BEFORE: Now I'm deep into work, five whole days in a row! Now is about the time I wish I was still young, because both of my jobs are a bit physical, so for every two days I work in a row now, I feel like I need at least one day off to recover. Well, I'm just not going to get that this week, with the Tribeca Festival running, and I picked up five shifts, three of which are on successive days. The report from Day 1 (Friday) was that I saw Tim Blake Nelson and Vera Farmiga at one screening, they were on stage for a Q&A after, and then Emilia Clarke walked right by me (she was surrounded by cast, crew and security people) and she was on stage for a Q&A at the later screening. We worked with the festival staff to clear the theaters quickly after the screenings, so we could get them cleaned and start loading in the second show. Tomorrow's going to be busy, too so I'm thinking I should use one of my "skip" days for June and have no Sunday movie, really I just need to get some sleep and prepare. If I get home late on Saturday after the Liberty game, that's what I'll do - no Sunday movie.
Keanu Reeves carries over from "From the World of John Wick: Ballerina".
THE PLOT: A band of former samurai sets out to avenge the death and dishonor of their master at the hands of a ruthless shogun.
AFTER: Well, Japanese movies are not really my thing, and this is basically a very Japanese movie, even if it's in English and was directed by an American. I still have not seen anything made by Kurosawa, and now if I'm only linking movies, it might be too late to do that. I know, I should watch "Ran" and "The Seven Samurai" if I'm going to call myself a movie buff, but I just have never been in the mood to do so. Hey, I did watch "The Last Samurai", and "The Magnificent Seven", which is basically the same as "The Seven Samurai", right?
This one kind of surprised me though, I didn't think there would be much too it and I did not expect to like it, not as much anyway. But I got into it, even though I fell asleep on Friday night while watching it, that meant I backtracked on Saturday morning and watched the whole second half, but this time on Peacock, with subtitles. (Originally I watched the first half on a homemade DVD with no subtitles, and it was much harder for me to tell what was going on. I don't LIKE watching Peacock, because that has to be on my phone and not my computer screen, but here's where the subtitles really did make a difference, I needed them.)
This is supposedly based on a real Japanese story, however there's a fair amount of fantasy worked in, like witchcraft and ghosts and dragon-like creatures. So it might be hard to tell where reality leaves off and fantasy begins, but I think maybe that's part of the charm? Keanu Reeves plays Kai, a half-Japanese and half-English outcast who grew up in the Tengu area, but escaped from his trainers when he was a teenager because they taught him to find in the manner of demons or something. He was found in the Ako domain and adopted by Lord Asano - over time he came to fall in love with Asano's daughter, Mika, only since Kai was not a samurai and also a half-breed, he could never be worthy of her love or something.
Lord Kira, from another province, wants to take over the Ako Domain, with the help of Mizuki, a shape-shifting enchantress who can turn into a fox. Misuki sends a monster to kill Asano and his men while on a hunting trip, but the monster is slain by Kai, who notices the fox nearby. Kai tries to warn Lord Asano's counselor, Oishi, about the shogun's concubine who is also a witch and sometimes a fox, but Oishi does not believe him. Lord Kira then suggests a duel between his best warrior, a golem, and Asano's chosen combatant, but Mizuki incapacitates Asano's warrior with magic. Kai tries to disguise himself and fight the golem, but when he is unmasked he is beaten severely. Mizuki strikes again when she bewitches Asano to make him think that Kira is raping his daughter Mika, causing Asano to attack Kira, for no reason. The shogun then sentences Asano to death via seppuku, or ritual suicide.
This gives Lord Kira domain over Ako and the shogun decrees that Mika must marry him, but she is granted one year to mourn her father before the wedding, but during this year she must stay with Lord Kira, I guess to get to know him better? Anyway, the counselor, Oishi and all of Asano's men are branded as ronin, masterless warriors, and they are also forbidden to avenge Asano and go after Lord Kira. For good measure, Oishi gets imprisoned in a pit and Kai is sold into slavery.
