Directed by Umetsugu Inoue • 1963 • Japan
Starring Raizo Ichikawa, Hizuro Takachiho, Masayo Banri

Despite its sixteenth-century setting, this thrilling saga of identity, doubles, and deception has a lot to say about modern Japan and issues of class, caste systems, and their toll on the people trapped within them. Based on a novel by leftist author Norio Nanjo, THE THIRD SHADOW WARRIOR weaves the twisty tale of Kyonosuke Ninomiya (Raizo Ichikawa), a young peasant whose dreams of becoming a samurai seemingly come true when he is recruited to serve as a lookalike decoy for a merciless warlord. But rather than the glory he envisioned, Ninomiya is thrust into a vicious power struggle and a nightmarish identity crisis from which there may be no escape.