Miyamoto is a hired killer who is hunting down the criminal Mizoguchi in revenge for the murder of his childhood best friend. When he finds him on a boat he has him trapped until he accidentally shoots a young girl, Milly, and Mizoguchi escapes. Milly forces Miyamoto to help her on her mission - she claims to have been sent back in time to stop an alien invasion that, in 2084, succeeds in wiping out mankind. In October 2002, the first alien fakes a crash landing to open the way - Milly must kill the first alien before events can be set in motion.
I saw the trailer for this film at least a year ago but never heard about it coming out in the UK, so was surprised when I happened upon it in the video store tonight. I rented it with memories of good effects and a reasonable enough premise. The plot is basically about as unoriginal as you could get - a mix of terminator's time travelling antics with aliens thrown in to the mix; it is complicated by the inclusion of the criminal Mizoguchi but basically it stands up well enough. The biggest problem with the plot is that it fails to set up enough in the way of action or even consistent excitement.
For the most part, the film is far too heavy and talky. It has sporadic moments of action but generally it is far too slow and dull to be ever really consistently exciting. Some of it is OK but even the main action scenes are reliant on sub-Matrix bullet time effects and they too lack excitement. I will shout from the rooftops that most of Hollywood action today owes much to HK, but this Japanese product owes much to Hollywood's recent action movies. The effects are poor but do the job - they look OK in isolation, the problem is they don't fit in with their surroundings.
The cast are fairly average and none really stand out; they don't really have any screen presence although Suzuki (Milly) is quite fun in a relaxed way and Kaneshiro is kind of cool, but outside of these two the rest of the cast is pretty poor - Kishitani in particular is a bad villain and comes across as a clichéd Japanese triad type. It's a shame, because better characters would have made a difference, but they weren't given the chance to do so.
Overall this is an OK film if you are in the mood, but it is impossible to overlook it's weaknesses. The plot is a mix of better films, the action is sporadic and, again, feels like it has been done better elsewhere (and it has!) while the film as a whole is disappointingly dull and lacking in even inconsistent thrills! I didn't hate it, but I gotta be honest and say it didn't satisfy either the sci-fi fan or martial arts fan in me.
I saw the trailer for this film at least a year ago but never heard about it coming out in the UK, so was surprised when I happened upon it in the video store tonight. I rented it with memories of good effects and a reasonable enough premise. The plot is basically about as unoriginal as you could get - a mix of terminator's time travelling antics with aliens thrown in to the mix; it is complicated by the inclusion of the criminal Mizoguchi but basically it stands up well enough. The biggest problem with the plot is that it fails to set up enough in the way of action or even consistent excitement.
For the most part, the film is far too heavy and talky. It has sporadic moments of action but generally it is far too slow and dull to be ever really consistently exciting. Some of it is OK but even the main action scenes are reliant on sub-Matrix bullet time effects and they too lack excitement. I will shout from the rooftops that most of Hollywood action today owes much to HK, but this Japanese product owes much to Hollywood's recent action movies. The effects are poor but do the job - they look OK in isolation, the problem is they don't fit in with their surroundings.
The cast are fairly average and none really stand out; they don't really have any screen presence although Suzuki (Milly) is quite fun in a relaxed way and Kaneshiro is kind of cool, but outside of these two the rest of the cast is pretty poor - Kishitani in particular is a bad villain and comes across as a clichéd Japanese triad type. It's a shame, because better characters would have made a difference, but they weren't given the chance to do so.
Overall this is an OK film if you are in the mood, but it is impossible to overlook it's weaknesses. The plot is a mix of better films, the action is sporadic and, again, feels like it has been done better elsewhere (and it has!) while the film as a whole is disappointingly dull and lacking in even inconsistent thrills! I didn't hate it, but I gotta be honest and say it didn't satisfy either the sci-fi fan or martial arts fan in me.