HANNIBAL RISING SAMURAI SWORDS THE REAL THING

Gaspard Ulliel learned how to fight with real Samurai swords for Hannibal Rising.

Gaspard Ulliel took martial arts and sword fighting lessons for Hannibal Rising to prepare for the scenes where Hannibal Lecter slays his victims.

He says he loved learning the specific technique.

“Yeah it’s the only scene that required physical preparation. So I think we practiced for a whole week with Gong Li and with a real Kendo teacher. I really like martial arts, kendo and Aikido so I really loved practicing.”

Authentic Samurai swords were used but director Peter Webber talks about the possible dangers of using real weaponry on the set and made sure the actors were safe.

“The only weapons that could be dangerous because we do have guns in the film it’s all blanks so the swords though. We had some very real, very expensive Samurai swords but we also had replicas because when you get swords too close to actors it could be dangerous. You don’t actually want to sever any limbs and there could be a lawsuit so you just have to hope that the armorer remembers the difference between the plastic sword and the metal sword.”

Despite the fact that Gaspard was well prepared he still nicked nemesis Rhys Ifans. Good thing it was plastic and not the real thing.