Oh my goodness. Look at what Cinema Eye has dug up for us all:
So, in order to end speculations and to answer those who emailed, kitanotakeshi.com can confirm, that Kitano indeed is making “Zatoichi 2”.
As the story goes, when Kitano agreed to make “Zatoichi”, he also agreed to make a sequel, if the first film would become a huge succes. Not only did “Zatoichi” become a huge succes, it became the biggest succes in Kitanos career as a director. Kitano didn’t talk about it, as he hadn’t decided when to make it. After all, he had only promised to make it, but not when, and he had already decided to dedicate 2004 to acting. But in August 2004, the contracts were signed and about the same time, Kitano dyed his hair blond again.
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yeh. this came from a japanese cinema email newsletter and the guy at the kitanotakeshi etc send out an email about it. posted this news story over at twitchfilm.com early last week i think and ever since then its been appearing everywhere… thing is the email had just popped up in my mailbox, put it up at twitch then watched as it slowly trickled over to other sites in the same layout, almost cut and paste style.