Santaro Marune

Two brothers, Takamaru and Kikumaru, are living with their father, Hakuraku-Ou, until one day Hakuraku-Ou is killed by "Death's-Head" Ginnosuke, a villain skilled in the art of sorcery. Hakuraku-Ou had long been seeking a Tiger Seal which, together with the Dragon Seal in his possession, would reveal the location of a huge ancestral fortune. But on the very night that the Tiger Seal was found, it was stolen by Tomomitsu, Ginnosuke's chief. When the two brothers receive the Dragon Seal from their father just before his death they determine to go to Death's-Head Castle, in order to recover the Tiger Seal.

長谷川伸の同名小説を、水野伸郎、野上龍雄が脚色、久方振りに丸根賛太郎が監督した、お家騒動をめぐる時代劇。撮影は「大岡政談　謎の逢びき」の片岡清。「七人若衆誕生」の松本錦四郎、「花嫁の抵抗」の小山明子、「昨日は昨日今日は今日」の北上弥太朗などが出演している。

1956 Japanese film, originally released in two parts.

Jida-geki by Santaro Marune.

Jida-geki by Santaro Marune.

A lowly drunken samurai finds an abandoned baby in the woods and takes it home. A gift from a fox. But there's something special about the boy.

A lowly drunken samurai finds an abandoned baby in the woods and takes it home. A gift from a fox. But there's something special about the boy.

A lowly drunken samurai finds an abandoned baby in the woods and takes it home. A gift from a fox. But there's something special about the boy.

元寇の役における博多湾での海戦を、オールスター・キャストで描いたスペクタクル時代劇。 台風シーンは、東宝特撮陣を招いて撮影された。 もはや神風にでも頼らなければ、日本は戦争に勝てないと思って製作されたような気もする、挙国一致の気概をあおる愛国映画である。

According to Donal Richie in The Japanese Film it was meant to do for sumo wrestling what Kurosawa had done for judo in Sanshiro sugata, and that Kurosawa wrote it for Daiei after "drinking up all [his] money" (from his autobiography).