On 27 April 2021, after having viewed a number of excerpts from it previously, I finally watched in its entirety the 2013 movie 47 Ronin (there have been at least six earlier versions).
Directed by Carl Rinsch, and released by Universal Pictures, 47 Ronin is a fictionalised, fantasised version of a real event featuring 47 ronin (masterless samurai) seeking revenge for the murder of their daimyo (feudal lord). It stars Keanu Reeves as Kai, a half-Japanese half-English outcast first seen here as a mysterious boy discovered in a Japanese forest several centuries ago after having secretly been raised there by the supernatural tengu spirits, who have taught him knowledge and skills not known to humans.
Kai is found and reared by Lord Asano Naganori (played by Min Tanaka), the Ako Domain's kindly daimyo, and he helps to avenge the daimyo's subsequent death via shogun-enforced ritual suicide (seppuku). This fatal ploy had been deftly engineered by Lord Kira of Nagato (Tadanobu Asano), a treacherous usurper of Asano's domain, who was assisted in his murderous machinations by a wily, evil kitsune (fox maiden) named Mizuki (Rinko Kikuchi).
Speaking of which: 47 Ronin certainly contains plenty of spectacular Oriental monsters and non-human entities. These include a rampaging kirin (see below), a golem, the tengu, and Mizuki – the afore-mentioned beguiling but wholly malign kitsune. She can transform herself into a white fox, a white spider, and even an enormous white dragon, as well as assuming the exact form of any human she chooses. However, she is always betrayed in her varied guises by her eyes, if close enough attention is paid to them, because they do not match – one eye is red, the other is blue.
My favourite monster was the ferocious, carnivorous kirin or Japanese unicorn, although this latter name is something of a misnomer. With its savage meat-eating proclivity, its scaly body, and its paired antlers, this Far-Eastern mythical beast looks and behaves nothing like the gentle horse-like single-horned unicorn of the West. The particularly sizeable, ornery kirin that Kai does battle with in 47 Ronin had been sent by Mizuki in an early attempt to kill Lord Asano, but is foiled from doing so when Kai single-handedly slays it.
Most of the movie follows Kai and the accompanying ronin, led by Asano's former principal counselor, Oishi (Hiroyuki Sanada), as they tenaciously persevere through all manner of hardships and confrontations in their determined quest for revenge, seeking to destroy Kira. They are also determined to rescue Mika (Ko Shibasaki), Lord Asano's daughter. Mika loves Kai, but she has been claimed and carried away by Kira, who intends to make her marry him instead, in order to ensure his status as Ako's ruler.
The culmination of their valiant endeavours sees Kai boldly return to the tengu who raised him, in order to elicit their assistance in conquering Kira and Mizuki by supplying Kai and the ronin with magical tengu-hewn blades for use in battling Kira's troops. But such assistance is offered neither readily nor unconditionally when the tricky, daunting tengu are involved, especially as no sword must ever be drawn while inside a tengu temple. Consequently, Kai and his companions face a grueling, mind-warping, weapons-bereft test of bravery and skill against their superhuman opponents if they are to succeed in procuring the latter's much-needed blades.
Incidentally: as seen, for example, in the poster opening this Shuker In MovieLand review and the one immediately above this paragraph, as well as in the opening seconds of the trailer linked to below, a lot of the early marketing and pre-release publicity for 47 Ronin prominently featured a very distinctive Canadian sideshow performer/fashion model/actor named Rick Genest (d. 2018, aged 32), who played Foreman, a character whom Kai encounters on a slave ship in this movie. Beyond 47 Ronin, Rick was famously known as Zombie Boy, because he had purposefully chosen via countless lengthy sessions to become intricately (and permanently) tattooed all over his entire body in a manner that grotesquely transformed his appearance into that of a rotting, living skeleton – a veritable zombie.
Due to various changes in vision concerning the route that this movie should take, however, Rick's Foreman character was almost entirely deleted. Sadly, only a few brief shots of him remain in the final cut, which in my view was a great shame, as Rick's unique appearance and presence would have added greatly to the movie's appeal (and is presumably why its publicity and marketing featured him so extensively in the first place). But if you click here, you can watch a fascinating interview with him on YouTube instead. RIP Rick.
47 Ronin contains dazzling CGI and other special effects, and held my rapt attention throughout, but is far greater than a mere showcase for visual spectacle. It is a movie based upon vengeance, but above all upon honour, which means that I should not have been surprised by what for me was its unexpected ending – I was, but I shouldn't have been. Anything else would have been out of character, not fitting to its intrinsic theme.
Something of a rarity among modern-day fantasy-incorporating films, which all too often possess plenty of pazazz but all too rarely contain much in the way of emotional substance or depth, 47 Ronin is a movie that truly moves its viewers – and how!
If you would like to view a thrilling official trailer for 47 Ronin on YouTube, please click here; and Kai's courageous conflict with the kirin (plus a glimpse of Mizuki in her white fox guise) can be viewed here.
To view a complete chronological listing of all of my Shuker In MovieLand blog's other film reviews and articles (each one instantly accessible via a direct clickable link), please click HERE, and please click HERE to view a complete fully-clickable alphabetical listing of them.
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