13 Assassins

The film is built as a long crescendo, opening at a level of considered, Zen-like reflection and ending with a prolonged cacophony of elaborate, town-wide annihilation.

A classically structured rampage that bears serious comparison to the definitive greats of Akira Kurosawa, 13 Assassins will floor connoisseurs of action, mood and the dignity of a pissed-off scowl.

Miike misses an opportunity to add even more resonance by telling us a little extra about each of the samurai fighting the good fight. But he's also busy shooting nearly an hour's worth of complicated fight choreography. Enthralling as that is, Miike's greatest achievement here is in giving us reason to deeply care.

Once the Seven-Samurai-style band of brothers is assembled, 13 Assassins is pure pleasure: and it culminates in a magnificent 45-minute showdown that has to be the best final battle sequence in cinema since, oh, Kill Bill at least.

It's also a deeply moral antiwar film, if one chooses to view it that way.

There's nothing unexpected in this well-made picture, aside from the name of the director: Takeshi Miike.

A decent historical drama, with one of the best extended battle scenes (a full half of the movie is the face-off in the 'village of death') in recent memory.

Es el remake de "Grupo Salvaje" (una de mis tres películas favoritas de siempre) es lo que decían y el principal (y suficiente) motivo para lanzarme a ver esta obra maestra porque aunque es un remake de otra película japonesa de los años 60', está mas que claro que la obra maestra de Sam Peckimpah es la principal fuente de inspiracion de Miike en este MAGISTRAL film. No voy a esconder el hecho que este tipo de temática en cuanto a misiones suicidas, cosas imposibles de que salgan bien, me encantan. Pero no pintado como en las epopeyas y grandes gestas, sino llevado a lo que es, algo imposible, donde uno mismo elige la manera de morir. La película ya desde el principio tiene momentos impactantes con muchos "bemoles" que rápidamente hacen intuir que esto es otra cosa. El villano es una pasada, una de las personas con menos humanidad que he visto nunca (y eso que la lista es larga). Pero la clave de la película es esa batalla final, una de las más largas que he visto, la cual es una auténtica CARNICERÍA y un baño de sangre, la cámara no rehuye nada y es bastante impactante todo. La relación entre los samurais que ya en días de paz no saben como morir de una manera noble, y se aferran para lo que viven: luchar. Es el motivo más hondo que les hace embarcarse en dicha misión. Por poner algún pero es que al estar concebida por Japoneses, en los nombres y en la materia histórica del relato te puedes perder un poco a veces, si no tienes algunos conocimientos de esta civilización, pero aquí las miradas y los rostros son los que más palabras dicen, ya que cuentan con una gran potencia visual. En conclusión, una de las películas que más me han gustado por derivar, claramente de "Grupo Salvaje" y derivar tan DIGNAMENTE y tan FIELMENTE. Esta película es ya otro nivel y muy superior a lo que estoy viendo últimamente, no le doy un 10 por derivar de otra, aunque se lo merecería. Para mí esta es, ORO PURO.

is a brutal and bloody film, hmm but it was not the great movie because I miss and history so to say the same of the Eastern battles. Maybe it was the final battle well prepared, generally a good movie to entertain a Tuesday night =)

There is nothing special about this movie, I don't see the appeal. The main heroes are honorable and strong fighters, but none have any personality so it's impossible to feel any emotion when any of them die. The main villain is also one-dimensional with no personality, so there's no emotion when he dies either (and it's obvious he will die, so at least make him compelling). The production value for a Japanese film is very good, but the content is very shallow.

I found this incredible tedious. You've seen all the action sequences before (and the ones you haven't don't come off well--flaming, low-budget, CGI warthogs, for example) and there's just not a lot of substance or real themes here. In fact, though the movie does question the nobility of lower status individuals sacrificing themselves for elites, it's like a typically bad action movie, where the good guys could easily have just shot a bad guy on a bridge (with perfect justification), but instead, let him go, committ hari-kari themselves (who knows why), and allow the bad guy to amass additional forces for the epic final battle....

Terrible. The same crap that I've seen in every samurai movie, repeated step by step and image by image. If you want to see yet another Samurai movie that starts with a monster-leader doing atrocities on innocent people, so that you feel no torture or death is good enough for him, then progress to the little guys defeating the big guys by each of them hacking 10 people to death with simple strokes, this is the movie for you. Why not just watch Seven Samurai again? The high critical reviews for this movie astonish me.