Shogun Assassin

This started screen life in Japan in 1972 as a Kenji Misumi samurai sword actioner with the wonderful export title of Baby Cart at the River Styx; it was then thoroughly overhauled by Roger Corman's New World (gaining a credit for 'psycho-acoustics', and the dubbed voice of Lamont Johnson for the hero) as a quickie cash-in on the popular TV mini-series Shogun. Any sense of déja vu is down to the fact that the simultaneously-shot sequel to Baby Cart, featuring the same pram-pushing avenger and son, has been doing the rounds here for years as Lightning Swords of Death. Clear as mud, innit? The exotic cheap thrills are, anyway, with the self-parodying laughs and gory comic-strip savagery making it a snappy little mongrel all round.