Historical Japan *Spoilers*

Rating: 5/10 (14 December 2003)

Honestly, I thought the movie was pretty decent. But there were some seeeerious historical issues that bothered me.
1. The movie has an absurdly idealistic notion of Samurai. Certainly Bushido is a wonderful code, but not every samurai follows it. The code for clergy in the medieval catholic church was laudable, although certainly not followed consistently. Samurai have a code, but are not perfectly moral and honorable individuals. The movie (understandably) glosses this over to make the samurai more appealing to the disillusioned Algren, but still.
2. The Ninja attack. No one ever (ever) ever caught a ninja. Once. In history. The idea that a platoon of them invade a village is almost laughable.
3. This isn't historical so much as simply annoying. Katsumoto is unnecessarily kind to Algen (Cruise) in the beginning, but by the end, he defers to him! How did that happen? Algren is certainly a fine warrior, but the idea that a powerful and experienced Daimyo like Katsumoto needs Tom Cruise to explain things to him is silly. A bit.
I don't want to give the impression that I disliked the movie. I thought it was decent, and the middle hour and a half was wonderful. That said...