“The movie starts with the narrator telling us about a brute who has got a penis like a horse, which means that this is going to be his story.” The man’s name is Sentaro and the first scene of the film shows him in attempt to have sex with a young girl in a field, but the girl turns out to be stronger than he thought so he fails. It also happens just at this time when Manjiro who believes himself to be an agent gets involved and shoots the “unsuccessful rapist”.
Later on they become lovers; it means that between them sex is regular while Sentaro finds himself amidst the Civil War waged by Shinshengumi against government troops. Moreover MAnjiro follows suit albeit in his own way which keeps changing sides too often as do women from one of local brothels. Meanwhile, there are more and more severe battles. This movie is full of Okamoto’s ironic and parodising humor, but the central source of the same is definitely seen in the repeatedly shown battle montage and having sex by Sentaro and Manjiro which are rather mockery that will leave anyone laughing at them because it is too obvious. Furthermore, this is also true with respect to the previous idea whereby while these two unlucky fellows are having sex, those ‘honourable samurais’ are inflicting various forms of torture on themselves for disgraced and killed one like this. It works similarly when put up side-by-side with the previous thought whereby even though they were considered as subordinate peasants by these fighters, they appeared to be satisfied by themselves completely.
Despite being quite common and sex too, Okamoto spends a lot of time on the same in the film; however, it is remarkable that the battles are mesmerizingly staged with this part representing one of the few serious aspects of samurai depiction. The costumes themselves, the sword versus gunplay, even how DP Daisaku Kimura handles each one of them are fantastic in an unusual sense for such an intense parodying film. In that regard therefore, the movie takes a whole new direction that involves cruelty, violence, several deaths and their aftermaths as well as some torturing basically helping to make it work out rather well though due to its entertainment value and also as seen via its general deconstruction of Bushido in totality.
The sexual scenes are interestingly shown as there is almost no nudity, and the overall impression they give off is more humorous than seductive, particularly in Sentaro’s case. Again, this section has the best camera work. The same thing goes for Yoshitami Kuroiwa’s editing that enables a rather fitting fast pace and reaches its climax through these many montages.
The performances are appropriately varied. Tsutomu Hiura gets to be a good clown while Yusuke Okada plays Manjiro like he thinks he is cleverer than he actually is and both of them are pretty funny for most of the movie. However Tatsuya Nakadai as Hijikata Toshizo remains dignified and serious all through.
Although Battle Cry is uneven at times with certain moments when it seems like Okamoto didn’t know what he was doing, it works well as both entertainment with sex comedy elements, and also as an elegy on war’s follies, the wickedness of Bushido and how futile it could be then.
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