"Actor: Reiko"

• Shogun's Samurai | DVD | (21/10/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  With Shogun Samurai, veteran Japanese director Fukasaku Kinji demonstrated that he could do more than the gritty social realist cop-and-gangster films for which he remains most famous. A deliberately stately historical drama, with a slightly ponderous narrator introducing some of its most powerful scenes, Shogun Samurai shows the succession crisis that followed the death of the second Tokugawa Shogun in the early 17th-century. The Imperial court fans the flames in an attempt to restore the Emperor's power; a young dancer tries to preserve the young prince she loves; a warrior clan take steps to return to their homeland; and the fencing master Yagyu will expend honour and lives, including those of his own children, to ensure that his school is patronised by the new Shogun. The film alternates powerful scenes of intrigue and stagy monomaniac rants by Yagyu with finely choreographed scenes of battle and duel; it has a powerful and tragic sense of the fragile sadness of things and the futility of all ambitions; Sonny Chiba is unusually impressive as Yagyu's most honourable son, the one-eyed Jubel. On the DVD: Shogun Samurai on disc has minimal additional features: a short prose profile of Fukasaku Kinji and some promotional clips. Picture is anamorphic 16:9. --Roz Kaveney

• Tokyo Bullet Reloaded - Black Angel / Score / Gonin | DVD | (01/02/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  The Black Angel: Ddirector Takashi Ishii continues to explore his distinct vision of Tokyo as a dark forbidding Technopolis a city of faceless chrome and marble structures cold lights and deep shadows. The Black Angel stars Riona Hazuki as Ikko the most powerful female action heroine ever to hit celluloid. At age 6 Ikko was safely put on a plane to Los Angeles by hitman Mayo but not before seeing her Yakuza boss father and mistress mother killed before her eyes. Flash forward 14 years. Ikko returns to Tokyo seeking revenge for the killings. She too calls herself the Black Angel styling herself after Mayo whom she remembers as a towering almost superhuman figure. When her target realises that she is after him and his gang he enlists the original Black Angel to wipe out Ikko and the stage is set for a violent reunion... (Dir. Takashi Ishii 1997) Gonin: Japanese Director Takashi Ishii's brutal hyperstylish hallucinogenic "" roller coaster"" of a movie takes a group of five desperate men through the robbery of a Yakuza gangster and the bloody revenge that follows. Ishii has assembled a cast of Japan's coolest actors including Naoto Takenaka (""Shall We Dance"") and the legendary 'Beat' Takeshi Kitano and his fluid sensual camera work creates sequences of unrivalled ballistic bloodshed. But what really raises this movie to a different level is the off-beat characters: 'Beat' Takeshi's sadistic portrayal of the one-eyed hitman gay hustlers and downtrodden ex-cops give 'Gonin' an eccentric film noir atmosphere that will blow you away. (Dir. Takashi Ishii 1995) Score: A gang of thieves come together for a jewellery heist one which they naturally carry out in their finest Reservoir Dogs outfits. All goes pretty much according to plan until a pair of psychotic highway robbers follow them to their hideout and attempt to part the gang from their loot... (Dir. Atsushi Muroga 1995)

• Sword of Vengeance (Re-mastered) | DVD | (31/07/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  For the first time in the UK Sword Of Vengeance has been created from a new print supplied by Toho with the digitisation and cleansing process carried out by Technicolor. Framed for treason the official executioner of the Shogunate Ogami Itto is stripped of office and declared an outlaw. Together with his infant son Diagoro he sets out as a mercenary on a blood-soaked journey of revenge against the secret society that murdered his wife and robbed him of his good name. With his life in ruins and literally believing that he is in hell he and his baby son have become a Lone Wolf and Cub! An edited version of Sword of Vengeance was released in 1983 by Roger Corman and Robert Houston as Shogun Assassin amalgamating both the aforementioned and Babycart at the River Styx the second film in the 'Lone Wolf And Cub' series.

• Godzilla gegen Mechagodzilla | Blu Ray | (31/10/2019) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• Queen Emeraldas | DVD | (19/07/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  In a far distant future a would-be master race seeks to dominate the galaxy. Against these merciless Afressians mankind has just one hope: the mysterious female warrior known as Emeraldas. Driven by the tortured memory of her lost love Emeraldas sails the Sea of Stars like a privateer of old blasting the forces of tyranny into atoms with an amazing array of futuristic weapons. But when the devious Commander Eldomain kidnaps a group of innocent civillians Emeraldas is drawn into a deadly trap from which even she may not escape! Featuring state of the art animation Leiji Matsumoto's fearless heroine who appeared with Captain Horlock and the crew of Galaxy Express 999 has her own special adventure!

• Saint John's Wort | DVD | (02/02/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Nami an artist working on a computer game visits a house that resembles one from dreams she has been having. As she explores it with one of the game's producers they feel as though they are being watched...

• Baby Cart at the River Styx | DVD | (03/11/2008) from £42.14   |  Saving you £-22.15 (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  For the first time in the UK Babycart At The River Styx has been created from a new print supplied by Toho with the digitisation and cleansing process carried out by Technicolor. Ogami Itto is dead - Lone wolf lives on continuing his blood spattered journey through the land he calls Hell. As he remorselessly seeks the secretive shadowy Yagu clan they continue in their efforts to destroy him first sending their female warriors the vicious Akashi ninja. Beyond them barring his way the self proclaimed 'Gods of Death' sadistic warriors with a lust for blood. Lone Wolf must defeat them to justify the 500 pieces of gold that have bought his sword once more.

• Onibi - The Fire Within | DVD | (25/07/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Kunihiro (Harada) is glad to be back in the outside world after a stretch in prison. He's even more glad to see his old friend Tanigawa (Aikawa) who is more than keen to welcome him back into the yakuza fold. However tired of the gangster life Kunihiro wants to go straight but finds that many obstacles not least Tanigawa stand in his way...