Line #11 Film/WhenTheLastSwordIsDrawn


1	[[quoteright:313:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/when_the_last_sword_is_drawn.jpg]]
2	''When the Last Sword Is Drawn'' (''壬生義士伝 Mibu Gishi Den'', "Legend of the Loyal Retainers of Mibu") is a 2002 Japanese [[HistoricalFiction historical drama film]], based on a novel by Creator/JiroAsada. Directed by Creator/YojiroTakita, it stars Creator/KiichiNakai and Creator/KoichiSato.
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4	One dark night sometime in the late 19th century, former {{samurai}} Saitō Hajime (Sato) brings his sick grandson to the local physician, Chiaki Ono (Creator/TakehiroMurata). On the doctor's mantelpiece, he spies an old photograph of a man he recognizes from [[UsefulNotes/MeijiRestoration the Bakumatsu and the Boshin War]], whom he knew as Nambu Morioka.
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6	In a series of flashbacks, the two men recall the story of an ImpoverishedPatrician named Yoshimura Kanichiro (Nakai) who defied his lord and left his home and family to serve in UsefulNotes/TheShinsengumi, taking the pseudonym Nambu Morioka. Saitō's initial impression of Nambu as a money-grubbing coward is put to the test as the simple-seeming man from Nambu proves himself again and again a MasterSwordsman.
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8	The film was nominated for eight awards at the 2004 Japanese Academy Awards, and won Best Film, Best Actor (Nakai), and Best Supporting Actor (Sato). A trailer can be viewed [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IudtQ4ZIok here.]]
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10	!!This film contains examples of the following tropes:
11	* AcheyScars: Saitou Hajime walks with a limp in the film's present day, which turns out to be a souvenir of a gunshot wound to the calf he sustained when he tried to follow Yoshimura on his UnderequippedCharge. He's shown clutching at it when he recalls the scene.
12	* CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass: Yoshimura puts on the air of a coward who's OnlyInItForTheMoney. Actually, he's sending most of his earnings home to his family and simply dislikes fighting, only doing it when he feels he has no choice (honorable or practical, depending on the situation).
13	* DualWielding: When the Imperial Army catches up with the Shinsengumi towards the end of the film and demands their surrender, Yoshimura's response is to draw both his katana and wakizashi, make a stirring speech, and charge into the guns.
14	* EndOfAnAge: This film is set during the UsefulNotes/MeijiRestoration, which historically saw the downfall of the samurai class and shogunate as the ''de facto'' rulers of Japan, and the Emperor taking back direct rulership for the first time in several hundred years. After this, Japan rapidly industrialized and Westernized, ultimately becoming the dominant superpower of East Asia until UsefulNotes/WorldWarII. This film is told from the point of view of the ''losing'' side of the revolution, framing it as tragic but largely inevitable.
15	* FramingDevice: The film is told as a series of flashbacks of Saitō and Chiaki recalling their memories of Yoshimura.
16	* GatlingGood: One is featured briefly in a scene during the Boshin War.
17	* TheHeroDies: [[spoiler:Yoshimura bleeds out from the gunshot wounds he takes in a headlong one-man attack on the Imperial army.]]
18	* HistoricalDomainCharacter: Several major figures of the UsefulNotes/MeijiRestoration period appear in the film.
19	** Saitō Hajime is one of the more popular figures of UsefulNotes/TheShinsengumi, and acts as co-narrator and {{deuteragonist}}. The film also features Hijikata Toshizo (played by Creator/EugeneNomura) and Okita Soji (Creator/MasatoSakai).
20	** Among government figures, Ōkubo Toshimichi is played by Creator/KanjiTsuda, and Creator/HideakiIto plays Tokugawa Yoshinobu, the 15th and final shogun.
21	* HonorBeforeReason: Late in the war, Saitō tells Yoshimura to desert and go home: everyone knows the shogunate forces are losing, and Saitō doesn't want him to die for no purpose. Yoshimura refuses, shortly before suicidally charging a company of Imperial troops. [[spoiler:He does return home afterwards, so badly injured he dies shortly after.]]
22	* ImpoverishedPatrician: As a samurai, Yoshimura is the Japanese equivalent of a knight, a retainer of the lord of Nambu, but he barely earns enough teaching at his lord's dojo to keep his family fed and housed. He initially asks his lord for permission to leave the clan to join the Shinsengumi for higher wages, then runs away in the night anyway when denied permission, which leads to his son being bullied by other students.
23	* MartialPacifist: In the finest East Asian tradition, Yoshimura is a MasterSwordsman who prefers the discipline of swordwork to actual fighting, only fighting when he feels he has no other choice.
24	* MasterSwordsman: Yoshimura was a dojo instructor in Nambu, and though only a poor samurai from the northern backcountry, he's able to hold his own when a drunken Saitō draws on him outside a bar despite having a few drinks in him himself. [[spoiler:Late in the film, he singlehandedly attacks a company-strength unit of the Imperial Army with only his katana and wakizashi, and actually survives long enough to make it back to Nambu before succumbing to his injuries the following night.]]
25	* MistakenForDying: Saitō isn't sure his grandson is ''dying'', but he has a fever that won't go down. Shizu (Dr. Chiaki's wife, and Yoshimura's daughter) assures him it's not serious.
26	* OnlyInItForTheMoney: As Nambu Morika, Yoshimura cultivates the impression of a greedy coward. He actually sends most of the money he earns in the Shinsengumi home to his family in Nambu.
27	* RomancingTheWidow: A close variant. Chiaki married Shizu after her father Yoshimura came home mortally wounded, and her older brother Kaichirou left to take his father's place fighting in the Boshin War and didn't come back.
28	* SecurityCling: Having lost both her father and her older brother to the Boshin War, Shizu clings tightly to her husband Chiaki in her sleep.
29	* {{Seppuku}}:
30	** Yoshimura first shows his true skills when he acts as ''kaishakunin'' for a Shinsengumi who had been ordered to commit seppuku. The man chickens out and tries to run, but Yoshimura catches and kills him with two blows.
31	** The children of other samurai bully Yoshimura's son Kaichirou after his father defies his lord by leaving the clan, telling Kaichirou to commit hara-kiri. Chiaki defends Kaichirou.
32	** [[spoiler:Yoshimura's lord]] orders him to kill himself when he returns home after the battle, but [[spoiler:he succumbs to his injuries first]].
33	* UnderequippedCharge: Late in the film, Yoshimura and Saitou's Shinsengumi unit are cornered by a musket company of the Imperial Army and ordered to withdraw from the area or be killed as rebels against Emperor Meiji. As his comrades flee, Yoshimura [[DualWielding draws his wakizashi (he already had his katana out)]], and yells to the Imperial troops, "I do not wish to raise my arm against His Majesty the Emperor, but my conscience bids me to fight!" He then charges alone into the guns with only his two swords, disappearing into the smoke as Saitou tries to follow but goes down from a gunshot to the ankle.
34	* WreckedWeapon: After beheading the seppuku runaway, Yoshimura falsely claims to have incurred a chip in his katana's blade in the process in order to extract more money from the Shinsengumi officers (ostensibly to replace the sword). [[spoiler:When he returns to Nambu badly wounded after fighting the Imperial Army, his sword is so badly bent his lord gives him one of his own to commit seppuku with.]]

Context Film / WhenTheLastSwordIsDrawn