Samurai vs Longbowman | realistic, non-choreographed medieval combat - i...

[u/Suzume_Chikahisa]

https://youtube.com/watch?v=n-w6ay4u19U&si=W_CwJad3oNGugIEw

[u/DragonGuard666]

Man, the whole lead up before the melee exchange was so good. Felt really tense and incredibly realistic with the samurai taking cover and returning fire.

Dunno why I hadn't yet. But I subbed to Dequitem after this.

[u/nusensei → u/DragonGuard666]

I wrote my evaluation in detail already, but IMO, the lead-up almost Shad-level unrealistic. The samurai is using the wrong equipment in the wrong manner, walking around with no idea on what to do with his hands and bow. It's the samurai version of Steven Seagal's Sniper Special Ops rather than War of the Arrows. But to be more fair, their execution is more like The Adventures of Robin Hood, where the actors are using modern fencing techniques with medieval swords.

This doesn't take away from the focus of the short film. The melee is clumsy, which is what you'd expect from an unchoreographed fight. They engage well, it's a good fantasy duel that ends in a brawl, and obviously they're not trying to hurt each other.

I found it interesting that you labelled it "incredibly realistic" whereas the details I saw took away from my enjoyment of the scene.

[u/DragonGuard666 → u/nusensei]

Sure. I admit I'm not as informed on the finer details. I'm more casual when it comes to fight stuff and specific historically accurate techniques and mannerisms. Maybe 'realistic' wasn't the right choice of word.

Of course the melee focus is very good. It's not 'pretty' and I imagine 'real combat' rarely is. I just really like how it was shot. Yeah it's not totally historically accurate pre-melee but to me it was able to create a great deal of tension, that I almost forgot I was watching a film for a second. To my less educated eye anyway.

[u/nusensei]

If I had only seen the setup to the video, I would've thought this was a C-tier fan film. The brawl between the two armoured fighters played out nicely. These guys are obviously competent at their art, and archery (particularly Japanese) is not their forte.

Given that they are deliberately trying not to shoot each other, the initial exchange was brief but OK. The English archer did loose a live arrow at the tree.

The depiction of samurai archery is, unfortunately, comically wrong. The person playing the samurai doesn't know the Japanese technique and is using a Western style. For those who don't know the difference, the Japanese use the thumb draw - and a specific version with a very deep hook; the arrow is placed on the right side. Note that all Japanese archers shot right-handed -- the bows were made with a slight offset so they could only feasibly be shot right-handed. The actor in the video was using a typical Mediterranean-style finger draw with the arrow on the knuckle / left side.

The samurai also doesn't have a quiver, and is only carrying a spare arrow somewhere on his left hip.

The way the samurai is scouting looks like a modern infantryman. You generally don't walk around pointing the bow and doing half-draws for a faster response time. A military bow is extremely heavy to draw, even with a half draw. It requires the right posture, footing and shoulder alignment to use, so a shot is typically done as a whole sequence once committed. The method used in the video would only be viable with low draw weight bows.

Another reason why you wouldn't raise the bow without shooting is that the underarm is one of the unprotected parts.

This video is a demonstration of koshiya kumiyumi, a battlefield style of archery:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJVC6ExVUi4&ab_channel=nogakeyumi

[u/Suzume_Chikahisa → u/nusensei]

Considering the setup is an excuse for a brawl I'm not surprised. But seeing the quivers in you linked video really drives the point home about looking like modern combat scouting.

[u/nusensei → u/Suzume_Chikahisa]

It's more that the close-ups at 1:08 unintentionally show how awkward it is to nock an arrow, but he's not using the right quiver and nocking the arrow on the wrong side of the bow, making the action of nocking and shooting far more clumsy that it actually is.

In fact, it's rather unusual for any style of archery to place the quiver on the opposite side for that reason. There are some exceptions, notably cross-draw quivers that place the arrows across the torso (I demonstrate it here). In most cases, the sword is on the left, the arrows are on the right (or back, typically lower back rather than the modern back quivers). For archers who carried their bows in a quiver, that would go on the left side.

[u/OceanoNox → u/nusensei]

I completely agree with you. In the comments, Dequitem explains he did that for safety, which might be because he doesn't know how to shoot with the thumb draw.

[u/nusensei → u/OceanoNox]

I saw the comment. I was confused by what they meant. That's a dangerous line to tread. I know a large portion of the Asiatic archery community might take offense at the insinuation that the thumb draw is more dangerous. People can take that (way too) seriously.

[u/OceanoNox → u/nusensei]

English is clearly not his first language. I'd like to believe people will ask questions first instead of being automatically offended (one can hope).

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