Reviews and random thoughts brought about by various movies, series, music, books, travels, social behavior and what not...

Sunday, September 16, 2012

Rurouni Kenshin (live movie adaptation)

I'm not much of a 'Samurai X' fan, but judging from the trailers, I think the live action movie adaptation of the anime and manga classic,"Rurouni Kenshin" is worth watching.

And I was right. All my expectations were vindicated. And if I may add, I think this movie will not only cater to the numerous Samurai X fans out there but also serve as a good stand alone movie even for people who are not fans, or not quite familiar with the series. And even for those not familiar, there are flashback scenes that explains why the things here are the way they are. As I was walking out of the theater, this guy asks his GF what she thinks of the movie, the girl responds with a hearty "nanka omoshiroi", although it is evident she's nota fan or unfamiliar with the series.

From some of the few episodes of the anime that I was able to watch, a lot of the actors were dead on in the potrayal of their respective characters. Satou Takeru (who I first mistook for Kazuya Kamenashi) was able to bring out the clueless carefree nature of the reformed Kenshin (I love the scene where he skips down the street and sees a wanted poster with his former alias on it, blurting out "Oro!!"), and when he changes to his "Battousai" mode where his voice lowers and brandishes a 'yankee'-ish diction.

But most of the comedy was stricken off the movie to make it in a more serious tone. Most of the goofing around is handled marvelously by Munetaka Aoki, who plays Sanosuke (my fave Samurai X character). Emi Takei also did a good Kaoru, and Taketo Tanaka did a noteworthy and awesome job with his natural potrayal of Yahiko. But Yosuke Eguchi somewhat remolded Hajime Saito and made it his own while retaining some aspects that are found in the anime.

Fight scenes are not that intense but was good...very good. Well planned and well executed.

You can count on this movie adaptation to be one of the movies I would watch again and again.




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