Not as intense as Inagaki's, not as beautiful as Mizoguchi's, and not as avant-garde as Ichikawa's. It's a little cheap-looking and kind of soapy. But what it does better than the others is convey the ronins' sacrifice and loyalty. The Bushido thing seems ridiculous by today's standards (a problem that Mizoguchi's version suffers from) but here you really get a sense of why it's so important to these guys. It's also a pretty fun flick. It sports a slew of all-star familiar Japanese faces.