ZEE'S REVIEWS

21st July 2008
Sukiyaki Western Django (2007)

If you've ever wondered what it would be like if spaghetti western met samurai drama, then this is the movie for you.

If you like the idea of Japanese cowboys in leather chaps and silk robes, wielding pistols and katanas, delivering classic lines in heavily accented English, then this is the movie for you.

If you like the kind of movie where someone can catch a descending sword blade between two palms or leap through a second storey window onto a horse galloping past, then this is the movie for you.

I am totally that person, so for me Sukiyaki Western Django is a melodramatic, somewhat violent, gloriously silly, and tremendously entertaining movie.

The Reds and the Whites are two rival clans warring over a hoard of gold rumoured to be hidden in the small town of Yuta. The Reds are led by the fiery, Shakespeare-spouting Kiyomori, while the Whites are led by the icy, calculating Yoshitsune. Both are ruthless, cunning, and slightly insane, and between them they have decimated the terrified townsfolk.

Caught in the middle are the tragic widow Shizuka, the fearless shopkeeper Ruriko, and the treacherous sheriff Hoanka. And riding into this conflict is the Gunman himself, a man with no name but a troubled dual identity, half-Red, half-White. These archetypal figures stride across the landscape, larger than life, as the spiralling conflict results in a spectacular showdown.

Sukiyaki Western Django is not a movie for everyone, requiring a degree of tolerance for both the violence and the silliness. In many ways it reminds me of Sin City--stylised, cinematic, bloody, melodramatic--only with a sense of humour. There is a fine line between staggeringly cool and slightly ridiculous, and Sukiyaki Western Django careens across it with wild abandon. But in spite of the bold strokes of its hyperreality, there are a number of surprisingly poignant moments. In fact, there is a lot to be surprised by in this movie.