Azumi (2003)

  Man, this was one of the worst Japanese films I've seen since Sukiyaki Western Django.  Terrible CGI, lame plot, and bad acting.  That is a trifecta of FAIL.  Honestly, these effects make it look like it was made in 1973, not 2003.

Azumi is an orphaned girl who has been raised with 9 boys to be an assassin.  Their master is under orders from a priest to keep peace in the country by killing anybody that would make a fuss.  For a minute, I worried it would go in a Minority Report: Feudal Japan Edition kind of way but no worries.  Everyone is a bad guy.  After training these ten kids for about a decade, he decides they're finally ready for the big mission.  He rounds them up and tells them to pair up with their favorite person.

Azumi pairs up with Nachi, and the lingering glances they give each other hint at some kind of romantic angle further down the road.

That is, until Master tells them that if they truly want to be considered assassins, they have to be willing to kill anytime, anywhere, any body.  And to prove their mettle, they have to kill the person they chose to stand beside.  Personally, I would have been extremely wary of the first kid who moved.  That's a motherfucker you really don't want at your back.

Since the title character really can't die in the first reel, that squishy little would-be subplot goes right out the window, but it sparks a sneaking sense of discomfort in the character.  She and the other four survivors journey with the old man to go kill some warlords.  They gank some dude while he's fishing and think they're pretty good.  Unfortunately, the second dude on the list gets smart or at least manages to hire underlings that get smart.

Enter a ninja that looks like a monkey, three gangster brothers with only a handful of braincells between them, and a genuine mass murderer who dresses like a girl and has a thing for roses.  It is all downhill from there.