A year later, Oishi gets released from prison, as he is deemed harmless - but he realizes that sorcery was used to frame Asano and he and his son, Chikara, try to reunite the scattered ronin, and also track down that half-breed, because he was a pretty good fighter, remember he fought like a demon almost. They find Kai in the fighting pits of a Dutch colony, and though the other ronin don't really care for Kai because he wasn't an official samurai, Oishi reminds them that NONE of them are samurai any more, so it doesn't really matter. They need his blade, and for that matter, they need a lot more weapons to boot. Kai leads some of the men to the Tengu Forest, where he grew up, as he believes they can get some good swords there, if they pass the mystical testing process. Kai bests his former master in a duel, while Oishi is shown an illusion of his men being slaughtered, and manages to resist drawing his blade and fighting back.
The ronin all reunite, since now they have the half-breed and enough swords to fight back. Their plan is to ambush Lord Kira on a pilgrimage, because he must visit the graves of his ancestors before he can marry Mika. One ronin is sent to the town Kira must travel to, to talk to some local riff-raff and whores to see if he can learn when Kira is planning to visit - but Mizuki is there and gives him false information so she can lure the ronin into a trap. Most of the ronin are killed in Mizuki's trap, and the rest need to come up with a new plan.
What happens next reminds me a bit of "Star Wars", and also "The Wizard of Oz" - remember last week when I reviewed the "Wicked" movies I mentioned that as a kid, I realized that those movies had a lot in common, specifically that in one, the heroes dress up like palace guards to infiltrate the Wicked Witch's palace to free Dorothy, and the in the other, the heroes dress up like stormtroopers to infiltrate the Death Star to free Leia. OK, so here the heroes dress up like wedding performers to infiltrate Lord Kira's castle to free Mika. Same shit - of course, I also know that the original "Star Wars" movie was heavily influenced by Lucas' love of Kurosawa movies, among other sources. But there's a connection between Japanese films, Westerns, fantasy movies, hell there are connections between all movies, really. Certain basic themes and plot points resonate across all genres, combat and rescue and revenge, right vs. wrong and all that.
Some of the ronin are granted access disguised as the wedding performers, while others scale the castle walls at night and take out the guards. It's a solid plan - but Oishi is on stage and is hit by a sentry's arrow, and the jig is up. Oishi fights Kira while Kai and Mika face Mizuki who attacks them as a dragon, and Kai has to unleash his demon-like fighting abilities to killer her. Oishi beheads Kira, and you'd think that would be the end of things, but then the whole thing has to be explained to the shogun, who had forbid any avenging of Lord Asano, and the penalty for breaking the shogun's rule is death.
There's some good news, however, the Shogun decides that since Lord Kira used treachery in the first place, and the ronin who are still alive followed the principles of bushido, their honor as samurai is restored, and they will receive a proper burial - yes, they still need to kill themselves, so umm, yeah, not really seeing the upside there. I'm not sure most Western audiences would consider this a happy ending - Kai went through hell to rescue Mika, and now he doesn't get to be with her? Well, maybe in the next world - he did say he would search for her through a thousand worlds and ten thousand lifetimes, so good luck with all that, I guess.
Directed by Carl Rinsch
Also starring Hiroyuki Sanada (last seen in "Speed Racer"), Ko Shibasaki, Tadanobu Asano (last seen in "Kate"), Min Tanaka, Jin Akanishi, Masayoshi Haneda (last seen in "Colette"), Hiroshi Sogabe, Takato Yonemoto (last seen in "Handsome: A Netflix Mystery Movie"), Hiroshi Yamada, Shu Nakajima, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa (last seen in "Balls of Fury"), Neil Fingleton, Rinko Kikuchi (last seen in "The Brothers Bloom"), Natsuki Kunimoto, Togo Igawa (also carrying over from "From the World of John Wick: Ballerina"), Tanroh Ishida, Masayuki Deai, Yorick van Wageningen (last seen in "Escape Room: Tournament of Champions"), Clyde Kusatsu (last seen in "The United States of Leland"), Haruka Abe (last seen in "Cruella"), Tomoko Komura, Takako Akashi (last seen in "The King's Man"), Akira Koieyama (last seen in "Rush"), Arisa Maekawa, Daniel Barber, Gedde Watanabe (last heard in "Kung Fu Panda 4"), Manato Sekiguchi, Rick Genest, Kano Ichiki, Yuriri Naka (also last seen in "Speed Racer"), Jamie Tran, and the voices of Ron Bottitta (last seen in "In Good Company"), Victoria Grace.
RATING: 6 out of 10 ghosts in the Tengu forest
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