movie review
Samurai Cruise isn’t cheesy

By David Waldron
Special to the Northern Light

If you’re anything like me, you saw the preview for “The Last Samurai” and thought, “Tom Cruise as a samurai? He’d make a better basketball player!” But love him or hate him, Cruise can act when he wants to, and he does his part to make this a good film.

“Samurai” takes place in Japan near the peak of its industrial revolution. The land is torn between its traditions and the ideas of the quickly encroaching western culture. A conflict develops between two groups: the sword-wielding samurai who are sworn to protect their country, and the government’s gun-toting military. The emperor of Japan is young, inexperienced and easily influenced by the greedy politicians and noblemen who believe that the samurai are a threat to the new Japanese way of life. The emperor remains indifferent and his complacency allows these two groups, who are both loyal to him, to kill each other.

Cruise plays Nathan Algren, an American captain the Japanese government employs to train and lead its army against the samurai. Ken Watanabe plays Katsumo, the commander of the samurai army. Without giving too much away, Cruise eventually ends up spending a lot of time with the samurai and begins to explore their fascinating culture. The film touches up on some interesting aspects of traditional Japanese life, and shows some amazing scenery of the country.

The sword fighting is undoubtedly the most impressive element of the movie. The finesse and smoothness of samurai sword fighting is as much of an art as it is entertainment. How is it that a samurai can make the simplest move look so damn cool? “Samurai” has mind-blowing quality in its action sequences comparable to Akira Kurosawa’s 1954 classic film “The Seven Samurai.” Even Cruise went through extensive training for the film, and handles himself well.

Another great thing about this movie is the fact that Cruise isn’t some dorky American who learns how to be an amazing samurai warrior just because he’s the protagonist. His character has been through a lot of battles and can hold his own with a blade. He simply learns a different style, with a much more intense discipline.

Obviously, a movie about samurai with a lead role by Tom Cruise is going to make people a little leery. If you look at the film with a thick enough magnifying glass you’ll find something wrong with it, but “Samurai” has a lot of great qualities. There’s beautiful scenery, well-developed characters, and a few pretty hilarious dialogues between Cruise and the samurai. And lets not forget about the huge battles and some sword fighting that puts the action in “Kill Bill” to shame. Don’t let Cruise scare you off. This movie is worth watching.