47 Ronin (2013)

A dopey but passably diverting fantasy take on a genuine event in Japanese feudal history. The story of the 47 Ronin who avenge the honour-induced suicide of their former lord is widely acknowledged as one of the pre-eminent examples of Bushido (the samurai code of chivalric values) in Japanese history and has passed, somewhat embellished, into a wide range of literature and arts, having been filmed at least six times before. But I'll wager none of those versions included a shape-shifting witch-dragon lady.

In this first (and probably last) Hollywood stab at the tale, Keanu Reeves comes billed as the star of the piece playing an outcast half-breed which is one of the many inventions added to this version of the tale and most likely intended as a familiarisation waypoint for western audiences. Stoic and ultra-serious he's not actually too bad, but neither the role as written, nor the screen time really allow him to make much of an impact. Thank goodness then for Hiroyuki Sanada as the ronin leader Oishi. One of the just about every well-known English-speaking Japanese actors that have been harvested for this production, he shoulders the bulk of the drama with capable authority, and along with Rinko Kikuchi's deliriously absurd wicked witch, ensures that at least a few engaging characters emerge from the CGI hailstorm.

Relatively unknown director Carl Rinsch struggles to marry the serious tone of the human drama to the Tolkien-esque fantasy romping, and as such the film lurches around, uncertain of what it wants to be. That said, some individual scenes are impressive, he and his DP have clearly spent a productive afternoon watching late-period Kurosawa and the courtly and battlefield scenes have a beautiful, symmetrical formality to them.

Not the disaster that the initial critical drubbing might suggest, this is no worse than most of the Narnia movies, or second-tier Wuxia fantasy such as Reign of Assassins, but then outside of Japan it doesn't have the franchise brand selling power of the former, and the latter sure didn't cost 175 million dollars to make. Ouch.

Rating: 3/5