Movie: Live Action Kenshin

[rockmanj]

I think the guy kind of pulls off the Kenshin look


http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=4WNi8z5EWuE

[Sandldan]

Got a bit scared when I first saw the WB logo, but was pleasantly surprised all around. Will be looking forward to this :)

[Assassin]

not half bad...whens it coming out, sept?

[rockmanj]

Looks like sometime this fall.

[Kraco]

Yeah, I'm also actually looking forward to this. I'm always highly skeptical when live action and Japan is mentioned in the same sentence, but this looked surprisingly good based on the teaser.

[Sapphire]

It's a trailer. Made by the West. You are all being deceived!

I'm pretty sure Blood+ looked OMGAAMZING too.

[Animeniax]

Why do you think the trailer is made by Westerners? It looks like a typical fansub of an Asian made trailer for an Asian movie.

I'll agree though, a lot of anime does not translate well into live action. You can't get the skirts to flow just right to allow the little panty peek, sexist overtones become creepy and gross, and too many special effects make it too cartoony so it just doesn't work in that medium. Here's hoping we're wrong and this is a cool movie worth watching.

[Kraco]

I'll agree though, a lot of anime does not translate well into live action. You can't get the skirts to flow just right to allow the little panty peek, sexist overtones become creepy and gross, and too many special effects make it too cartoony so it just doesn't work in that medium. Here's hoping we're wrong and this is a cool movie worth watching.

Fortunately Kenshin has enough story and good characters for the script writer and director to work on if they want to make a decent adaptation, instead of a failure of a direct transfer from one medium to another.

[rockmanj]

Luckily Kenshin was not too cartoony. The guy that is playing Sano looks a bit small, but I will be optimistic unless I see something that suggests it will be utter shit.

[Marik]

The Yahoo! Japan (http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/company.php?id=2607) website's Movies section began streaming the full 127-second trailer for the live-action film adaptation of Nobuhiro Watsuki's Rurouni Kenshin manga on Tuesday.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvF6uGEO_Ug&feature=player_embedded

[Animeniax]

Wow, looks awesome and from little I can tell, faithful to the original anime/manga. I hope they capture the light-hearted innocence of Kenshin and his pals in between the violence.

[Kraco]

Yeah, this looked quite decent, again. At least as long as the English song doesn't make it to the movie. A historical Japanese movie could do without background music in English...

It seems like the movie is stuffed full of material. I hope not too much. The very beginning is there, Sanosuke is there (of which I'm very grateful), the freezing guy Udou, the gatling gun dude, Saitou Hajime, and lots of others. I don't think Kenshin is going to get a break during the film...

[Animeniax]

I agree the English song was out of place, but still very much how it goes in pop culture in Japan... "anything can be made cooler with an some English." Not sure why, but I also felt great relief when I saw (late in the trailer) that Sanosuke with his giant sword was in the film.

[Marik]

New one-minute ad. Seems to be a shorter version of the yahoo trailer. Much better quality at least. (1080p)


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4Bhr80HfyY&feature=player_embedded

[Animeniax]

While I'm happy to see this movie being made, I think it says a lot about the state of Japanese cinema and television that they have to revisit and remake stories and works from their past in order to make worthwhile productions. They're stuck in their past with outdated ideas and systems and unable to progress. This is endemic of their society as well as their cinema.

[Idealistic]

Subbed versions are out on the intarwebz. Just finished watching and it was legen.... wait for it.... dary.

[shinta|hikari]

Please post a link.

[Kraco]

This was the one I downloaded. (http://www.nyaa.eu/?page=torrentinfo&tid=388129)

It has got English subs as a separate srt, which I prompty turned into an .ass with a decent font, and muxed into the mkv. It could have certainly used editing beyond that, but it's perfectly understandable as it is. Also, it's not 720p, like the name suggests, but 536p, due to the picture aspect ratio. About 3GB, with good video quality and multichannel audio.

I'm usually not holding my breath when starting to watch Japanese live action, but in my opinion this was pulled off pretty well. Only tolerable levels of the annoying overacted emotions and dialogue that pollutes much of live action from Japan. Action especially was quite good and suitably bloody, and generally speaking they had found a balance between what looks natural in live action and in manga/anime. Not that Kenshin would have ever been entirely full of strange special attacks that would never translate.

Still, being just a single movie, the scope was necessarily reduced and the story changed considerably. Kenshin himself, Kaoru, Megumi, Kanryuu the opium dealer, and Jin'e survived it well enough or even thrived. Hajime made it as well to a degree, considering his role so far isn't so essential. My favourite character Sanosuke was sacrificied, though. Of course I'm biased, but nevertheless I feel like they could have removed him altogether and the script would have needed barely any editing. He had zero depth and contributed next to nothing, aside from a couple of loose fighting scenes that didn't matter in the bigger picture. Yahiko didn't do much better, but it's not like his role within the boundaries of this movie's plot would have needed anything more.

[Uchiha Barles]

Yeah, this was definitely low on the fail meter. I almost felt like I was watching the anime. I think I enjoyed this more than the early anime episodes as well. Kaoru used to annoy me, but I liked her in the movie.

[Kraco]

Kaoru used to annoy me, but I liked her in the movie.

It certainly helped they chose such a cute actress.

[Munsu]

Just watched the movie, and quite enjoyed it. I hope they do more, they certainly have enough story for a couple more movies... heck, the prequel OVA would be awesome to see in live-action too.

[lelouch]

Yeah solid movie overall. Not sure if the main villain really has a massive under-bite in real life or if he's just trying to look retarded for the movie. I hope it's the latter.