Sukiyaki Western Django (2008)

Very well executed

The Worst Film Ever

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

Viewed on DVD. Cinematography/lighting = seven (7) stars; editing/continuity = four (4) stars; translation = one (1) star. Director Takashi Miike delivers an ambiguous tale of Samurai Gun Slingers (or is it Cowboy Sword Swingers?) in the blood thirsty style of Quentin Tarantino who shows up in bookend cameo appearances (see below). Miike's fantasy film crams virtually every motion-picture myth from the Italian brand of the American Old West into the scenario pot (including the music) plus some clever original variations such as: a shootout at high (give or take) noon that occurs during a snow storm; Yakuza ancestors in the form of rival red and white town gangs who, of course, wear only red or white, respectively (to help the viewer determine which side a stunt actor is now on?); Samurai sword moves that deflect six-gun bullets; a hand-held Gatling gun with two-foot clip (for holding thousands of rounds?); a lynching Torii gate at the edge of town (instead of a lone leafless tree); the usual cluttered boot hill but with both above and below ground "burials"; saloon dancing entertainment that substitutes floor slithering for high kicking; and gold that looks freshly minted instead of freshly mined (so there's no mistaking it for fool's gold?). Acting is not so great and may have been negatively impacted by requiring all players to their deliver lines entirely in English (there is no voice-acting dubbing). Actresses and actors speak "high English" rather than "cowboy lingo," but retain the usual rising and falling intonations spoken by native Japanese (with a sentence-ending "ne" occasionally slipping out!). Stunt actors are kept busy dying many, many times as either Red Gang or White Gang members. Costumes are especially interesting. No one wears a white hat, since there are no "good guys" (some members of the Red Gang do wear white Hachimaki (headbands), though). These Yakuza fore runners also care a lot about there appearances, since their costumes always look brand new (including their baseball jackets!) as do their vast assortment of firearms and leather accessories (a gun collector's dream!). Special effects are modest but very well done. Editing and continuity are not quite there. The film is too long and sags when the satire hits a dry spot. Scenes often switch back and forth between sunshine, heavy (real not movie) rain, and snow (a lot of it). There is too much reliance on voice-over expository to fill in the gaps. Cinematography (wide screen, color) and scene lighting are fine. Surround-sound field is OK, but seems under used. Interior set used for the opening scenes features Tarantino as a gun fighter reacting to especially spicy sukiyaki in front of a painted back drop that includes the Japanese flag (way before it was adopted?) and Mount Fuji (closing interior scenes features an ancient Tarantino as a gun-shop proprietor zipping around in a racing wheel chair!). Some signs (including the town's name) are only partially translated. The English subtitle menu is confusing (since the film has only English dialog). (These subtitles are meant for the hard of hearing.) Credits are not translated which seems to be an especially disrespectful action by the film's director/producers directed against all those who helped to make this English-language movie possible! WILLIAM FLANIGAN, PhD.

I really didn't know what to think about this flick before I have seen it and even afterwards I'm still confused. It starts of with Quentin Tarantino sitting before a fake western city or in other words, blue key. From there it is rather okay with the snake but then it changes into a rare western with two gangs fighting against each other for a mysterious treasure. There's also a stranger walking in town.It all looks like a great western story but it is the fact that Japanese people are involved that it just didn't work out as a western. maybe you shouldn't take it all that seriously because it is also the legend of Django. And Django we all knew by Franco Nero's performance. Secondly I watched it as a Takashi Miiki flick that should be full of gore and blood. But even there it failed a bit for me because the way the gore is added is a bit laughable and even funny. Other scene's the gore just works out fine. I just have mixed feelings toward this, to be honest, a samurai story played with a western background. Not my typical Miiki flick, I prefer his old school gore flicks.Gore 2/5 Nudity 0/5 Effects 3/5 Story 3/5 Comedy 1/5

Reading some of the reviews, I am surprise that others are confused as to the story. It is basically a samurai movie made as a Japanese western with Japanese cowboys instead of samurais. The story is almost the same as Yojimbo/A Fistfull of dollars. Stranger comes into town and gets the 2 opposing gangs to start killing each other. The difference being he has a sidekick in the kick ass Bloody Benten (female gunslinger). I think what makes everyone go "huh?" is its rather confusing opening with Quentin Tarantino and also the dialogue in heavily Japanese accented and enunciated English. It is rather jarring and does distract from the story. However if you have watched enough undubbed samurai movies you will be familiar with the style and delivery of the dialogue so the distraction goes away. The movie is nothing original but based on it simply being a gunfight movie its not bad.

Trust Japanese director Takeshi Miike to dream up something as outrageously funny, wicked and dramatic such as Sukiyaki Western Django, his take on what a Japanese Western would look and feel like, encapsulating genre themes, character motivations, and action done to violent perfection. Fans of Westerns will definitely not want to miss this, just as how Thai director Wisit Sasanatieng had taken the genre and given it a Thai spin, Miike does the same for this film in a daring attempt to weave something unique into his vastly varied filmography.Such is Miike's clout that he had gotten Quentin Tarantino to play a character with different outlooks, in an introductory scene that resembled the color saturated scenarios in Sasanatieng's Tears of the Black Tiger. This scene alone will set the tone for the film, in being amusing in the black humour sense, filled with impossible action amped up for entertainment sake, and a host of characters you'd want to know more of. Like any classic Westerns, it then progressed some years later, with a mysterious, skilled gunslinger (Hideaki Ito) riding into a town to decide to which clan should he offer his skills to, the Reds or the Whites, each needing resource to track down the location of rumoured treasure in the land.It's like the good the bad and the ugly, where the only good guy you know is the skilled gunslinger, with his introduction already showcasing what he's capable of. We learn more about the backstories of both clans and their leaders, and from then on the gunslinger's allegiance turn to focus on Shizuka (Yoshino Kimura) the widow, the daughter in law of Ruriko (Kaori Momoi) where the latter turns out to be more than who she's willing to tell. Taking an interest, the Gunslinger hatches a quick plot to rid the land of its scourge, which culminates in a crazy all out gun battle where winner takes all.The cast is filled with recognizable faces from contemporary Japanese cinema, where besides those already mentioned, Teruyuki Kagawa stars as the irreverent Sheriff who has his own agenda, and I'm sure is in a role that's quite unreal as the character who just refuses to die. Yoshino Kimura also deserves special mention in her role as the temptress out for revenge but not sure how, and has this really strange dance to perform midway through the film. Hideaki Ito oozes machismo as the classic hero who talks less and lets his skills impose his will, and just about everyone puts in double the effort to ensure that their English enunciation is as perfect as can be, with the benchmark I used was whether they were comprehensible even with the subtitles turned off.It's pretty violent but in the cartoony sort of way, heavily relying on special and practical effects to make you feel every bullet spinning in the air, every round that impacts the body, and the aftermath damage caused, which I mentioned hovers in quite an unreal manner which is likely played out just for laughs. Action is carefully crafted to avoid repetition, though with what's inherent with the genre you do occasionally feel for anyone to dispatch another with less theatrics. But this is Sukiyaki Western Django, and part of the fun is to see how the tried and tested formula got spun on its head. Not quite memorable, but a fun ride nonetheless.