The Last Samurai

Peter C wrote:

I don't know what I wanted from a movie called The Last Samurai starring Tom Cruise. Maybe I just wanted it not to exist. But it does. It exists and exists and exists. Director Edward Zwick has made no secret of his desire to pay homage to Japanese cinematic master Akira Kurosawa, but The Last Samurai is transparently a Western epic, no matter how badly it may wish to be more.

Judged on its own merits, The Last Samurai also falls short, blunting its comic-book action effectiveness--on which level the film works best--with dramatic bloat and poorly developed romance. First and foremost the film is a star vehicle for Cruise, who plays 19th-century ex-Cavalry-man Capt. Nathan Algren. This false idol, reduced to a perpetual alcoholic binge peppered with sideshow appearances on behalf of Winchester rifles, ships off to Japan at the behest of a political opportunist named Omura (Masato Harada). Omura hires Algren, at great expense, to train Japanese troops to quell a rebellion led by fearsome samurai General Katsumoto (Ken Watanabe). When the campaign goes horribly wrong, Algren finds himself Katsumoto's captive.   [ show more ]

Already bitter and cynical from his reluctant participation in the massacre of native american women and children, Algren suffers wounds and indignities in the home of the woman he widowed in battle. Katsumoto engages Algren in regular "know your enemy" chats, while Algren detoxes and ingratiates himself with the dead warrior's family. Before you can say Dickie Roberts--Former Child Star, Algren is an unlikely part of the family, speaking fluent Japanese (he's a linguist, you know), wooing the widow, and playing Dad with the kids. If you can believe that, story man John Logan reasons, you can believe that Algren learns to love his enemy and gains enough trust to fight alongside them in battle with nary a whiff of resentment.

Though Logan shares screenplay credit with Zwick and regular Zwick collaborator Marshall Herskovitz, I blame Logan, the unaccountably successful screenwriter whose credits include Gladiator, Star Trek: Nemesis, The Time Machine, and Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas. It seems obvious that the merits of Logan's successful projects are owed to the filmmakers who rewrite him (like Oliver Stone on Any Given Sunday) than Logan's own dubious talents, and here Zwick fails to rewrite him into credibility or depth.

As for Cruise, his movie-star performance anchors the film for better and worse. Though the film poetically insists Algren is a noble tiger, Zwick and his star can't resist upsetting their bleary tone with goofy flourishes, like an awkward kung fu display meant to poke fun at Algren's last vestiges of vanity. But if this is the thing--a Dances With Samurais--who better than Cruise to lend professional aplomb, from his starry smile to his thorough physicality?

Less fact than fable, The Last Samurai is well-intentioned and musters the requisite Japanese-scroll vistas and check-out-all-the-soldiers battle scenes one would expect of an Oscar-bait epic shot by two-time Oscar winner John Toll (Braveheart and Legends of the Fall, natch). The director overworks the slo-mo, allows clunky epigrams, and generally betrays that he lacks Kurosawa's sharp and sophisticated regard for human behavior; instead, Zwick becomes too wrapped up in exoticism to see the Japanese as living, breathing individuals. If this blustery movie about "a forgotten word: honor" has its heart in the right place, it too fully embraces the samurai swordfighting tip "No mind." [ show less ]

mstomaso wrote on IMDB:

After my third viewing, I can finally admit that this film has me. I enjoyed it during its theatrical run, enjoyed it more the second time around, and now, I can only say that I love it. The cast is exemplary. Tom Cruise is so good in this film that it is very often easy to forget he is Tom Cruise. Easily his most powerful role and best performance since Jerry Maguire. Ken Watanabe, however, is incredible in every scene - acting with a rare sensitivity and intensity and breathing life into a character much larger and more human than the grand story of which he is a part. Though the entire cast is excellent, I feel that I must also single out Koyuki and Shichinosuke Nakamura for, respectively, the female lead and the emperor, for the subtle strength and believability they each give their very challenging roles.   [ show more ]

The story takes place during the early modernization of Japan, in the 1870s and 1880s. The Emperor's power has been weakened by the political and economic power of his cabinet, by his young age, and by the political influence of the United States and other western powers pulling the strings of his cabinet and supplying modern weaponry and tactics to the modernizing Japanese army. Cruise plays Captain Allgren, an alcoholic veteran who has seen and participated in too many massacres of innocent people, and is offered an opportunity to reclaim some of his honor by helping to train the Japanese military in the use of firearms. When he arrives in Japan, we learn that the first test of the Japanese army and its new weapons will be against a rebellious group of samurai who believe themselves to be in the service of the Emperor and Japan, but resist the Emperor's cabinet and the influence of western nations. In the power void left by a passive emperor, Japan seems poised to enter into a civil war against its own values, faith and honor. During the first attack on the Samurai, Allgren is captured by the Samurai and begins a spiritual, physical and philosophical journey which will bring him a level of self-respect his own culture could never supply.

My interpretation of this journey is that Allgren has found a place and people that offer him redemption, where, in his own world, he can find none. But Allgren's is only a small part of the story - which ultimately revolves around what is right for Japan, for the subjectivity of a whole nation, and how to portray such a subject from its own perspective. Traditional Japan is treated with empathy here, not aggrandizing exaggeration, as some of the film's critics seem to suggest. This is not a film about what is objectively right and wrong, but a film about struggling to understand and empower tradition as a means to control and benefit from change. I find no grand moral statement here, but rather an intense, sympathetic, human drama with a strong sense of honor and sacrifice.

Edward Zwick has made a film which operates well at every level, carrying simple but profound philosophical ideas, but avoiding the mistake of making these ideas and the characters that express them super-heroic. Ultimately, this beautifully shot film conveys powerful messages about war, tradition, ethics, honor and culture, which, though not particularly original, are sensitively and intelligently brought forward. There is a lot of action, including some remarkably well-acted sword fighting and martial artistry, but none of it seems unnecessary and the whole film is truly tightly woven. My highest recommendation. [ show less ]

Halsy wrote on IMDB:

Others here (those PC type people) have erroneously stated that the film is a typically racist one in which the "superior white man" has to save the "noble savages", nothing could be further from the truth. In fact it's quite the opposite. Tom Cruise's character, Nathan Algren, is a deeply flawed and troubled man who hides in a bottle ashamed of his past, and rightly so.

Upon traveling to Japan to modernize the Japanese army - at Japan's request - he falls in battle and is taken captive after displaying tremendous ferocity. A warrior is a warrior is a warrior regardless of his ethnicity. Algren is then forced to confront his past and his demons. With the help of the "noble savages" he does so. It is he that owes a debt of gratitude to them, not the other way around.   [ show more ]

If you're going to look at this film from a politically correct point of view (the apologists POV) the film will come up wanting. If you look at the film - correctly - you'll be able to relate to a man who is displaced in society and hiding from himself because he lacks clarity of vision in his life and understanding his purpose. And how by simplifying and focusing he comes to a sort of peace within himself, something we all seek. Ken Watanabe's character, Katsumoto, summarizes this quite aptly (and prettily I might add), "The perfect blossom is a rare thing. You could spend your life looking for one, and it would not be a wasted life."

It's a good film, with superb visuals and music. The only real fluff in this film is the romance between Cruise and the Japenese girl. When will Hollywood learn? We really don't need or want that, when watching this type of film. Leave the romance to romance films. [ show less ]