|
|
|
Year:
2003
|
Rated:
R
|
Runtime:
144 min.
|
OFFICIAL SITE
|
|
Starring:
Tom Cruise, Billy Connolly, Tony
Goldwyn, Shin Koyamada, Timothy Spall, Ken Watanabe, Hiroyuki Sanada,
Koyuki, Shichinosuke Nakamura, Seizo Fukumoto, Shun Sugata, Masato Harada
|
|
Directed
by: Edward Zwick
|
|
Written
by: John Logan, Marshall
Herskovitz, Edward Zwick
|
|
Music
by: Geoff Zanelli, Hans Zimmer
|
|
Movie
Studio: Warner Bros.
|
|
Trivia:
IMdb
|
Full
Details: IMdb
|
|
Store |
VHS
|
DVD
|
SOUNDTRACK
(CD)
|
BOOK
|
BOOK
|
POSTER
|
POSTER
|
|
|
Review |
| HugeReviews.com
Rating: What'll
it be? |
Review
by: Step
up and review this puppy! |
|
Super
The
Last Samurai
By Joe De Matteo
Way back when my wife and I were still sitting through
the movies the other one liked, with a smile on my face and
dread in my heart, I went to see 10 with her.
I’d never heard of Dudley Moore and I didn’t know
it was going to be a comedy.
We all know the end of this story.
An ambulance had to be sent for, they carried me out of
the theater on a stretcher, and I was in intensive care for
the 2 weeks it took me to stop laughing.
Michael
[Flanagan] was the first to show me the preview online (at
HugeReviews.com). The
extended trailer was so good I watched it over and over again.
Mark
[Capitelli]
told me I was going to ruin the movie for myself if I didn’t
stop watching the preview.
It’s true that I had extremely high expectations. |
|
The movie was predictable, beyond the obvious story of
a soldier going native, but it didn’t make a difference.
Want some adjectives?
How about exciting?
It was exciting on so many levels.
Beautiful: the countryside, the costumes, the mountain-scapes,
the interiors and exteriors of homes and temples, even the
battle scenes were filmed artfully, and were all very
beautiful. There
is one scene at the beginning of a battle, the rider in the foreground on a grand white
horse. As the charge starts the camera goes to slow motion and
focuses on the horses’ legs.
Watching that horse's front legs, first one, then the
other, slowly step up, then gracefully move forward to take
the next length of ground is a beautiful thing. |
DVD
|
|
The battle scenes are Action-packed, and the time between
battles is quiet time that you learn more about the
characters, actually watch Tom Cruse’s stubborn character
grow; you look at beautiful things and learn about the
contrasts and harmonies between cultures and people.
You may feel that the picture drags at points, but those
are important parts for you to absorb the subtleties in what
you may want to off-handedly classify as an in-your-face film.
Almost like reading the descriptive passages in a deep
novel. That is
because this story is deep.
At points it’s like watching a 90 minute movie based
on a twelve-hundred page novel; you wish they hadn’t cut
quite so much of the back story out.
This is not the greatest movie you’ll ever see, but an
excellent one. I
had a little problem with the ending, but that's what happens
when a creative genius like myself has to look at the work of
successful writers. Though
the score was good, I sometimes caught a deep, moaning
instrument that reminded me of Crouching Tiger, Hidden
Dragon, and that was distracting. Aside from that, there were the mimes in the bath
house…just joking.
So, Mark, the
400 viewings of both long and short trailers did not ruin the
movie for me.
The Last
Samurai is a SUPER movie. Go see it.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
