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The Assassination of Ryoma
Movie

The Assassination of Ryoma

1974 • Unknown

Woke Score
3.4
out of 10

Plot

Story of the last three days in the life of Sakamoto Ryoma (1836-1867), the imperial loyalist who tried to unite the Choshu and Satsuma clans and prepared the way for the Meiji Restoration (1868).

Overall Series Review

This 1974 Japanese film offers a gritty, anti-heroic revisionist portrait of the national icon Sakamoto Ryoma during his final three days. The narrative strips away his legendary status, presenting him as an 'earthy,' 'confused,' and often 'bumbling' man primarily concerned with hiding from assassins and pursuing a neighbor for sex. The style is raw, shot in high-contrast black-and-white with a hand-held camera, deliberately mocking the romanticism of traditional historical and samurai films. Its political allegory critiques the outdated feudalistic Japanese caste system and the confusion surrounding modernization. While the film subverts historical heroism and criticizes its own civilization's traditional structures, these critiques are centered on 19th-century Japanese internal caste politics, not modern Western identity concepts. The gender dynamics are crude and unromantic, but do not employ modern feminist tropes like the 'Girl Boss' or anti-natalist lecturing. Overall, the film is a product of 1970s New Wave cinema, skeptical of authority and tradition, but it does not align with the modern 'woke' framework defined by intersectional racial politics or gender ideology.

Categorical Breakdown

Identity Politics2/10

The film’s central conflict critiques the feudalistic Japanese caste system, as the main character, a low-level samurai, is shown to resent the arrogance of the higher-ranking samurai. He is depicted as trying to move past the caste prejudices of the era. The conflict is internal to Japanese society and based on social class/caste, not on race, 'whiteness' vilification, or modern intersectional theory.

Oikophobia8/10

The film aggressively deconstructs the legacy of a national hero and mocks traditional samurai institutions and history. The narrative includes scenes, like a botched, graphic seppuku, framed to show the brutality and 'insanity' of the traditional practice. The overall tone is 'blasphemous' and anti-genre, openly criticizing feudal Japanese culture as corrupt and outdated in its pursuit of a 'modern society.'

Feminism3/10

Gender dynamics are crude and exploitative, with the main male lead, Ryoma, being highly focused on lust and crudely fondling a woman early in the film. However, the female characters are not presented as 'Mary Sue' or 'Girl Boss' archetypes. The focus is on the male hero's base humanity and confusion rather than on a lecture about patriarchy or promoting anti-natalist messages. The depiction of sex is transactional and raw, a product of 1970s New Wave sensibilities, not a vehicle for modern feminist ideology.

LGBTQ+1/10

The narrative adheres to a normative structure, focusing on heterosexual relationships, however crude. There is no presence of alternative sexual ideologies, deconstruction of the nuclear family (which is not a significant element), or any commentary on modern gender theory. Sexuality, though explicit in its crudeness, remains private and unpoliticized in the sense of the queer theory lens.

Anti-Theism3/10

The film embraces a high degree of moral relativism by depicting the legendary hero as confused, flawed, and morally ambiguous. This moral vacuum stems from the collapse of the traditional samurai code and social order. However, the narrative does not specifically target or vilify traditional religion, especially Christianity, which is the focus of the scoring definition, keeping the score low.