As a young child, Kotono (Minami Tsukui) witnesses the slaying of her father, a master swordsman, by one of his most gifted pupils. Already trained in swordsmanship from an early age, she continues her studies and inherits her father's skills and his legendary weapon. Now, fully grown and adopting the persona of a beautiful geisha, Kotono sets out to avenge her father's death by confronting the man who killed him. But, the path to completing her quest is an obstructed one. To reach her goal, she must first conquer a succession of adversaries including deadly female ninjas, murderous monks, fantastical demons and ruthless assassins.

The feature directorial debut of former stunt man and action director/choreographer Gô Ohara (Chanbara Beauty; Death Trance), the period martial arts action flick Geisha Assassin takes 'old school' martial arts movie conventions and drags them kicking and screaming into the 21st century with its non-stop barrage of lightning-fast swordplay and impressively realistic kick boxing and kung fu sequences.

Relatively low on plot but pleasingly high on fighting and all-round action, Ohara's movie combines the look and feel of arthouse Asian cinema such as House of 1000 Daggers with the no-punches-pulled mayhem of Kill Bill and the breathless fight-after-fight principles of a modern-day combat video game.

Geisha Assassin (cert. 15) will be released on DVD by MVM on 5th April 2010 at the RRP of £15.99.