While the film is nearly entirely in black-and-white, paying homage to older samurai movies, this allows for the artistic and dramatic use of color; this is most noticeable whenever a character is killed, and the screen flashes red for a moment.

Samurai Fiction was the first full-length feature film for writer-director Hiroyuki Nakano, who had been primarily a director of music videos for MTV Japan.

The young noble ends up staying with an older samurai (Morio Kazama) and his daughter Koharu (Tamaki Ogawa) while he heals from his wound and plans his next move.

The older samurai tries to dissuade him from fighting, but Heishirō's honor won't allow him to leave Kazamatsuri alive.

The older samurai, who turns out to be the master Hanbei Mizoguchi, convinces him to fight Kazamatsuri by throwing rocks rather than with swords.

Meanwhile, Kazamatsuri settles for a few days at a gambling house owned by Lady Okatsu (Mari Natsuki), who falls in love with him.

For example, the stolen sword that is at the center of the plot was a personal possession of Toshiro Mifune, the star of many of Akira Kurosawa's samurai films.

The films would be only vaguely related, in terms of plot or characters as Nakano wanted to explore a number of genres.