A kendo student training for his promotional exam is determined to succeed and prove his worthiness to his father. As the exam approaches, he must confront his own darker self and come to terms with his own weaknesses.
Made in close collaboration with the Budapest Főnix Kendo and Iaido Club, with experienced kendoka playing the roles of the main characters.
Director, Cinematographer, Editor: George C. Perrin
Screenplay: George C. Perrin, Szabolcs Gasparin
Assistant Director, Co-Producer: Laura Ittzés
Assistant Editor: Julia K. Perrin
Special FX: Norbert Orosz, Gergely Glovotz
Cast: Szabolcs Gasparin, Zsolt Vadadi, Tamás R. Révi, Márk Matus
7th Dan Renshi
Szabolcs began practicing kendo in 1997 in Salgótarján. A scholarship then took him to Kokushikan University in Tokyo, where he deepened his study of kendo and budo. He represented the Hungarian national team from 2002 to 2010. In 2024, he graduated to 7th dan in Milan and was awarded the Renshi teaching title.
Former President of the Hungarian Kendo Federation
Zsolt trained at the Budapest Főnix Kendo and Iaido Club since 1985, making multiple trips to Japan — including a 1990 scholarship to study kendo, iaido, kyudo and jodo. A two-time Hungarian champion and European team champion in 2002, he served as president of the Hungarian Kendo Federation between 1998-2023.
Opera Singer, Actor, Painter
Tamás R. Révi was a retired transportation engineer and trained opera singer who performed many leading tenor roles in the 1960s. He continued to appear in operettas, short films and theatrical productions, and was also an accomplished painter whose works were regularly shown at exhibitions. He passed away in 2023.
4th Dan Kendoka and Former Club Instructor
Márk began kendo in 2001 in Karlsruhe, Germany, before returning to Budapest and joining the Budapest Főnix Kendo and Iaido Club in 2002. He taught at the club from 2009 and passed his 4th dan examination before stepping back from active practice.
Using software frame interpolation in post-production to create slow-motion footage from 25 fps.
George Perrin first approached the Budapest Főnix Kendo and Iaido Club in February 2008 with the idea of making a short fiction film about the Japanese martial art of kendo.
The club's sensei and president, Tibor Bárány (7th dan kendo), welcomed the idea and introduced him to the students. Over the following eight months, through many hours of study and observation, the concept of the film gradually took shape.
The story was written in close collaboration with Szabolcs Gasparin, a 4th dan student at the time, who plays the lead role in the film. For the role of the Sensei, we could not have hoped for a better candidate than Zsolt Vadadi, then president of the Hungarian Kendo Federation, who was also a charismatic advisor throughout the production.
As a low-budget, fully independent film, 4th Dan was made entirely by people who worked on it out of enthusiasm for filmmaking, for kendo, or both. On the 8th of February, 2010, '4th Dan' premiered in the Urania cinema in Budapest at the end of the Hungarian Filmweek.
Even before its release, the online kendo community embraced the project, volunteering subtitle translations in 15 languages. The film was then released on YouTube and DVD, with the online release sponsored by e-mudo.com, the Gulf Coast Kendo & Iaido Club, and the European Kendo Federation. The film won the prize for best cinematography at the 41st Budapest Independent Film Festival, but its YouTube release made it ineligible for a wider festival run. In the years that followed, George Perrin completed a feature-length screenplay for a kendo martial arts drama, though to this day the project remains shelved.
