Sukiyaki Western Django

I would give this 3 1/2. Most of this rating goes for the execution of this take on B-grade Spaghetti Western spin-offs.Enter through the Torii gate and find yourself in a world that never really existed ... isn't this what a movie is about? Going some where that never was or, at least, you would never be able to go there if it wasn't by entering through the movie?I watched it with the subtitles on. I'm pretty good with language accents so for the most part I could follow what they were saying without them, but they helped from time to time.I'm going to take an edge off it from the get go, so you can let it go and enjoy the movie.This is a western with a bunch of guys who wear a mix of western and Japanese club/gang attire.Alot of mud and a very small, rundown Japanese town. Basically, there are three buildngs. One for the Reds, one for the Whites, and one for the neither Red nor White or No Man's Land or whatnot.The Reds and the Whites are there for the secret treasure and are pretty much at a stand-off .... until the fateful day when a non-aligned gunfighter rolls into town ... and, yeah, you probably know what starts happening at that point.Guns, swords, arrow, and knives start flying.Alot of comedy thrown in ... most of it will be lost on a large majority of people that take themselves and movies too seriously... but then, of course, I couldn't stop laughing while watching Ran when the old king is wandering around looking for a sword so he could commit seppuku, and he walks down a flight of stairs with his empty scabbard dragged along beind him is falling from one step to the next *clunk*clunk*clunk* ... meanwhile a reviewer from a local magazine sitting behind me was crying and choked out "It's so horrible ... how can you be laughing?"Was it Shakespeare that said "One man's tragedy is another man's comedy", or is that the other way around?This may make a huge difference in how you feel about this movie when you are watching it.Don't take yourself and everything else so seriously ... and just go with it.

Extras: the reason to actually buy anything on DVD. This DVD has some of those, including a making of feature which is, for the most part, comedy goldmine. Outside of that, there are some deleted scenes, the trailers, some totally unrelated trailers and the usual language options. The unrelated trailers show up when the DVD starts up, but can be skipped, apparently. Gotta have trailers, reminds me of VHS. I used to have one of those, but it had problems, and eventually someone threw it away. It had ben disassembled partly to make it work, so it sort of looked like rash at the time, I guess. Missing are director/cast commentary, but the last time I saw a DVD from this director it was in japanese, and like so many people outside of that particular country I can't understand a whole lot in japanese.The film itself:This movie does not take itself seriously at all. Not that Miike Takeshi films on the whole do that a lot. It is a bizarre hybrid Samurai film / spaghetti western, which is amusing since so many spaghetti westerns were blatant rip offs of samurai films to begin with. "Magnificent seven" and "Fistful of dollars" being the most notable examples. The samurai films tended to steal from Shakespeare, so the whole thing has now gone full circle and is about to make a new round.Everybody speaks english, correctly but with a distinct accent. There seems to be some budget; the sets alone must have cost at least 30 million yen, and the whole thing is set high upon a moor somewhere and involves loads of extras.The plot doesn't really matter, since the whole movie can be seen as just one weird scene after another, spaced closely enough together to keep one interested. And the scenes are spectacular and memorable and make sense in context... most of the time.But it doesn't matter what I say. If you deliberately buy something called "Sukiyaki Western Django," knowing it was directed by Miike Takeshi you are probably a fan of the genre and an anime otaku at heart and know full well what you are getting into. And you'll love it. And you'll laugh at the references.

Great action and good quality

Where to begin. When I first heard of this ultra stylized film I immediately had to search it out and watch it. When I got my hands on it, it was initially exactly what I thought it would be. A hokey tongue in cheek homage to the American western. The ridiculous idea that the American prospecting culture that was prevalent in the old us westerns, not only exists but all of the caricatures of the culture also thrive. If you can get past the idea that the western culture did not exist, and the seeming anachronisms with weaponry and style, then you can truly enjoy what I am not afraid to call a great movie. The entire cast speaks English throughout the movie, and it is obviously not everyones first language...so that to me was impressive. Moments of comic relief occur when the actors unknowingly put the emphasis on the wrong syllable, or simply say an old American slang term incorrectly. Between the great action, the brilliant direction and a superb job done by all of the cast...I feel this unknown jem will go down in the annals of cinematic history as one of the best..if not the only one...of it's kind.

Takashi Miike’s Japanese take on the spaghetti western & samurai films of yesteryear. Most confusingly all dialogue is English, but it still requires subs because the Japanese actors (naturally) struggle to deliver the Americanized lines – everyone’s acting totally suffers because of this huge distraction. All of the action is good to watch, from the quick draws through to Gatling Gun mayhem and the action-packed showdown is pretty immense. The gang costumes are flamboyant and seeing the red & white colours constantly jumping out is a real treat on the eyes.Miike does a fantastic job of keeping it stylish throughout, whilst minimising his trademark ‘weirdness’ – although the sheriff character was truly ridiculous. You can’t help but think that if he focused on perfecting one or two films a year instead of 5-6 he’d be one of the best directors on the planet.Overall there’s no denying this is a bunch of tried themes, concepts and characters tied neatly together and packaged as homage. Still, this one’s worth a watch if you like foreign and offbeat movies.

This is a strange film and not in the sense of its content. I personally enjoy the wide range that Takashi Miike offers from his gangster films to his samurai films but this film just didn't do it for me. Personally speaking this film was fairly mediocre in terms of everything really. Miike can do a lot better than rehashing the tired 2 warring factions with the simple villagers in the middle. But my biggest complaint by far is the director's choice to shoot this in English. This fact didn't add anything as i still had to put the subtitles on as most of the casts accents are so think i could only make out the odd word.Overall: If you are a fan of Takashi Mike give this film a go but don't hold your breath. A strictly mediocre effort.

Although I can appreciate this film is somewhat of an aquired taste, I thoroughly enjoyed it! It is an offbeat gem, shot beautifully with plenty of action, pathos and dark comedy. My one complaint is that having viewed the uncut version I feel the cuts made to the international version are rather brutal and come at the expense of depth of character and plot. I would love to get my hands on a copy with these scenes reinstated and not just given the deleted scenes treatment in the extras! Still an amazing film though, I especially enjoyed the performances of Yuseke Iseya, Koichi Sato and Kaori Momoi.

Hummm

This movie is gorgeous, let's say that straight away. Every scene looks beautiful and the characters each brim with personality. It's cheesy over the top gory action will more than satisfy any fan of both genres. I only have two complaints: the random dark moments and the Emglish acting. The film is 90% entertaining fun but there are two or three majorly depressing scenes; also the entirely Japanese (aside from Tarantino) attempt to do the whole movie in English, not to sound mean but I had subtitles on because I did not understand what they were saying without them