Harakiri

Harakiri (originally Seppuku, in Japanese 切腹) is a 1962 Japanese film directed by Masaki Kobayashi and produced by the Shochiku studio. It is set between 1619 and 1630, at the start of the Edo period. The ronin Hanshiro Tsugumo, played by Tatsuya Nakadai, arrives at a clan's estate and asks to be allowed to commit seppuku on its grounds. From a martial arts point of view, the film rests on two things: the ritual of seppuku, which also involved a swordsman in the role of kaishakunin, and swordplay with the katana. According to the Japanese Wikipedia, real swords were used in the duel between the characters played by Tatsuya Nakadai and Tetsuro Tamba, and each actor holds the stances of a different period of Japanese swordsmanship. We have not been able to establish from sources who directed the fights in the film, nor that either actor actually trained in swordsmanship. At the 1963 Cannes festival the film competed for the Palme d'Or and won the Special Jury Prize. According to the Japanese Wikipedia, it also received the top prize for a Japanese film at the Mainichi Film Concours in Japan. In 2011 Takashi Miike made a 3D remake titled Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai (in Japanese Ichimei, 一命). It premiered on 19 May 2011 at the Cannes festival and in Japan on 15 October 2011; the lead role is played by Ichikawa Ebizo XI.

Martial arts in this work

Fight choreography

According to the Japanese Wikipedia, the duel between the characters played by Tatsuya Nakadai (Hanshiro Tsugumo) and Tetsuro Tamba (Hikokuro Omodaka) was filmed with real swords (shinken), not with bamboo props (takemitsu); this source describes the filming as literally risking one's life. According to the same source, Nakadai holds the hasso no kamae stance from the Sengoku period tradition, while Tamba chooses the jodan and chudan stances; the difference is meant to express the distinction between the swordsmanship of the Sengoku period and of the early Edo period. A reviewer at the Kung-fu Kingdom website writes that the weight of the real swords forced the actors to move from the hips, not just the arms, and that the fights are deliberately clumsy, without exaggerated stylization, in contrast to the samurai films of the time. We did not find the name of the head of swordplay (tate) in the sources.

Fact and fiction

The film is set between 1619 and 1630, and its premise rests on a request to commit seppuku. Seppuku appears as a samurai practice as early as the Heian period; among the earliest recorded cases are Minamoto no Tametomo in 1170, and Minamoto no Yorimasa committed seppuku after composing a poem at the start of the Genpei War. In the Edo period seppuku became highly ritualized and, from a voluntary act of honor, also turned into a judicial punishment for guilty samurai. The kaishakunin, a skilled swordsman, ended the suffering by beheading with a sword; in Edo his role became so formalized that a symbolic gesture, reaching for a fan, was enough. As a judicial punishment, seppuku was abolished in 1873.

People and martial arts

• Masaki KobayashiDirector
• Tatsuya NakadaiActor — as Hanshiro Tsugumo· Koryu Bujutsu (portrays the art on screen)
• Tetsuro TambaActor — as Hikokuro Omodaka· Koryu Bujutsu (portrays the art on screen)

Awards

• Won · Mainichi Film Concours, Japanese Film Grand Prize (1962)
• Won · Cannes Film Festival, Special Jury Prize (Prix du jury) (1963)