So, Evan was in town for the holidays, which meant we saw a
movie, because that’s what we do. Also, it was unilaterally decided that I
would be going to visit them soon for another weekend of movies. I had no say
in this. On the plus side, they have Netflix, so if I get sick again (it
happened last time), we can at least pack in several movies at their home.
There were three options of movies for us. First was the new
Hobbit movie, but it seemed more like a family movie, in that Evan promised to
take his wife, and I should probably take my nephew. Secondly was Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues, which seemed like a ripe case for Hangover 2 syndrome (a
sequel to a massively successful comedy that rehashes the same jokes with
little humour). Third was 47 Ronin which had the lowest Rotten Tomatoes score
of the three, so we went to that.
Trailers this time included I, Frankenstein (Evan pointed
out the irony of titling it that. I guess I, Adam would have been lost on
everyone. Although I, Daemon would have been pretty cool), Endless Love (about
a shady guy who turned his life around, then fell in love with a good girl,
whose dad looks into the guy's shady past. What the hell’s a love movie trailer doing in front of this movie?), Non-stop (Liam Neeson Neesoning his way
through a plane mid-flight), and X-Men: Days of Future Past (in which Wolverine
is sent back into the past to stop a war on mutants, because time travel has
always worked out so well. Alright trailer with terrific music).
47 Ronin stars Keanu Reeves as Kai, a white guy in Ancient
Japan (he’s actually the son of a British sailor and a Japanese woman, putting the time of the movie somewhere after the British had arrived, but before mythical creatures had died out). He
hangs around the province of Arco
The beginning of the movie states that those who understand
the 47 Ronin understand Japan ,
but that’s not really true. Samurai are viewed a lot like knights. Back then,
they were normal people who acted like normal people, with all their good
qualities and bad. Much, much later, we look back at them with idealism as
paragons of Honour, but they were not. Knights were kind of into the
pillage/rape/murder thing, and I would wager small amounts of money that one of the reasons for the
Crusades was so that the pillage/rape/murder could happen on foreign soil to
the people of a religion Europe didn’t really care
about.
Samurai were the same way. Some time later, important
Japanese people got together and said “This is how Samurai acted, and so should
you” regardless of whether or not Samurai actually
acted that way. I’m sure some did, just as I’m sure some knights actually were knights in shining armour. But to
say to understand the 47 Ronin is to undertand Japan
is wrong. It’s actually understanding what Japan
wishes it was. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. We all idealise the past.
All the founding fathers had foibles – they were people, after all. Nobody’s
perfect. Anyway, I just wanted to state that.
So, the movie itself? Well, it looked great. They had $175
million for a budget, and they spent a lot of it on effects, and the rest on
costumes so elaborate, they were ridiculously over the top. There wasn’t a lot
of humour, but that’s okay in a serious movie like this, trying to get the
point across that honour is worth dying for. The music is perfectly adequate.
The only real letdown, actually, is the action, which is
kind of a big deal for me. There were only a couple of extended set pieces in
the movie (there were some other very short ones). The first was good, the
second was a battle in a flaming village that was a huge letdown because they
went with the shaky-cam, short-cuts method instead of having awesome flaming
fights, and the last was actually pretty good, and featured one of the better
human vs dragon battles I’ve seen. In fact, I don’t really remember seeing
anyone battle an Eastern-style dragon before. Still, the potential was there
for so much more awesome, and they dropped the ball.
In conclusion, I’m going to have to give this a DVD rating.
On the ride home, we compared it to Battleship, but upon further review, I
think the scenery bumps it up a little. Not much.
On a final note, there’s a really nifty scene where (before
the final battle) the remaining Ronin all sign their names on a piece of paper
detailing their goal. Each signs their name, then draws their katana a few
inches, presses their thumb against the blade, and leave a bloody thumbprint
next to their name. I just thought that was pretty cool.
