'Hara-Kiri' review: sumptuous chess game
G. Allen Johnson
Updated 4:48 p.m., Thursday, August 16, 2012
Eita plays Motome, a lone samurai, in Takashi Miike's "Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai." Photo: Tribeca Film / SF
Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai
WILD APPLAUSE Drama.
Starring Eita, Koji Yakusho. Directed by Takashi Miike. In Japanese with English subtitles. (Not rated. 126 minutes.)
Takashi Miike must be getting soft in his maturing years (he's 52). Kinda nice to see.
The outrageous bad boy of Japanese cinema, who has averaged three or four films a year for 20 years, has always seemed to go with his worst instincts - often to our delight. But his seeming desire to go as far over the top as possible has made him one of the sloppiest geniuses around.
Suddenly, he has the patience of an old master. For the second time out, he has made an elegant, feeling, brutal film that is a remake of a 1960s classic. In 2010, it was "13 Assassins." This time, it's a riff on Masaki Kobayashi's 1962 classic, "Harakiri."
Set in 1630 during a time of economic hardship, "Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai" opens with a wandering ronin (basically a samurai without a job), Motome (Eita), arriving at the compound of a rich lord (Koji Yakusho), asking permission to commit hara-kiri, a ritual suicide. Do it on such impressive ground, and the stature of the ronin's death increases.
The lord suspects him of bluffing, trying to get a handout to save the trouble of the clean-up. What he doesn't know is why Motome is really there. Turns out Motome's son tried this same ruse, and the lord's clan cruelly forced him to commit suicide.
Takashi's film is sumptuous, with rich cinematography, costumes and set design. Half the time it is a game of chess - the battle of wits between Motome and the lord. Half of the time it is a moving melodrama, tracing the backstory of Motome's family, including his son, daughter and grandson, all of whom would have had a life of plenty, had not the inhumane codes of the ruling elite gotten in the way.
G. Allen Johnson is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail:
ajohnson@sfchronicle.com