A press conference was held yesterday at Space FS Shiodome to announce completion of Go Ohara‘s directorial debut, Geisha Assassin (Geisha vs Ninja). Ohara joined the film’s stars, Minami Tsukui and Masaki Nomura to offer greetings from the stage before a preview screening. Also in attendance were 3 guys in ninja costumes for the sake of corny photo ops.

In the film Tsukui, who was chosen from over 2,000 young actresses, plays a geisha named Kotono who faces off against the ninjas who killed her father. She initially found the the intense fight scenes to be difficult because she had never worn a geisha wig before, but eventually she got used to it. Co-star Nomura praised the acrobatic skill and strength Tsukui showed during their scenes.

Until now, Ohara had been an action director and stunt coordinator for his entire career, working on films like Death Trance in 2005 and Chanbara Beauty earlier this year. Considering the first poster made available for the film included a promotional blurb invoking Hollywood titles like “Kill Bill” and “Resident Evil” it’s pretty safe to assume this one was made with an eventual western release in mind from the beginning.

That English-language poster has been re-posted all over the web already, so here’s the Japanese poster in high resolution:

Geisha vs Ninjas is slated for release in September.

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Tags: geisha, geisha assassin, go ohara, kaori sakai, masaki nomura, minami tsukui, nao nagasawa, ninjas, satoshi hakuzen, shuji kurimoto, shuntaro ito, sukeomi oota, taka okubo