Bounty Hunters, Yakuzas and Rōnins: Intercultural Transformations between the Italian Western and the Japanese Swordfight Film in the 1960s

Abstract

This chapter presents a comparative analysis based on the assumption that the outlaw is a global figural stereotype in cinematic narratives that make use of semantic elements as well as syntactic formations of the Western genre. It argues that typical figures of the Italian Western and the Japanese sword film make equivalent claims on the outlaw narrative. In the Italian Western, bounty hunters and mercenaries are often ‘nihilistic heroes’ who, although they are not outlaws in a narrow sense of the word, often act like them in an ambivalent way. The sword film can be considered a subgenre of jidai-geki (the Japanese expression for historical period dramas). Typical figures in these films are rōnins (masterless samurais) and yakuzas (gamblers), who often act as bounty hunters and mercenaries. All these figures are modelled on the stereotype of the outlaw.