bloodygranuaile (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
bloodygranuaile) wrote2013-07-27 09:39 pm
bloodygranuaile) wrote2013-07-27 09:39 pm
Rock 'n' roll samurai movie!
Man, it's been a very long time since I've done a movie review. This is partly because I don't watch movies much anymore except for rewatching Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl over and over again while I do research for my eLance client. I may have to cancel my Netflix DVD account; it takes me so long to get around to watching a movie that it would probably be cheaper for me to buy them at this rate.
Anyway. I finally got around to watching Samurai Fiction, recommended by Shayna quite a long time ago. Shayna's movie recommendations are pretty much always awesome, and this was no exception. It's a Japanese film, and though it was made in the 1990s, it's almost entirely in black and white. Occasional splashes of color are used to very good artistic effect. The cinematography is lovely, and shows the movie to have been directed by someone who is clearly very familiar with old samurai movies and the films of Akira Kurosawa. The very modern rock 'n' roll soundtrack works extremely well, especially for the fight scenes.
The storyline itself is a fun martial arts romp--not quite a comedy, but with a strong comic streak in it. Kazamatsuri, a very tall outlaw samurai, steals a sword that is the most precious treasure of the clan he's working for. The son of the clan chief, a hotheaded but honorable young samurai named Heishiro, runs off to take the sword back, accompanied by his two ridiculous friends. His father sends two awesome ninja after him to make sure he doesn't get into too much trouble. (ONE OF THE NINJA IS A LADY WOOHOO.) Kazamatsuri, unfortunately, is so badass that he beats the shit out of the three young dudes, and Heishiro recuperates at the house of a middle-aged dude who saved his sorry ass. The middle-aged guy, Mizoguchi, is a master swordsman, but also a pacifist, and lives in the woods with his daughter Koharu. A predictable but still very cute romance blossoms between Koharu and Heishiro, which mostly involves Heishiro getting nosebleeds. Kazamatsuri spends most of this time hanging out in a whorehouse with a couple of doofy minion-y friends he picked up and the woman who owns the place, who quite frankly may be the most awesome character in the movie. Mizoguchi tries to talk Heishiro out of killing Kazamatsuri as the story inevitably gears up towards a grand Final Showdown wherein the sword gets tossed into the river.
While there is a repeated srs bsns theme of pacifism and the necessity of taming Heishiro's hotheadedness and impatience, as they are manifestations of ego, these themes are basically there to ground the story just enough to keep it engaging--it is mostly a good, fluffy popcorn movie. Some parts of it are straight-up absurdist. Kazamatsuri makes the greatest unimpressed faces, and our noble young hero Heishiro's periodic flip-outs are deliciously undignified. Koharu is pretty adorbs and is shown as knowledgeable about a bunch of stuff like plant uses and is opinionated and not silly at all, so overall not a bad showing for being the sweet idealized lady love interest who's the only non-warrior in the movie. (Even awesome hooker lady claims to have killed several men and can hold her own in a fight using a poker).
My only real complaint about this movie is that the lady ninja did not get enough screen time. MORE LADY NINJA PLEASE! LADY NINJA ALL THE TIME 4EVER.
Anyway. I finally got around to watching Samurai Fiction, recommended by Shayna quite a long time ago. Shayna's movie recommendations are pretty much always awesome, and this was no exception. It's a Japanese film, and though it was made in the 1990s, it's almost entirely in black and white. Occasional splashes of color are used to very good artistic effect. The cinematography is lovely, and shows the movie to have been directed by someone who is clearly very familiar with old samurai movies and the films of Akira Kurosawa. The very modern rock 'n' roll soundtrack works extremely well, especially for the fight scenes.
The storyline itself is a fun martial arts romp--not quite a comedy, but with a strong comic streak in it. Kazamatsuri, a very tall outlaw samurai, steals a sword that is the most precious treasure of the clan he's working for. The son of the clan chief, a hotheaded but honorable young samurai named Heishiro, runs off to take the sword back, accompanied by his two ridiculous friends. His father sends two awesome ninja after him to make sure he doesn't get into too much trouble. (ONE OF THE NINJA IS A LADY WOOHOO.) Kazamatsuri, unfortunately, is so badass that he beats the shit out of the three young dudes, and Heishiro recuperates at the house of a middle-aged dude who saved his sorry ass. The middle-aged guy, Mizoguchi, is a master swordsman, but also a pacifist, and lives in the woods with his daughter Koharu. A predictable but still very cute romance blossoms between Koharu and Heishiro, which mostly involves Heishiro getting nosebleeds. Kazamatsuri spends most of this time hanging out in a whorehouse with a couple of doofy minion-y friends he picked up and the woman who owns the place, who quite frankly may be the most awesome character in the movie. Mizoguchi tries to talk Heishiro out of killing Kazamatsuri as the story inevitably gears up towards a grand Final Showdown wherein the sword gets tossed into the river.
While there is a repeated srs bsns theme of pacifism and the necessity of taming Heishiro's hotheadedness and impatience, as they are manifestations of ego, these themes are basically there to ground the story just enough to keep it engaging--it is mostly a good, fluffy popcorn movie. Some parts of it are straight-up absurdist. Kazamatsuri makes the greatest unimpressed faces, and our noble young hero Heishiro's periodic flip-outs are deliciously undignified. Koharu is pretty adorbs and is shown as knowledgeable about a bunch of stuff like plant uses and is opinionated and not silly at all, so overall not a bad showing for being the sweet idealized lady love interest who's the only non-warrior in the movie. (Even awesome hooker lady claims to have killed several men and can hold her own in a fight using a poker).
My only real complaint about this movie is that the lady ninja did not get enough screen time. MORE LADY NINJA PLEASE! LADY NINJA ALL THE TIME 4EVER.