Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai

Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai (一命, 2011) — watch online on iFILM. Directed by Takashi Miike and starring Koji Yakusho, this Japanese period drama follows an aging, impoverished samurai named Hanshiro who arrives at the Iyi clan's manor with a single request: permission to take his own life on the premises.

The clan's senior retainer has seen this before. He tells Hanshiro about a young ronin named Motome who came with the same request not long ago. What happened to Motome is ugly enough to be delivered in pieces. Hanshiro listens. Then he makes his own request — that three specific guards be present at his ritual. As it happens, all three are absent. Each one is gone for a reason.

Miike shoots the film with an almost theatrical stillness — a long way from his usual register — letting the moral weight build instead. Based on Yasuhiko Takiguchi's novel, the story uses the samurai code not as a celebration of honor but as an exposure of how institutions wield it against those with no power. Stream Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai (2011) on iFILM.