Popular reviews

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  Review by Viewtifold ★★★ 8

  The First Weeaboo

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  Review by matt lynch ★★★ 5

  It's true: according to Wikipedia, Tom Cruise is indeed still the only samurai on record, and has been since 1877.

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  Review by Mario 🎃 ★★★★½ 8

  Tom Cruise looks HOT with beard and long hair.

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  Review by CinemaCl🎃wn ★★★½ 18

  Very sound in its depiction of old Japanese customs, traditions & way of life, featuring an interesting story, convincingly performed by the cast, benefitting from impressive work by the crew, and steered by beautiful music from Hans Zimmer, The Last Samurai is a story of romanticism vs modernism, purity vs corruption, and a conflict of two different cultures.

  Co-written & directed by Edward Zwick, his research of Japanese history, culture, customs, traditions & accent is commendable and the plot manages to be emotionally investing for the most part if not all the way. Camerawork is top-notch, both during the battle scenes and while capturing the westernisation of 19th century Japan. Pacing is steady throughout, and the film as a whole scores high in…

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  Review by Josh Lewis ★★★ 4

  Not dissimilar to the way Cruise devotes himself to the principles of the samurai way, Zwick has spent decades honing his craft and becoming a master of the art of the 3-star classic that is either your dads or some guy from your high school's favorite movie of all time by virtue of the fact they’ve seen it no less than 600 times on TV. Here he takes a stab at one of those movies where a swagged-out white guy travels to a foreign land and (faced with the horrors of the modern West) adopts their “weird” spiritual, noble customs and earns their respect by having the pure heart of an ancient hero. The result is an expensive historical war…

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  Review by Will Menaker ★★★½ 5

  Same director, but this film manages to be the exact inverse of 'Glory', a film about a white man who bravely fights and dies to liberate others from a cruel and oppressive feudal social order, in this one a white man fights and *lives*--like an absolute coward--to preserve one. Despite Edward Zwick's bird-brained conception of the Samurai rebellion against the Meiji restoration as some kind of indigenous people's struggle, through a little thing I like to call "movie magic"--incredible sword duels, battle scenes, and Tom Cruise--this movie is a winner.

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  Review by Will ★★★½ 2

  That score... Absolutely insane. Hans Zimmer never fails to amaze me. I've always been a giant fan of his Batman and Pirates of the Caribbean score but I think this might be my new favourite.

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  Review by TheCloser79 ★★★★★ 6

  "The Last Samurai" is a modern classic, a real people's champ. While critics dismissed him as "quite good", he left a lasting impression on the audience. And he is still underestimated and overlooked too often. I can not understand that! The story of an American military advisor in Japan at the end of the 19th century, who is arrested by the "enemies" and gets to know and love their culture, always hits the heart and also keeps on entertaining. The battles are enormous and brilliant, Tom Cruise is not only supported by the Japanese actors (above all Ken Watanabe and Hiroyuki Sanada), but is almost played against the wall by them and the long runtime never stretches. But the core…

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  Review by Rafael "Parker!!" Jovine ★★★★ 17

  I wasn't ready for this movie the first time I saw this. Like I may have had not the maturity. I was approximately twelve years old at the time, and I went to see it out of curiosity, but I had forgotten just about everything ever since. So, having returned to this picture so many years later, I was able to enjoy it more.

  The sense of scale that Zwick brings to the table once again was the first thing that drew me in to what could be his most epic work. The stunning cinematography by John Toll and production design combined with the natural beauty of the film's setting to provide an immersive experience for any viewer who allows…

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  Review by alex todd 🧟‍♂️ ★★★★

  Samurai are cool

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  Review by Santacage ★★★★★ 4

  Such a heart-touching movie, which never gets boring despite its long runtime.
  The performances, especially by Tom Cruise and Ken Watanabe, are absolutely outstanding and the soundtrack by Hans Zimmer is perfect.
  If you have not watched this movie already, I would highly suggest you do!
  Really underrated!!

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  Review by comrade_yui ★★★ 1

  a film entirely devoid of subtext, tuned with a gorgeous hans zimmer score at a time when he actually put in the effort, loads of extras with a nice proportion of intimacy vs. scope, and cruise and watanabe have an adorably-chaste masculine chemistry. zwick is a terrible director and slathers this with a thick coating of dumb romanticism; but hey, i like dumb romanticism, and this is perfectly serviceable as a 2000s crowd pleaser. there were so many historical epics like this back then; audiences didn't know how lucky they were to have them, before franchises took over everything...