When I heard that Japanese were making a period samurai movie based on the modern-day Eastwood western classic UNFORGIVEN, I was in two minds. I love samurai flicks (and also leading actor Ken Watanabe), but the Eastwood film was already pretty much perfect for a lot of fans. How could the Japanese hope to better it?
The answer is that they haven't. This new UNFORGIVEN is the inferior film in every respect, with a boring villain and a lack of talented actors and characterisation that made the original such a great movie. The Japanese UNFORGIVEN feels slow and stately and is certainly well shot throughout, but aside from the exciting climax, it has no real voice or look of its own.
For the most part, this is a shot-for-shot remake and I have no interest in shot-for-shot remakes. Thematic remakes are fine; remakes that take key material and give their own slant, like Carpenter's THE THING or Aja's THE HILLS HAVE EYES, great. But all the while I was watching this film, I was wishing I was watching the superb original instead. Watanabe does his best and while it's nice to see the Japanese remaking an American film for a change (as so many times it's been the other way around), UNFORGIVEN is a bit pointless.
