Better than Expected - A Double Movie Review

 Recently I watched a couple of older movies that I'd kinda wanted to see: The Watch and 47 Ronin. Neither are considered to be great movies, in fact they were considered to be the opposite of that.

This is the high water mark of maturity in The Watch.

Honestly. These were not terrible movies. They were not great either. But they were fun.

So lets start with The Watch. This was originally going to be called Neighborhood Watch, but then news happened and the name was quickly changed.

3 out of 5 stars

 This was a funny but very crude movie. However there are times when that kind of humor is exactly what you need. Yes, I will readily admit that there are instances where this movie goes a bit too far... but overall it is a solid Ben Stiller & Vince Vaughn comedy. Jonah Hill is okay in the movie, he's done better, and Richard Ayoade is a British comedian that I've only briefly seen somewhere else... so really no clue what to expect from him. He performed his role well.

Basically this is the story of a retail manager who starts up a neighborhood watch to investigate the murder of his employee and stumbled into an alien invasion. Yes. That is the plot. The strength of the movie lies in the way it developed the characters that the movie swirls around. Not every character actually 'grows up,' but most do.

US poster. Very Misleading.

Now on to 47 Ronin.

First I want to talk about these two movie posters. They are very different. Yes, both focus on Keanu Reeves, who is arguably not the (only) main character. In the American poster you see no other heroes, in fact the second largest character depicted is really really really unimportant. The skull guy has maybe 1 line. Perhaps he had a larger role and was cut out... but I have this feeling the US poster just used him because of his image. The Japanese poster actually shows some of the massive cast of Japanese actors like Rinko Kikuchi (Pacific Rim) and Hiroyuki Sanada (Helix and The Wolverine). In contrast, take a look at the US poster again. One Japanese actress, 3 villains, and Keanu. The Japanese one actually shows 2 villains, 3 of the 47 ronin (including Keanu), and Mika.

The US poster is all style, no substance.

3.5 out of 5 stars

Anyways, lets dig into the movie briefly.

Japanese poster. Accurate.

This is a far more fantastic retelling of the classic Japanese story of Chūshingura. Chūshingura is the title given to stories, fictional ones, told about the historical event known as the Revenge of the Forty-Seven Ronin. This event is cited as one of the highest ideals of Bushido. There is a yearly festival held at Sengakuji Temple in Tokyo held on December 14th celebrating the day that the 47 ronin committed seppuku after achieving their vengeance.

This movie, 47 Ronin, is a very fantastical tale filled with mythological east-Asian and Japanese beats such as the Kirin, the Kitsune, and Karasu-Tengu (sometimes called Kenku). So the details of this version of Chūshingura, are very very fictitious. If you were looking for a historically accurate drama, you watched the wrong movie. This had a lot more of an anime feel to it. It fictionalized history.

And yet it works as a movie. Sure, it is no 47 Samurai (Chūshingura: Hana no Maki, Yuki no Maki), but I do not think it ever tries to be. Instead it a faster, shinier, far more fanciful telling. Keanu does not drag the movie down either as for the most part he is not the impetus of the plot. That is correctly done by Hiroyuki Sanada who portrays Oishi Kuranosuke / Oishi Yoshio. 

Actually this movie made me want to go back and watch Chūshingura again. It had just enough of the historical elements to whet my appetite for the original film. And again, 47 Ronin is not a bad film for what it shows. If you compare it to Chūshingura you will be disappointed, but what else would you expect? 

I have to admit the strangest thing I found in my research on these movies was this little Wikipedia gem: Suicides by sharp instrument in Japan. It is a category...