Silver Screen Samurai is a nice little read published in 2004 by Cocoro Books and DH Publishing. Well, there isn’t much reading considering that it’s mostly pictures. The full-color book is a display of Japanese samurai movie posters.

The movies run the gamut starting with “Zazen Tange Returns” (1935) and conculde with Kitano’s stellar 2003 remake, “Zatoichi”. There is suprisingly much diversity concerning the titles chosen for print. Each poster has a romaji title as well as an English translation. The book is also complete with production info and summary for each film. Another nice inclusion is that every poster has an approximate value listed above it. Within the book are a few nice 2-page offsets that tell of everything from actor biographies to “women of the sword” to samurai in anime.

Favorite posters of mine include “The Warriors and the Lady” (1957), Ambush (1970), The Chanbara Graffiti (1981), Samurai Fiction (1998), and Owl’s Castle (1999).

I reccommend Silver Screen Samurai for the sole purpose that it is a cool addition to any samurai movie fan’s collection.

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