Self-important, over-dramatic, uninspired.

Redundant and unnecessary.

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Tatjana Patitz is the superhot naked model with Eddie Sakamura in the beginning left strangled on the company boardroom desk in one of movies' very best and most memorable introductory scenes to setup a story line. Tatjana's in the George Michael 'Freedom' video and one of the all-time sexy supermodels, if you didn't know. She has breathtaking Tatjanas, and the real killer pair of Patitz!Rising Sun is Wesley Snipes' (Blade from Blade) very best performance as well as one of Connery's (James Bond from James Bond) very best. They're on the lead in this all-time puzzle unraveling murder mystery with great acting from the deep supporting cast, Harvey Keitel (The Wolf from Pulp Fiction), Tia Carrere (Cassandra from Wayne's World), Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa (Shang Tsung from Mortal Kombat), Mako (The Wizard from Conan) and Buscemi (from Fargo and everything) and Alexandra Powers (from Dead Poets Society).Rising Sun has meaningful story progression that thoroughly develops the plot line. Pay close attention to its excellent keenly descript writing. The next generation video analysis is entirely enthralling stuff to watch for its time and even now.I can get up to rewatch Rising Sun time and time again as it offers a full array of emotions when viewing. It's one of my favorite movies and one of the underrated movies. I love Japanese culture!

Writer Michael Crichton wrote the part of Captain Connor with Sean Connery in mind and Connery absolutely shines in the role. Connery plays a police detective with an expertise in Japanese culture who's called in to assist on a murder case that took place at an LA high rise owned by a Japanese multinational corporation. Connery is partnered with a very American of detective, Wesley Snipes, which unfortunately gives the film a disappointingly conventional buddy-cop-film vibe that was wisely absent from Crichton's novel. Crichton (a film director himself) and "Rising Sun" director Philip Kaufman reportedly clashed over changes to the script Kaufman made regarding making Connor's partner black, which I'll side with Kaufman that it added an interesting new element in this clash of cultures murder mystery, but I'll side with Crichton in that it was badly done. The scene where Snipes take Connery to a black neighborhood and Captain Connor suddenly becomes the most uncomfortable whitest white person of all time, seemingly to have forgotten all his skills and control previously demonstrated up to that point. This could have been an interesting scene if it was done in a more subtle manner, but Connor is suddenly becoming a buffoon seemed out of place. It's as if Sherlock Holmes for a few scenes became Inspector Clouseau. I'll also side with Crichton on the change of murderer at the end of the film, which seemed completely unnecessary and also went against much of what the book and film had to say about the nature of culture and culture clashes. Despite these deficiencies, there is much to enjoy. Connery has one of the best roles of his career (minus the Inspector Clouseau scenes). Director Phillips Kaufman bring style and atmosphere, crafting a slick modern day noir, while also bringing a surprising amount of sensuality to a mainstream film, rivaling his more art-house of features like "Henry & June" and "The Unbearable Lightness of Being." Director of photography Michael Chapman also gets kudos for his moody photography. The film also features a strong supporting cast that includes Harvey Keitel, Kevin Anderson, Mako, Ray Wise, Stan Shaw, Tia Carrere, and Steve Buscemi. Overall, despite it's deficiencies, this is a stylish mystery that borders on erotic thriller and is centers around an interesting (though not so subtle) subtext about culture.

Here's another film that cops too much flack. It's an underrated movie, which at times loses it's punch, but it becomes such an engrossing movie that gets with the times. It's set around a big computer organization, where everything's not black and white. We have a beautiful high priced girl/mistress, who's been accidentally strangled, or was she murdered, while engaged in a session of rough sex that got out of control. All evidence, instantly points towards Eddie Sakamoto, the son of the original owner of the business, I think, as he was in a relationship with the dead lass, and they had argued at the start while singing "Don't fence me in" at karaoke, where she just stormed out, where he gives chase. The exterior trick shot, outside the bar where the sports car is made to look really small as it takes off, outside the park, was a cool shot on Kaufman's part (this is the dude that made The Wanderers). Enter Connery, a cop was a mysterious past and Snipes who's assigned with him. The teaming up of these two is interesting. Like the Seagal characters, Connery's here is kept pretty secretive, as if almost boxed up. He's flawlessly great, disposing of tight situations, with a hand to the throat, when muscle bound geezers, give him trouble. We learn too about Snipes's background some, but this film really opens our eyes, to the deception in computer graphics, and the falsity of misrepresenting images, where's Eddie's may of been planted, preferably by the killer and his goons, possible employees of the business. RS is a nice cool mixture with the just the right of amount of sex, (it's hot, especially, naked sushi scene, much alike to the one in the dreaded, Showdown in Little Tokyo). There's nice looking broads, and some action, but on the surface, it's a drama thriller, but it's a very good drama thriller, right to the end, that has you wondering, if the supposed killer that dies at the end, is really our guy. These thrillers, who's victim is killed right at the start (Saigon, Basic Instinct) where the rest of the movie you're left to guess the killer, I love. RS has it all, = one big surprise, plus some of those great actors from Reservoir Dogs, Buscemi, playing a pussy character in this too. We even have a car chase, where at Snipes request, these homeboys stall these not so happy Asians. The interrogation scenes with Snipes, the interrogated set in before or after scenario's, I liked too which really gave it an interesting and serious angle. These after scenarios could have you thinking they took place after the end of the story, which is rather cool. After all poor Snipes has got enough personal problems. Also we have same real racial hatred going, thanks to a conflict of opinions, and ill favour. Don't believe the bad hype on this. Rent it today.

Michael Crichton's novel about murder and merger serves as the basis for a fine thriller of a film. For Sean Connery fans they will be pleased with what Connery does in this film.Wesley Snipes plays a Los Angeles homicide detective who has it insisted to him that he bring retired police captain Connery along with him to solve a murder committed in one of those glass tower buildings owned by a Japanese firm. The book and the film were made at a time it seemed that the Japanese were acquiring a lot of things American and were beating us at our capitalist game. Connery is quite a lover of Japanese culture and tradition in addition to possessing a keen eye for subtle nuances. His presence proves to be invaluable.The murder is that of a high priced mistress and it looks like she was strangled during some rough sex. In fact the Japanese who have a very different attitude toward privacy and tape everything and everyone have the room under video surveillance. The tape they supply shows a US Senator Ray Wise doing the deed. A lovely piece of blackmail since his vote in the Senate is a key one to get.But Connery doesn't buy it and eventually the truth is learned.Both Connery and Snipes are manipulated to a first solution and then to a correct one. The subtleties of the Oriental mind.Rising Sun is an OK thriller. It certainly gets a bit paranoiac about the Japanese taking over the country. Fears about that certainly proved to be premature.Cary-Hiroyki Tagawa as an up and coming Japanese yuppie businessman who has the solution and is part of it should be singled out for praise. As well as Harvey Keitel playing a Philistine American cop who symbolizes the ugly American in his own country. Good thing he had Snipes and Connery along. I'm agreeing with a lot of other reviewers who think Steve Buscemi was totally wasted in a role that proved superfluous to the film and went nowhere. I'm betting in the book he had a more central purpose to the plot.Sean Connery's world wide legion of fans should enjoy this.