Two very different films: a western, and a samurai epic.
First, Meek's Cutoff. Not a conventional western by any means, but a western nonetheless. The story is based on a historical event of the first wagon trail led by Stephen Meek in the mid 19th century along the Oregon Trail. It's a long journey for both the characters and the audience, but more in the way that you sympathise with the settlers during this long and endless trek through a vast nothingness and the uncertain. At times, there were flickers of True Grit and There Will Be Blood - much less drama and gunfire, but still, flickers. And not only because Paul Dano stars in both...
Next was 13 Assassins. Plenty of slicing and dicing as every samurai movie should include. Being an avid fan of samurai films since seeing Kurosawa's epics (if you haven't heard of him, check him out because he's a real hero of cinema and everyone should know it), I couldn't hate this movie even if I tried. The real standout of the film is without a doubt, the battle scene. Swords, arrows, blood, explosions and bulls on fire, pretty much sums it up. Takeshi Miike is definitely channeling some serious Kurosawa during these scenes and that's never a bad thing. It's a shame that over quarter of an hour has been cut out of the international version in order to avoid cultural confusion... perhaps us Nipponjin can be a little misunderstood? But I think the most comical thing about this film was the fact that the bad guy (who is seriously evil as f*$%) is this guy (he's the one with the red scarf on the right, and yes, this is his dayjob)...
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