The Last Samurai (2003) - Movie Review
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Cruise plays Captain Nathan Algren, a Civil War veteran who suffers from nightmares of killing innocent native Americans. He travels to Japan to train an army to go up against a band of rogue samurais that disagree with the Emperor's decision to adopt Western civilization wherever possible. However, in his first encounter with the sword-carrying "savages," he is taken prisoner and brought to a small village where the lead samurai Katsumoto (Ken Watanabe) lives. Over time, Algren learns to love the life and way of the samurai, and eventually ends up fighting with them against the more modern army that seeks to change the way of Japanese life.
The meaning of The Last Samurai is quite evident: is modernization so important that it destroys who you are? These movie seems to have deep political motivations in regards to what is going on today: does it really make things better when one nation accepts another nation's culture? Obviously, this theme rings heavily during the final half hour of the film, as the samurai and the modern army clash for the last time, yet they are all Japanese fighting one another (well, with one very famous American thrown in for charm).
The Last Samurai succeeds with its breathtaking scenery, its good action scenes and its intriguing characters. Though not perfect (can a superstar such as Cruise ever be completely accepted in a role such as this?), Cruise is believable as a man who changes so much throughout the film. He is likeable but flawed, perhaps the character that can win over any audience. Toward the end, Cruise does begin to look more like Cruise than his character Nathan Algren; some of the acting is a little over the top and took some of the power out of the scenes. Nevertheless, he should be given a pat on the back for doing yet another highly ambitious film and getting away with it.
More than anything else, The Last Samurai is fun to watch because of the scenery. It is such a beautiful movie, in both the shots it shows and the way it chooses to show them. Director Edward Zwick (Glory) knows how to direct a movie like this, and is very effective.
The Last Samurai is a fairly flawless movie with epic scope, exciting action sequences and some powerful drama. Nevertheless, I never felt blown away by this film for some reason or another; I never got that feeling that I get when I am seeing a truly extraordinary film. The Last Samurai may be one of 2003's epics, and for that it should be congratulated, but compared to the few films that can truly be considered "awesome," it isn't quite up there.
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Anonymous says:
July 10, 2004I have no clue how you guys got so off topic.
Anyway, I really liked this movie. I saw it in theatres, and bought it when it came out on DVD. Although the combat between the emporer and the samurai really happened, Quatsimoto's rebellion was actually one of the smaller ones, although the most dramatic. No, there where not any ninjas who tried to assassinate him, but there was an attack on his life (although it was much less dramatic).
Nathan Algren was not a historical character, and the United States did not play so large a part in the history of Japan as might be surmised by watching the movie, but it made of a good one nontheless. The combat was amazingly done, but personally I disliked the theme of eliminating all your enemies (i.e. Nathan Algren seeming to only live to kill his one time superior officer in combat. I can understand his reasoning, but they shouldn't have made it such a large underlying theme.
As to Film fan's comment that this was a 'hate film against Western Culture', maybe we need to understand the viewpoints of others once and a while, even if it is a hard thing to do. The Japanese might have been brutal, but what nation, nay what person, can claim that they are completely innocent themselves?
Anonymous says:
June 26, 2004This is a great movie. Notice I said movie, not history. Takamori and the Emporer were real, but after that... Just about every thing said by everyone else is true. You'll be superbly entertained, but it ain't a history lesson. BTW, my dog is happy I didn't puke on her, the neighbors granny is kinda hot, and Nathan Algren IS NOT A REAL PERSON.
Anonymous says:
June 21, 2004I wept, I laughed, I was angered.. then I vomitted all over my dog. Then he ate my popcorn and I had sex with the neighbors grandmother.... this is how this movie has effected me
Anonymous says:
June 21, 2004When having sex with your neighbors grandmother it is a good idea to clean the vomit off your dog and place your popcorn in an empty gas can. This will ensure you find your own G spot.
Anonymous says:
June 17, 2004I think there are a lot of people living around Japan that might beg to differ on how enlightened they really were. But the film is a hate film against Western Culture. Cruise runs around bad mouthing his culture and there he is surrounded by patriarchal, violent, parochial japanese crap. It was so false as a film and so kiss ass of the non western culture. Spare me. The Japanese are a brutal feudal military culture. Cruise used the same ten facial expressions he used in every other film he has been in.