Description:

aka: Samurai Commando: Mission 1549 - This is the second movie adaptation of a novel written by Ryo Hanmura. The first being the campy and fun, 1979 "G.I. Samurai". Starring cult favorite action star Sonny Chiba. Notably, the two movies have very little in common besides their basic plot-outline.

A small squadron of the Japanese Self Defense Force including vehicles are sucked into a time-warp and find themselves in the middle of the Senguko period. A very bloody era when Japan was torn by countless battles between power-hungry warlords. Seeing as they have no apparent way of returning home the men of the SDF taskforce decide to do their best and adapt to this time period. And by adapt I mean exploit their superior military equipment so that they can dominate Japan.

This is as close as the two adaptations get from one another. "Samurai Commando Mission 1549"'s main group of characters are actually the rescue team sent to find/stop the missing squadron. It seems their tinkering in the past has made the present a bit more unstable and it's up to these men (and woman) to save the modern world from disappearing.

The remake is based on the original plot but changes it drastically. In this version, a group of Self Defense Force soldiers artificially recreates the time warp on a mission to rescue and bring back the first group. Compared to the 1979 version, where the SDF unit's only course was "fight to death", the 2005 version is quite positive in approach. It depicts how the characters did their best in living instead of dying and this includes Matoba despite his sinister scheme.

STARRING: EGUCHI YOSUKE, SUZUKI KYOKA, KAGA TAKESHI

2005 - JAPANESE with OPTIONAL ENGLISH SUBTITLES - COLOR - 16:9 ANAMORPHIC WIDESCREEN - 97 MINUTES