Three Outlaw Samurai | Blu-ray

Hideo Gosha's debut picture immediately captured the energy shift in chambara (samurai) cinema. So much so, in fact, that the film essentially takes viewers through the transition of the genre over the course of its runtime.

Effectively a 'bottle movie', Three Outlaw Samurai tells the tale of three disparate swordsmen hired to diffuse a hostage situation, after a local lord's daughter is kidnapped by a band of peasants. As the film goes on, however, it becomes more and more clear that this was a crime born of desperation and that justice is on the side of the peasants.

Where classic samurai film saw these men as the chivalrous and code-bound envoys of the nobility. Samurais of the 60s became more and more aligned with Spaghetti Western heroes as lawless outsiders. Three Outlaw Samurai shows that shift with perfect clarity.