Shinobi: Heart Under Blade is a live-action adaptation of Fûtaro Yamada’s ninja-adventure novel The Kouga Ninja Scrolls, which in turn inspired the manga and anime Basilisk—so with a pedigree like that it ought to be a knockout. It’s stuffed with outlandish costumes, lush scenery, savage fights and bizarre adversaries. But it’s strangely unengaging as a story, and anyone who’s familiar with the original material (like me) will squirm at how much has been thrown out.
Back when the original DVD edition of it appeared I wrote a review for my own site where I panned it roundly. Now having seen it again on Blu-ray Disc, I’m inclined to be a little kinder to it, if only because it really does look spectacular on all counts—and because anime/manga fans will almost certainly get a bang out of it. The cliché that this is a “manga come to life” completely applies here, but sadly, that’s pretty much all it is.
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