Part of 1973
Educated from birth in the art of assassination, Shurayuki Hime (Meiko Kaji) — or Yuki for short — is groomed to fulfill a singular life purpose: revenge. In retribution for the murders of her father and brother and the rape of her mother, she blazes a crimson trail of a merciless gore in the fulfillment of her destiny. Toshiya Fujita’s film remains true to the spirit of its comic origins (it’s based on a manga by “Lone Wolf And Cub” creator Kazuo Koike) by delivering one eye-popping set piece after another, awash in operatic violence and enough fake blood to give any viscera-crazed slasher fan reason to cheer. In recent years, it’s earned reappraisal as one of the key entries into the blood-soaked genre of ‘70s Samurai epics thanks to being the primary point of influence for Quentin Tarantino’s celebrated KILL BILL films.
“A pulpy, violent tale of revenge based on a comic serialized in a popular Playboy-esque men’s magazine, LADY SNOWBLOOD didn’t have to be art. But director Toshiya Fujita treated it as such…. This is one of those movies where blood doesn’t run or drip, it sprays — she’s both human and divine.” —Katie Rife, The A.V. Club “Conscious and unconscious reflections of LADY SNOWBLOOD shimmer throughout cinema — in the films of Quentin Tarantino and Chan-wook Park, and even in the snowy lightsaber fight in STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS. If casual viewers know LADY SNOWBLOOD at all, they might recognize the first film as the inspiration for Lucy Liu‘s character O-Ren Ishii in the KILL BILL films, and as a pointer to the snowy showdown between O-Ren and Uma Thurman‘s Beatrix Kiddo.” —Russ Fischer, IndieWire
