All the good action comes at the end with Kenshin, Saito and Sano all having some great scenes fending off Shishio’s arsonists in Kyoto. The Aoshi/Sano fight is one-sided and uninteresting, the Kenshin/Sojiro clash is over way too quickly and the Kenshin/Cho battle is good but not the best in the franchise. I also found this film delivered the least in the action department. The film introduces Misao, her clan of Hidden Watcher ninjas, grizzled elder Okina and troubled, relentless Aoshi, but I can’t say I was very much invested in this subplot. We then get a scene straight out of the anime where child sociopath Sojiro (a spot-on performance by Ryosuke Miura) uses his speed to murder government official Okubo in his moving carriage.
Then the pace of the film slows as the government tries to convince Kenshin to take out Shishio. The film starts off pretty strongly showing the minions of former assassin turned psychotic megalomaniac Makoto Shishio slaughtering a group of policemen and brutally dropping a few of them into a literal inferno, much to the horror of a helpless and infuriated Saito. And while some films have done an excellent job of this like The Empire Strikes Back and The Two Towers, Kyoto Inferno is closer to the middling Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest. The story doesn’t really begin nor does it end but it is all middle.
Rurouni kenshin kyoto inferno cast movie#
It’s never easy being the second movie in a trilogy (until the last two films this year, that is). And that main music theme? Fuhgeddaboutit!Įditor Jules’s Score: 8 out of 10 Kyoto Inferno Looks like I picked to wrong day to quit smoking. Overall just a well-paced, thoroughly entertaining film that does a stellar job of representing the source material. I would have liked Saito to get more action but I have a bias for him as he’s my favourite character. The final battle between Kenshin and Jin-e is also a thrilling time. The action sequences are all well-done, from Kenshin beating the crap out of some hoodlums to the mega-fight outside the mansion to Sano’s hilarious mansion brawl to Kenshin fighting the masked, dual-gun wielding bad guy. The plot features Kenshin and his new friends battling amoral, punchable-faced opium dealer Kanryū and Battosai imitator Jin-e (a chillingly good performance from Kōji Kikkawa). Takeru Satoh nails it as haunted former assassin turned heroic wanderer Kenshin Himura, Emi Takei captures the strength and vulnerability of Kaoru, Munetaka Aoki is a riot as rowdy street fighter Sanosuke, Yōsuke Eguchi is brilliant as the steely cop Saito and I could go on and on. And Keishi Ōtomo’s film does a commendable job of balancing all the elements. It had to explain Kenshin’s backstory and character motivations, introduce the other main characters and also deliver a fun action adventure film. The first film had a lot of heavy lifting to do. Rurouni Kenshin When Kaoru ‘threatens’ to stop cooking So with a Hiten Mitsurugi-ryū-styled SPOILER ALERT let’s revisit 2012’s Rurouni Kenshin (also known as Rurouni Kenshin: Origins), as well as Kyoto Inferno and The Legend Ends, both of which released in 2014. And I reviewed them both ( The Final and The Beginning) but for completion sake I thought I would review the first three films as well.
Rurouni kenshin kyoto inferno cast series#
So in recent months Netflix dropped the fourth and fifth films in the Rurouni Kenshin live action film series based on the manga and anime of the same name.