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Movie Review: Zatoichi sakata giri (Zatoichi and the Doomed Man)

Have I seen enough Zatoichi movies now to be able to say that this is not one of the better ones? We start off with Zatoichi in prison, where he meets someone who wants him to deliver a message so he won't be put to death. It seems like things could get interesting as Zatoichi decides not to help this person; of course, he soon gets pulled into it anyways. He also starts traveling with a swindler who eventually tries to assume Zatoichi's identity, which could have been a really interesting way to examine Zatoichi's reputation (especially the drinking and pretty women part of things) but nothing much is done with it. Things end with an overly-long fight scene, Zatoichi gets a woman he rescued to help clean things up by delivering a message, and he walks away. I'd like to think there is some deep symbolism I should be attributing to some of these things (like Zatoichi encountering the ocean for the first time) but really it seemed a little thrown together. I guess if you make 3 of these movies a year you can't make them all be that interesting. It certainly made me question whether I should bother with the next one, although the IMDB review says it is a good one, so I will probably give it a shot.