Yawn. Poorly Filmed Snooze Fest.

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

The Japanese ape American Movies? Please, go over your history. The Japanese were able to take a Western art form and appropriate it to their own culture in ways we may only stand in awe of their accomplishments. This includes rock-n-roll, the arguably penultimate Western art form. Yes, 'Returner' is very sentimental in places, ala Stephen Spielberg, unfortunately. Still Suzuki and Yoshiro work so well together in this film, it is just a plain pleasure to watch. I will never regret the tears I shed for this work.As a reviewer before me noted, where are the Americans getting a large proportion of their best movies? The Japanese and the Pang Brothers (Hong Kong, I believe, though they work a lot in Thailand). Usually less than brilliant remakes of the originals. Bangkok Dangerous? The Eye? Does anyone dare re-make 'Ab-normal Beauty'?

Kaneshiro always seems to bring a different type of element to every movie he appears and Returner is no exception. Given the movie as ongoing action, but for the slow parts, he really lets his characters conflict show through and expresses it as effectively as possible. Especially with his interactions with the female lead, Milly which also helps lighten the mood when things get a little too intense.It was surprising to see that the actress that played Milly was a young teen girl while she acted roughly like she was in her later teens early twenties. But her maturity in certain scenes did seem to change every so often.

I am going to quote a previous reviewer, mats_carcass, who put the problem with this film most succinctly:"Ingredients: 2 Parts E.T. 1 Part The Terminator 1 Part Indepedance Day Rind of The Matrix pretty much every action movie cliché" all true; and add as well an actress with a face that would look great in a manga cartoon and a popular young Chinese actor doing what popular young Chinese actors do in action films these days.Yet while I respect the perceptions of the reviewer I quote, I must disagree as to the entertainment value of the film; I liked the characters enough that I found their story entertaining, and the pacing was good, with a enough plot twists to allow me to ignore the derivative nature of the whole project. Laso, it is well made, and the importance of that to a derivative film can't be overestimated. If it moves as well as the films it imitates, then I don't mind wasting a little time with it.I also warn the viewer not to turn the movie off at the point the main plot seems resolved. The last ten minutes are actually the best thing about the story, because they leave us with questions that the main story line only implies.

I looked forward to seeing this one, but the only thing good about it is the special effects, and those are to few.Asian films often tend to have a strange, childish humor, that does not fit in properly, and this is a typical example of one of those film. In other film (like Oldboy) the humor stands for something, and suits the mood, but here it's just stupid.I don't know a word of Japanese, but I can tell that these are no superior actors. It's sad really to see a nice layout to a plot become so destroyed. Next film up is Casshern, and I have very high hopes for this one.