Namakura Gatana (The Dull Sword)

A short comedy: a samurai proudly buys a new sword, discovers it cannot cut anything, and is chased off by the townspeople he tried it on. The drawing is spare and the timing is surprisingly modern.

For decades the film was believed lost. A print turned up in an antique market in Osaka in 2008, which is the source of most copies in circulation today. Our VHS copy is a Japanese TV broadcast from the late 1990s that predates the rediscovery and shows a slightly different, more worn print.

We keep both versions. The print scan is cleaner; the tape has two title cards the scan does not.