Well...

Rating: 8/10 (29 January 2008)

The movie is good. Or it isn't. It all depends on you and how do you accept the American "samurai" movies. That is what 'The Last Samurai' is - an American movie. This movie has some great action, pretty good acting, beautiful cinematography but lacks in showing the real Japanese culture. Don't get me wrong, there is the samurai honor and everything else you want to see but it all was made more elementary and easier for the westerners to accept it. And there was the American Super Hero - Tom Cruise... This is a big problem.
SPOILER WARNING!!! Algren learnt Japanese in less than two years. This is impossible no matter how good linguist you are. At the same time he became the greatest swordsman in Japan and he learnt everything about being samurai just in a few months. It was him who saved the samurai leader from the ninja. All of the movie's message was destroyed by showing the American as the greatest and the strongest person.
The other big problem of the movie is the story. I do not know about historical accuracy but the biggest part of the story was almost directly taken from the great novel "Shogun". It is not the first time nor the last time when I see the same story in another book or movie or even comics. I have seen it even in a comics about Conan. But in all of these movies the depth of the original story is just not there. I almost hate it when I see something like this...
END OF SPOILERS!!!
There are some big problems in the movie but there are some very good things too. As I said before there is some good acting and beautiful cinematography. But the greatest reason to see the movie is the action. There are some of the greatest fights I have ever seen. And they are done by the Japanese way - one strike - one dead enemy. It is just great and you have to see it.
I guess you will be disappointed by the movie if you expect some deep story about the confrontation of two cultures - there is not depth. But if you expect great action you will enjoy it.