Dance With Wolves II - The Japanese Episode

Rating: 4/10 (19 January 2004)

The Last Samurai was a trip to cliché city and back again.
It was a sort of Dance With Wolves II - The Japanese Episode.
Despite what some other reviewers have said, I believe the
second half of the film to be stronger than the first. The first half
was woefully boring (most of the film was given away in the trailers
anyway),, the second half was much better, apart from the ending
which takes Hollywood syrupy schmaltz to another level.
Other comments are that Cruise overacts as usual, he's a good
actor, but I assume he took this role for the money. Likewise, the
supporting cast was abysmal. Tim Small wasn't bad as the
narrator/bumbling Englishman (stereotyped beyond belief)and for
me the best bit about Billy Connolly was the early resolution of his
character - you know the one, the Scotch/Irish role he has never
played before. The remainder of the cast was satisfactory, with
special note to Ken Watanabe, good in his first English speaking
role.
Oh and I thought the special effects were very obvious. You could
clearly see where they used fake armies to give the impression of
numbers and likewise the CGI used was really jerky and repetitive.
Sure the explosions were good, but anyone could do that. I don't
know why, but I just got the impression that the producers had
used all their money on getting Cruise and didn't have much left to
spend on the rest, especially the script that was so clichéd it was a
joke.
Indeed, the whole scale of this film seemed rather small, in short,
watch the battle scenes which are great and sleep through the
rest.