Onna Sazen: Tsubanari mutô-ryû no maki - Production & Contact Info (original) (raw)

Sanjiro, the third son of Tayasu Chikatsune, a close relative of the shogun, was wed to Fuyo, princess of the Marquis of Kishu. Sanjiro was given an excellent Shizu Saburo sword by the Kishu family, and under the pretext of testing its ...See moreSanjiro, the third son of Tayasu Chikatsune, a close relative of the shogun, was wed to Fuyo, princess of the Marquis of Kishu. Sanjiro was given an excellent Shizu Saburo sword by the Kishu family, and under the pretext of testing its sharpness, he devoted himself to nightly killing a passerby. Kagehisa, the master of the Ogiyama Dojo, had taught his disciples that the sword is to be used not to challenge but to defend, but two of his disciples went out to exterminate the street killer, only to be returned and slain. Kagehisa's daughter Rurimi (Ryûko Kawaji) excelled in the Tsubanari-Muto school he had devised. One night, dressed as a man, she waited at a street corner and, calling herself Tange Sazen, she struck Sanjiro with the back of the sword and admonished him for his recklessness, thus bringing shame on her father's disciples. But soon after, Sanjiro was killed by someone and his Shizu Saburo sword was also taken away. Rurimi's fiancee Somechi Chikara, a spy for the shogunate, was ordered to arrest Sanjiro's murderer, and Sanjiro's followers Sugimori and Ikebe testified that a Tsubanari-Muto school expert named Tange Sazen was responsible. Rurimi ran away from home to find the real murderer, while Kagehisa protected her daughter and got arrested. Hotta Yamato, a retainer of the Kishu family, had been seducing Sanjiro through Sugimori and Ikebe into the street killing in order to bring his nephew Samanosuke and Princess Fuyo together to gain the favor of the Marquis of Kishu. However, when Yamato learned that Akaboshi Ikkaku, his confidant, had slain Sanjiro in an attempt to gain favor with Yamato, he had Akaboshi cut down the witnesses Sugimori and Ikeba for fear of exposing his misdeeds. Rurimi, who had been living in the tenement of the Ogiyama family's gardener Yasuke and his daughter Ofuji, met the dying Sugimori under the tutelage of flute master Chikamaro Umetani and unintentionally learned of Yamato's plot. Sugimori still appeared at Yamato's concubine's house, took the hidden Shizu Saburo sword, and escaped, but was hunted down by Akaboshi to Ofuji's tenement, where Yasuke was killed, while Sugimori escaped with the sword and went missing. On the day of Kagehisa's execution and the wedding ceremony of Samanosuke and Princess Fuyo, Rurimi went to the ceremony to uncover Yamato's plot, but was almost trapped because she did not have the Shizu Saburo sword, an important piece of evidence. But then Sugimori appeared, breaking through the ceiling, and the tables were turned, and the villains were finally defeated. Written by Yoshito See less