The Last Samurai Movie Review (2. Edward Zwick's . The battle scenes are stirring and elegantly mounted, but they are less about who wins than about what can be proven by dying. Beautifully designed, intelligently written, acted with conviction, it's an uncommonly thoughtful epic. Its power is compromised only by an ending that sheepishly backs away from what the film is really about. Advertisement. Tom Cruise and Ken Watanabe co- star, as a shabby Civil War veteran and a proud samurai warrior. Cruise plays Nathan Algren, a war hero who now drifts and drinks too much, with no purpose in life. He's hired by Americans who are supplying mercenaries to train an army for the Japanese emperor, who wants to move his country into the modern world and is faced with a samurai rebellion. The first official trailer has debuted online for a fantastic documentary. The role of the samurai leader Katsumoto (Watanabe) is complex; he is fighting against the emperor's men, but out of loyalty to the tradition the emperor represents, he would sacrifice his life in an instant, he says, if the emperor requested it. But Japan has been seized with a fever to shake off its medieval ways and copy the West, and the West sees money to be made in the transition: Representatives from the Remington arms company are filling big contracts for weapons, and the U. S. Embassy is a clearinghouse for lucrative trade arrangements. Into this cauldron Algren descends as a cynic. He is told the samurai are . Leading his untried troops into battle, he is captured and faces death - - but is spared by a word from Katsumoto, who returns him as a prisoner to the village of his son. It's at this point that . Katsumoto, who conveniently speaks English, explains he has kept Algren alive because he wants to know his enemy. Algren at first refuses to speak, but gradually, during a long, rainy winter of captivity, he begins to have philosophical conversations with the other man about the ethics of war and warriors. Thank you all very much for your compliments and continued patronage. To view the newest arrivals, click the 'What's New' tab for all the newest titles.Over the last two months, I watched all 25 original Zatoichi films. While none of them are exactly masterpieces, they are all worth watching at least once. This story revolves around a Japanese samurai known as mifune. He is from a humble farm in Hiroshima who must protect his family from yet another attack by the. Title details and video sharing options. The master Kambei (Takashi Shimura) and his. Some of these talks sound like Socratic exchanges: Katsumoto: . Haunted by nightmares from his wartime experiences, he confesses, . Algren finds himself gradually shifting allegiances, away from the mercenaries and toward the samurai, but his shift is visceral, not ideological. He bonds with Katsumoto, respects him, wants to find respect in his eyes. The movie illustrates the universal military truth that men in battle are motivated not by their cause but by loyalty to their comrades. It has been compared to . Katsumoto is the teacher and Algren is the student, and the film wonderfully re- creates the patterns and textures of the Japanese past; its production design, sets and costumes are astonishing. Watanabe is a deep, powerful presence; he has the potential to become the first world star from Japan since Toshiro Mifune. Cruise is already a star, and will be targeted by those predisposed to see him and not his character, but here I think his stardom works for the film, because he takes with him into battle both the cocksure pilot of . Scichinosuke Nakamura plays the emperor as a tormented, shy man who admires Katsumoto's values, even while agreeing with his advisers that the rebellion must be put down. Here he gives Algren a speech attacking Custer, whose last stand was fresh in everyone's mind. To be sure, his men share his values, but is there an element of seeking ? Is a there a line between dying for what you believe in, and dying because of what you believe in? That the film raises this question shows how thoughtful it is. But the ending caves in to Hollywood requirements, and we feel the air going out of the picture. An art film can trust its audience to follow along to the necessary conclusion. A Hollywood ending assumes that the audience caves in at the end, turns dim- witted and sentimental, and must be fed its lollypop. If there's going to be an alternative ending on the DVD, I know what it would have to show - - and so, I suspect, does Edward Zwick. Note: Which character is the ? A case can be made for either answer, which suggests the nature of their relationship. Seven Samurai (re-release) movie reviews & Metacritic score: Akira Kurosawa's 1956 classic, set in 16th Century Japan, stands as the prototypical action film. Toshiro Mifune was born on 1 April 1920 in Qingdao, Shandong, China, to Japanese parents. His parents were Methodist missionaries working there. Toshiro Mifune achieved more worldwide fame than any other Japanese actor of his century. He was born in Tsingtao, China. Directors Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese are among those who pay tribute to celebrated Japanese actor Toshiro Mifune in this Telluride doc. One of the docs at this year’s festival, Mifune: The Last Samuai, pays tribute to legendary Japanese actor Toshiro Mifune, whose work with Akira Kurosawa helped to revitalize Japanese cinema in the years after World War II. The subject is a rich one, but the film simply isn’t incisive enough to make much of a dent in a crowded marketplace. Keanu Reeves provides the rather bland narration, which offers such nuggets as that Mifune “embodied steadfastness and integrity.” The script, by director Steven Okazaki and Stuart Galbraith IV, rarely goes beyond platitudes. There are some impressive interviewees on display here, including American directors Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese, several of Mifune’s surviving collaborators, and family members of both Mifune and Kurosawa. But the people asking the questions didn’t encourage anyone to probe very deeply into their subject. The film opens arrestingly, with a thumbnail history of Japanese cinema and excerpts from silent films that have largely vanished. A whole new wave emerged with Kurosawa’s masterpieces, Rashomon and The Seven Samurai, in the early 1. Yet the doc fails to provide any trenchant analysis of these seminal films. Rashomon in particular had a lasting cultural impact that is never even hinted at here. The dissection of Throne of Blood, Kurosawa’s electrifying adaptation of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, is more substantial. Okazaki informs us that the startling climax of the film, in which the hero dies after an attack by enemy archers, was executed without many safety precautions. We get some hints about the impact of the war on both Mifune and Kurosawa. We learn about Mifune’s drinking and about the breakup of his marriage. Similarly, there are mentions of tensions between actor and director that finally brought an end to their collaboration after 1. Perhaps Mifune craved recognition beyond Japanese shores. He went on to co- star in Hollywood movies like John Frankenheimer’s Grand Prix, John Boorman’s Hell in the Pacific, as well as Spielberg’s comic dud, 1. Kurosawa. The film excerpts are welcome and do convince us of the startling impact of some of these pictures. But you will have to search elsewhere to find a deeper understanding of the greatest Japanese actor. Director- editor: Steven Okazaki. Screenwriters: Steven Okazaki, Stuart Galbraith IVProducers: Toshiaki Nakazawa, Toichiro Shiraishi, Kensuke Zushi, Yukie Kito, Steven Okazaki, Taro Goto. Consulting producer: Rikiya Mifune. Directors of photography: Tohru Hina, Yasuyuki Isikawa. Music: Jeffrey Wood. No rating, 8. 0 minutes.
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