Really Surprised!

Fantastic!

A Masterpiece!

A different way of telling a story

AZUMI is a wonderful Japanese period swordplay epic that provides a pleasant contrast to the Chinese wuxia movies loved by cinema fans across the globe – popular titles like HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS and HERO. AZUMI is similar to these movies and at the same time a lot different: it possesses a great deal of verve and vitality of the kind you'd find in a Takeshi Miike movie and it's more action packed and colourful than any of those movies. This is a gory, blood spurting account of the assassin's creed, mixing in a bunch of assorted and despicable villains and all manner of varied battles and characters to keep things moving along nicely.The film begins with one of the most shocking twists I can remember, a touch that allows us to immediately empathise with the protagonists involved. From then on in, characterisation grows, while a series of vicious, expertly-choreographed battles keep the viewer enthralled. As the young heroine of the title, Aya Ueto is impossibly beautiful and impossibly deadly; a fitting combination. She's matched by a cast of skilled professionals, all of them playing familiar types – the aged and ruthless master, the effeminate and hateful villain, the monkey-like wizard.The movie is a visual treat and the colour palette provides a vibrant alternative to that seen in HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS. Action-wise, the fights are thoroughly engaging and fully exciting, with excellent use of the camera to get across the adrenaline rush – Kitamura's bravura 360 spin around the protagonists as they fight on a beam at the climax, for instance. The last half hour of the movie is a huge pitched battle against hundreds of opponents, and it never bores for a second. A sequel followed two years later. This is what movie-making is all about!

Reading some of the reviews I just can't understand how anyone can give this anything higher than 6. It's a hack'n'slash movie from 2003 without any blood? People are dying by having the backside of a sword hitting their stomach! By someone parrying their blow! If it was made in the 70s fair enough but really. Going through a 2 hour long movie off people "dying" by the sword, without a sword getting bloody except for maybe every third of the fight scenes? That just bothers me greatly. Do not waste your time on this. If you want a good Samurai action-packed movie I recommend "13 Assassins"

I'm not really into martial art flicks but I do search the old ones still on VHS or when some pops up for almost no money then I pick them up. Azumi was one of them, part 1 and 2 was bought for almost 2 euro's and they were new, go figure that one. So I thought, well, it's going to be crap but hey, what a surprise. It clocks in over 2 hours and it never bored me. Of course as a exploitation/horror geek I was looking for the effects used and sadly sometimes they used CGI blood but the story and the so typical Asian way of filming overruled the use of CGI. Based on a comic luckily it didn't had that overacting or the so typical costumes used in the American flicks. Again, be aware that it is really an Asian flick by which I mean that you will need to understand their way of living and their way of filming. You know, flying through the air and the typical way of using ninja swords. It never is really gory or messy but the red stuff do flows. There are some jokes in it but what really attracted me was the gay samurai. Fully dressed in white and walking with a red rose. It's funny to see and perfectly filmed. It isn't an original flick but if you are open for Asian martial art ones than I surely would recommend it.

I expected more from this movie. I knew it was going to be an action movie but it just never really worked that well. The first half I enjoyed...but as soon as the story moved onto the other characters except for Azumi was when I felt that the movie lost its focus. Also I know its based on a manga but how can someone survive thats been stabbed so many times whilst his friend dies from a few slashes? I love Uteo Aya in this. Shes very pretty and her acting was good. The settings were beautiful and the fight scenes were alright but it was lacking something and I can't quite put my finger on what it was.If you have time to spare watch it and make your own judgement but I felt it was pretty average.