The Last Samurai
Studio: Warner Bros.
Website: http://www.lastsamurai.com/
Release Date: 2003-12-05
Cast: Tom Cruise, Ken Watanabe, Billy Connolly, Koyuki, Tony Goldwyn
Director: Edward Zwick
Screenwriter: John Logan, Marshall Herskovitz
WorkNameSort: The Last Samurai
Our Rating: 3.50
It’s not entirely fair to say that Tom Cruise can’t play embittered war veterans. Embittered young veterans, sure — his Ron Kovic in “Born on the Fourth of July” crackles with the pained umbrage of a first-time soldier who’s had his future suddenly snatched out from under him. But accepting eternal freshman Cruise as a battle-scarred, morally deadened Civil War survivor (and ex-Custer confrère) is another matter entirely, and it’s that overly optimistic casting that makes Last Samurai’s first act a tough slog. The movie picks up steam sometime after Cruise’s Capt. Nathan Algren is plucked from his duties hawking firearms and sent to Japan, where an easily influenced emperor is being prodded into a national process of Westernization. Holding the line for the old ways is samurai warrior Katsumoto (Ken Watanabe), who considers his violent rebellion an act of true fealty to the empire. The closer Algren comes to the samurai, the better the film gets: Cruise looks a lot more natural swinging a sword around in a rejuvenating fury than he does drinking away the memory of slain comrades and Native Americans. Extended captivity in Katsumoto’s camp converts Algren to his host’s ways — a transformation explained less coherently by director/co-writer Edward Zwick’s undercooked story than by cinematographer John Toll’s heart-stopping depictions of Nipponese natural beauty. (Anybody with a pad as sweet as Katsumoto’s is somebody you’d gladly take up arms for.) As Algren’s fiercely principled captor-turned-mentor, Watanabe ultimately reveals himself to be the movie’s real star — even if his quirky, repeatedly declared passion for “good conversation” makes you wonder if he’s going to bust out in a chorus of “Getting to Know You” at any minute.
This article appears in Dec 3-9, 2003.