Directed by Umetsugu Inoue • 1963 • Japan

Despite its setting in 1567 Japan, Umetsugu Inoue's 1963 drama THE THIRD SHADOW WARRIOR (aka The Third Shadow, aka Daisan no Kagemusha) seemed to have a lot to say about twentieth century Japan -- derived from a novel by leftist author Norio Nanjo, its story of a peasant who ascends to the nobility, only to be destroyed in the process, is a harsh criticism of social caste systems and their toll on the people trapped within them