasn't pretty good at all.. He doesn't show the acting that he is… More
A very very Japanese movie.. It shows us the real faces of the Japanese in the past... The story was ordinary, but the directing was pretty good... So it was a pretty good movie.. But for me, Takuya Kimura act wasn't pretty good at all.. He doesn't show the acting that he is blind people... Rei Dan acts was the good ones... She can shows the feel that she is a really depressed young wife... At last, it's a pretty interesting movie to watch....
danny d

this is a beautiful film. the close of yoji yamada's loose samurai trilogy, this film catches a seemingly cliche theme of a man looking for sight through blind eyes and makes something extrordinary and anything but cliche. the diologue is poetic and tragic and the story is… More
this is a beautiful film. the close of yoji yamada's loose samurai trilogy, this film catches a seemingly cliche theme of a man looking for sight through blind eyes and makes something extrordinary and anything but cliche. the diologue is poetic and tragic and the story is passionate and heart felt. the acting, music, and direction were amazing and the cinematography was as good as it gets. yamada should never stop making period pieces, all three from the trilogy of films with similar themes were mind blowing. this will be one of my most rewatched films in years to come.