The Last Samurai
Jan. 2nd, 2004 11:15 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tarigwaemirAd Mundo Exteriore,
Watched The Last Samurai, finally, with parents yesterday. I paid, since Father passed his exam on estate law or something like that, and I promised to do so if he did. I'm sure most of you have watched it already or don't plan to watch it at all, but I'll still be considerate and apply the cut.
All right, I concede that for a movie with a fundamentally flawed premise, it was very well made. I am especially annoyed that they couldn't avoid the "Western man and exotic Eastern woman" romance. -_- Mother says that I should give them credit for not overplaying it, but I still feel like they gave in to a terrible cliché. Also extremely, extremely annoyed by the American Indian analogy for samurai. Simply because it does not work. The samurai are not some separate "tribe" living in Japan, but a specific social class. If you needed an analogy from American history, the best would be the Southern plantation owners, fighting to continue their own way of life. By the time of the Tokugawa shogunate, which fell in the Meiji restoration, the samurai were thorough aristocrats, not "savages" or "tribal peoples". Argh.
Also, sure, the samurai may seem glamorous and in touch with nature and all that, but they were also feudal lords and pretty cruel and oppressive to the peasants. Katsumoto is an ideal, and a very cool ideal, I confess, but nevertheless, not every samurai had his devotion to the principles of bushido.
Oh, and yet another pet peeve: Tom Cruise cannot possibly learn Japanese swordsmanship in four to six months. Sorry. Not possible. He may know how to use an army saber, but Western swords use a very different grip and technique from an Eastern sword. I will concede that he could be extremely talented in that area, but still, I say that with that little training, he could not have held off four more experienced assassins, and he definitely could not have been the only one to survive that last battle. I mean, it would have taken him a month to learn how to move properly in that armor! -_- He's also entirely unnecessary to the movie. Marvelous effort and all that, but he's still acting a stereotype, not a person.
That being said, Katsumoto is awesome. Absolutely awesome. His dying line, "They are all perfect," while he stared at the falling cherry blossoms was possibly the best line of dialogue in the movie. And Ujio (I think?) was a pretty close second too. (One of the utterly unbelievable scenes in the movie has to be that one where Tom Cruise ends up in a draw with Ujio. Hah.) In fact, as I said before, the Western actors are utterly superfluous to the movie. I'm not saying this entirely out of pan-Asian pride or anything like that. I actually like Tom Cruise as an actor and would continue to retain some respect for him if he didn't choose to make this movie. But Katsumoto's story would have been just as compelling without any American interference, thank you very much.
(Of course, if the movie's based on a true story--is it?--I have nothing to say, but I'll still be annoyed.)
In other news, I have accomplished nothing during break except an idea of what my paper topic will be and several notecards on two primary sources. -_- I've decided to just go and study math for today. Oh, and thanks to Father's insane "let's get up at 6:30 in the morning and exercise" plan, I have a slight increase in stamina (not much) and something approaching a normal sleep cycle (unfortunately sabotaged by my daytime naps). ::sighs:: I think I can manage being industrious during reading period though, as long as I make sure I'm in Lamont when taking notes.
I refuse to do the 2003 meme because I have nothing interesting to say for most of the questions. ::shrugs::
...Tari
Watched The Last Samurai, finally, with parents yesterday. I paid, since Father passed his exam on estate law or something like that, and I promised to do so if he did. I'm sure most of you have watched it already or don't plan to watch it at all, but I'll still be considerate and apply the cut.
All right, I concede that for a movie with a fundamentally flawed premise, it was very well made. I am especially annoyed that they couldn't avoid the "Western man and exotic Eastern woman" romance. -_- Mother says that I should give them credit for not overplaying it, but I still feel like they gave in to a terrible cliché. Also extremely, extremely annoyed by the American Indian analogy for samurai. Simply because it does not work. The samurai are not some separate "tribe" living in Japan, but a specific social class. If you needed an analogy from American history, the best would be the Southern plantation owners, fighting to continue their own way of life. By the time of the Tokugawa shogunate, which fell in the Meiji restoration, the samurai were thorough aristocrats, not "savages" or "tribal peoples". Argh.
Also, sure, the samurai may seem glamorous and in touch with nature and all that, but they were also feudal lords and pretty cruel and oppressive to the peasants. Katsumoto is an ideal, and a very cool ideal, I confess, but nevertheless, not every samurai had his devotion to the principles of bushido.
Oh, and yet another pet peeve: Tom Cruise cannot possibly learn Japanese swordsmanship in four to six months. Sorry. Not possible. He may know how to use an army saber, but Western swords use a very different grip and technique from an Eastern sword. I will concede that he could be extremely talented in that area, but still, I say that with that little training, he could not have held off four more experienced assassins, and he definitely could not have been the only one to survive that last battle. I mean, it would have taken him a month to learn how to move properly in that armor! -_- He's also entirely unnecessary to the movie. Marvelous effort and all that, but he's still acting a stereotype, not a person.
That being said, Katsumoto is awesome. Absolutely awesome. His dying line, "They are all perfect," while he stared at the falling cherry blossoms was possibly the best line of dialogue in the movie. And Ujio (I think?) was a pretty close second too. (One of the utterly unbelievable scenes in the movie has to be that one where Tom Cruise ends up in a draw with Ujio. Hah.) In fact, as I said before, the Western actors are utterly superfluous to the movie. I'm not saying this entirely out of pan-Asian pride or anything like that. I actually like Tom Cruise as an actor and would continue to retain some respect for him if he didn't choose to make this movie. But Katsumoto's story would have been just as compelling without any American interference, thank you very much.
(Of course, if the movie's based on a true story--is it?--I have nothing to say, but I'll still be annoyed.)
In other news, I have accomplished nothing during break except an idea of what my paper topic will be and several notecards on two primary sources. -_- I've decided to just go and study math for today. Oh, and thanks to Father's insane "let's get up at 6:30 in the morning and exercise" plan, I have a slight increase in stamina (not much) and something approaching a normal sleep cycle (unfortunately sabotaged by my daytime naps). ::sighs:: I think I can manage being industrious during reading period though, as long as I make sure I'm in Lamont when taking notes.
I refuse to do the 2003 meme because I have nothing interesting to say for most of the questions. ::shrugs::
...Tari
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2004-01-02 10:59 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-01-02 02:40 pm (UTC)...Tari