Hanzo the Razor 3: Who’s Got the Gold? (1974)

Hanzo uncovers a plot to smuggle gold out of the national treasury that’s linked to an illegal loan shark operation run by an official and a blind high priest who hosts sex orgies for middle-aged wives.

The exploitive Hanzo the Razor samurai trilogy concludes as Shintaro Katsu (The Tale of Zatoichi) once again takes on the role of Kazuo Koike’s well-endowed manga character “Razor” Hanzo Itami, the Edo-era’s toughest samurai cop.

It begins like a Scooby Doo episode as Hanzo and his two deputies unmask a female ghost, only to discover a stash of hidden gold hidden in bamboo stalks outside the national treasury. Events quickly become anything but child’s play when Hanzo’s usual unorthodox interrogation methods on the woman are interrupted by a gang of desperate men intent on keeping the stolen gold a secret. Thus begins a new investigation as Hanzo starts to uncover corruption in the treasury where officials deny work to honest men and loan out money to reap large sums of interest. Helping him to uncover the truth is an official’s wife whom he blackmails after catching her secretly engaging in a sex orgy with Buddhist monks. The case turns personal when a childhood friend is targeted by the officials who desire a famous spear, also a treasured family heirloom. When his friend turns up dead and the spear missing, Hanzo sees that truth prevails and the assassin is brought to justice, his way.

There is also a subplot involving a wanted rebel calling for reforms and modernization that Hanzo hides away so that he’ll have time to construct a cannon to show off the power of foreign guns before he dies from a terminal illness. The whole thing is reduced to a joke however when the rebel faces the official and his guards with his cannon. He starts firing it until everyone flees apart from a smoking and dazed official portrayed in a very cartoony fashion. Then again, this trilogy is based on a manga series and all of the sexual content is pretty much a joke too.

On the plus side, the action here is probably the best of the series and ably shows off Hanzo’s sai and chain techniques. It’s probably a good time to point out that police officers in the Edo era rarely used swords. Instead, they had weapons similar to the three-pronged sai that were designed to ensnare a sword and effectively disarm the wielder. It’s reasonably fitting then that Katsu’s main weapon in the series is not a sword, although he does use swords, spears, spiked iron knuckles, and various traps.

Unlike the Zatoichi series, its clear that by this third movie Katsu’s Hanzo and his sexual exploits would not have the same longevity. The gag of Hanzo conditioning his penis and then using it as an interrogation tool on women has become routine and these brief scenes are breezed through as a matter of function either to appease expectant audiences or remind us that this supposed to be a different kind of samurai movie. In fact, apart from three short, sex-related scenes, Who’s Got the Gold? is pretty much your standard chambara movie. That’s not to say some viewers still won’t be thoroughly offended though.

In spite of some quality action, polished camera work and sexual tomfoolery, Who’s Got the Gold? is the least memorable of the three Hanzo the Razor films, in part because it’s the last. As such, the novelty of a samurai cop who turns every female suspect into a wide-eyed and gasping lover with a package most men would envy has run its course, while the detective drama and silly subplot are nothing to get a rise out of.