When the Last Sword Is Drawn

I read the original book written in japanese which was so touching and purified my soul. So my expectation for this film was very high. This film really did the best to put the story in 2 hrs+ and it was as good as I expected. The samurai split and love for family beautifully pictured.

This movie was recommended to me after I went to see "The Last Samurai (2003)" and was deeply captivated with that story.

This movie takes place during the confusing times when the Emperor attempted to modernize Japan and the time of the samurai warriors and their shogun masters was ending. It tells the story of the "lesser" samurai Kanichiro Yoshimura and his rival Hajime Saito. This is more of a drama than an action movie, and that is where it scored high with me. Call it a samurai movie with a twist - or, if you like, one that probably is more historically correct and pays more respect to the proud samurai warriors.

My face did get wet, I admit that. I really did have empathy (and sympathy for that matter) with poor, hard-working, misunderstood Yoshimura. 10/10!

This film looked really promising, but I was put off by the clichéd sentimentality (flashbacks in soft focus!) and confounding choices of tragic hero Kanichiro Yoshimura. Frequent flashbacks and flash-forwards attempt to liven up the limp plot, but don't do much for narrative momentum. The film drags terribly towards the end, and could have done with some more judicious editing.

Last Sword really didn't deserve to beat Takeshi Kitano's fantastic Zatoichi for best film at the 2003 Japanese Academy Awards, but I can't begrudge the best actor nod for Kichi Nakai, who gives an amazing performance. In all, nearly worth the two and a half hours at the cinema.

A great movie about samurais, full of historical details and deep feelings, is a story of a brave samurai that put´s love and family first.But when samurai code and family mixed together, emerges a number of moral questions like honor and loyalty and how thin is the line that separates the traitor from the hero.Society in hour days seems different but people still use political and religion arguments to convince others to serve their thirst for power.On the end what really matters is love and some of us learn that by the hard way.

;) "A must see masterpiece"

One acid test for a movie is that of whether or not you find yourself caring for (any of) the characters as you watch it. This superb study of human personality and of self-sacrifice, honour and duty in difficult circumstances passes that test like almost no other film I've seen.

I've read many of the comments here that want to split this film into good parts and bad parts and would only say that I, for one, cannot see the join - from start to finish the film is well-paced with a series of events that will make you laugh at times and may well make you cry at other times. For me, it was uncomfortable a lot of the time, as I wasn't much pleased with the way the story unfolded and the direction the events took - with just about everything going against the way I would have liked it to! (Risk of a spoiler prevents me being too specific here!) Too many personal chords were being struck for me to actually *enjoy* the film at times but it maintained an unusual integrity in sticking to its own uncomfortable/unsatisfying course and reaching its own rather superb conclusion in a way that many movies seem unable to do without pandering to their audience's expectations in some way.

Technicalities were mostly excellent: The acting (possibly because of the non-familiar faces) was impeccable, the soundtrack was excellent and all other aspects were most satisfactory despite a slight air of claustrophobia with much of the film taking place in a somewhat shut-in environment with only the briefest picture-postcard views of Japan. Also, with the copy I saw, the colour could have been better at times, as could the lighting of the interiors...

The temptation to say avoid this film and any disquiet it might bring you is strong, but instead I say watch it and I have no qualms in giving it 9 out of 10 - it's worth it!!