13 Assassins

2010 Leftovers Marathon, part 2 of 13

Data
Title: 13 Assassins
Year: 2010 (Japan); 2011 (US)
Length: 126 minutes
Director: Takashi Miike
Writer: Daisuke Tengan, based on a screenplay by Kaneo Ikegami
With: Kôji Yakusho, Takayuki Yamada, Yûsuke Iseya, Gorô Inagaki, Masachika Ichimura, Mikijiro Hira, Hiroki Matsukata, Ikki Sawamura, Arata Furuta, Tsuyoshi Ihara, Masataka Kubota, Sôsuke Takaoka, Seiji Rokkaku, Yûma Ishigaki, Kôen Kondô, Ikki Namioka
Cinematography: Nobuyasu Kita
Music: Kôji Endô
I saw it: on video (rented from Netflix), a couple days ago
Synopsis: a small group of samurai attack an evil nobleman's army

My reaction
Concept:
Story: An hour of planning and strategy (and a few character introductions), followed by an hour of battle. Half the movie is one giant action scene. That is all you need to know about this movie.
Characters: The nature of the story doesn't leave much room for development or back story or anything like that. But they are unusually good characters for an action movie. Particularly notable is that the unforgivably evil villain has twisted reason behind his evil, and isn't just there to give the good guys a villain.
Dialog:
Pacing:
Cinematography:
Special effects/design:
Acting:
Music:
Subjective Rating: 7/10 (Good, ). Kind of awesome. Too derivative (most of the story arc and characters are taken directly from Seven Samurai) to get an 8/10, but still awesome.
Objective Rating (Average):