Has anyone seen this?
This is a rather peculiar movie from Shaw Brothers that mixes sword play with the macabre. It's not quite horror, IMO, but it came pretty darn close. Long story short you have two feuding aristo's at either end of the street who are being played off against each other by a demented lunatic. It's a story reminiscent of Yojimbo. So you have your usual tale of greed, pride, and revenge with the addition of women being skinned alive.
LATERNS, while being very stylistically shot, sadly lacks the wit of Yojimbo. Even it's spaghetti western counterpart, A Fistful of Dollars, managed to be funny. LATERNS seemed to be trying to play it more for suspense and drama with a touch of macabre humor that, to me, wasn't very humorous.
Full review up at Mise-en-Scene Crypt
here and, in case that link doesn't work, it's also posted
here.