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What do you get when you put a peculiar
public prosecutor with a TV-shopping addiction together with his straight-laced,
no-nonsense law clerk, along with her eccentric colleagues?
So what exactly is the Truth? Is there
Justice in this dog-eat-dog world? How can we as mere humans, attempt
to define something so abstract and complicated?
Curiously, Hero
(in theatres November 22) comes up with a simple answer for both questions.
Starring Kimura Takuya (2046, Love
and Honour) as Kuryu Kohei, the casually dressed but not-so-casual-about-pursuit-for-truth public prosecutor; and a delightful ensemble cast
including Matsu Takako (Tokyo Tower) as law clerk Amamiya Maiko and
Abe Hiroshi (TRICK, Hana and Alice) as Shibayama Mitsugu; Hero continues
from where the chart-breaking 2001 TV series left off.
Returning to the Josai Branch of the
Tokyo public prosecutor's office after six years and numerous stints
at various outposts in the countryside, Kuryu finds himself assigned
to what seems to be a deceptively simple manslaughter case.
Alarm bells start to ring as the accused
retracts his confession and throws the whole court session into disarray.
Turns out that his defence lawyer is the distinguished Gamo (Matsumoto
Koshiro), who apparently is under the thumb of someone powerful. Political
intrigue and signs of national scandal start to entangle themselves
into a huge complication.
Things start to get messy for Kuryu
and his colleagues, who not only have to deal with domestic problems
(Shibayama is embroiled in divorce-proceedings against his wife) and
the daily grind of work.
When nothing else could seem to get
any worse for Kuryu, he discovers that a crucial piece of the puzzle
lies in (South) Korea, which he needs to get in order to prove the attacker's
guilt. Thus Kuryu and Amamiya embark on a
wild chase across borders to the city of Pusan.
Filled with hilarious
moments where the duo try to convey their questions in botched Korean,
the trip proves to be a memorable one where the almost-romance of Kuryu
and Amamiya takes a small but significant step forward.
For fans wondering if Hero made
a successful transition from hit TV series to box-office buster, let
HOOKED ease your fears: Director Suzuki Masayuki resumes his idiosyncratic
fetish for close-ups and oddly-angled shots that are never an eye-sore
and at the same time, a refreshing change of pace from the stock cinematography
that is prevalent in films today.
The series' quirky humour is still
firmly intact, and perhaps even better than before, seeing as how the
repertoire of trademark subtle jokes and jibes was expanded to include
a whole new set of laughs that ribbed the audience non-stop. While the
TV series made audiences chuckle every now and then, one of the movie's
best points is that it managed to elicit consistent laughs throughout
the movie without degrading the high comedic level.
Similarly, while the TV series and
even its 2006 2-hour special was curiously devoid of exciting court-room
scenes, the film finally satisfies with fast-paced and adrenaline
pumping rebuttals, as well as counter-arguments reminiscent of Boston Legal.
Fans of Hero (the series) and of legal dramas alike will delight
in the tenacity of the court-room battles present in the film, which
while exciting, do not alienate audience members who have no legal knowledge
at all. Hero succeeds in establishing moot points purely based
on logic alone, something which democratizes the film.
However, what takes Hero to
greater heights as a legal comedy is undoubtedly its excellent ensemble
cast who reunites with Kuryu, all their quirks intact. The legal clerks
Suetsugu and Endo, fellow lawyers Nakamura Misuzu, Shibayama Mitsugu
and Egami Tatsuo, together with Chief Ushimaru Yutaka, enchant the audiences with
their superb performance as a dysfunctional group of prosecutors who
band together when push comes to shove. It's extremely endearing to
see them support each other under the pressure of a potentially explosive
case.
So with such contagious humour and
impeccable acting, can anyone actually find fault with this movie? Unfortunately,
we can.
Newbies to the Hero series might
be left in the dark for certain in-jokes that only fans from the series
and TV special know, such as the chronic TV-shopper that Kuryu is, the
"I have everything" bartender and the appearance of key influential
characters who appeared in the TV Special. But don't fret! Even without
all these nuggets of information, viewers can still expect a thoroughly
enjoyable movie.
So if you're feeling a little blue
during the next few weeks, why not take a quick trip down to the cinema
to let Kimura Takuya and company heroically save you with a dose of
light-hearted fun? Considering the success of the movie in Japan,
Hero is one film that you should not miss before this year ends -
even if you watch it only for heart-throb KimuTaku. hooked
HOOKED's rating: 4/5
Images courtesy of:
Yahoo Movies
Singapore
StareastAsia.com
Asianpopcorn.com
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nice review
Written by charmainesparkle on 2007-11-13 23:45:48
great review there.. i can't wait to catch that movie! it'll have to be between my exams though. what a pity! |
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