zatoichi

[climbthis]

minasan

anyone see beat takeshi's zatoichi remake yet?

jerome cervantes

[cybermaai]

I saw it last Thursday and thought it rocked. I wasn't planning to see it, figuring it was a slumping film industry's attempt to capitilize on past glory. Then I learned it was directed by Takeshi, whose films I admire. His use of music was excellent. The CG stuff was interesting for chambara. I saw it at an afternoon matinee and the audience was composed of about thirty middle-aged men, a sad comment on the current economic reality here.
When's the US release?

[climbthis]

taylor san

so far as i know, no us release yet. saw the trailer and it looks pretty good. i heard kitano wanted the soundtrack to be more modern, like something from "stomp"

mata ne

[cybermaai]

The review was in today's Japan Times. It can be found online at
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/arts.htm

[CKohalyk]

I saw it last week... and as a Takeshi fan I thought it was sh!te.

I don't think they should've attempted so much CG when they don't have the budget for it. The soundtrack was interesting in the first part of the film (i.e. natural farming sounds) but the synthesized music near the end got very annoying.

There is only ONE good fight scene (in the garden of the oyabun), and there are WAAYYYYY too many artistic death portraits. And the ending... well I won't reveal that here.

The acting is okay, Takeshi is good in the beginning but becomes a different character by the middle of the film (he changes again near the end but at least this time there is some motivation). The Oyabun gave the best performance by far I thought... really impressive.

Although there were some interesting ideas about breaking out of the jidaigeki mold (modern music, modern acting, etc.) it didn't come together as well as I would've liked. I think Takeshi really should've stuck to his realistic brand of ultra-violence characteristic of his earlier films and toned down on the (bad) CG effects.

I give it 2 stars outta 5.

I understand that you MUST watch it... I did too. But don't pay more than $10 to do so (ie rent it if you can wait.).