Author Archives: Sunset

here comes the sun

The Beautiful Country

One of the first things I noticed about Binh, early on in the movie, was that he had a tendency to slouch. In a world where he towered over most people around him, had to duck in market places to avoid hitting his head of knocking down any of the coverings, Binh slouched. Of course, it may have been a habit for him to do so, after living in a place where he was generally too big to most things.

Binh’s tale was a sad one, to say the least. Despite this, Binh wanted for very little himself. He never even really said that he didn’t deserve to be treated the way he was by the family he “lived” with early on in the film. Binh never complained, and only when he realized he would have nowhere else to go did he even ask about his origins.

This is especially evident as the movie goes on. When he loses that place, he finds one with his mother, Mai, and his half-brother, Tam, though it’s short lived. When he loses that place as well, he goes to the next one he can think of. The one where his father might be. But even as he tries to find that place, he loses the one he had been given and asked to protect. Despite his best efforts, Tam dies of illness and malnutrition.

It’s only then that Binh loses his cool. It’s only then that he lashes out, and we realize something else about him. He gambles, a simple game of exchanging English words, and we see that for how little he speaks, Binh knows more English than most anyone else on the ship, save for the actual crew of the ship. Binh, who has been mistreated most of his life, is very intelligent. And it would seem he made a point of learning as much English, and as much about America as he could with his limited resources, because it’s where his father came from.

He makes it to America, where he realizes not only does the woman he love not love him, but that – being the son of a GI during the war – he could have flown to America for free. He leaves then, because by all means he’s a US citizen, and he hitchhikes to Texas. He meets his father, and for the first time since Tam’s death, though it takes some time, Binh seems happy again.

As the film began to draw to a close, I realized Binh didn’t really slouch anymore.

one more spoon of cough syrup

Post-watch impressions of 47 Ronin

Something that struck me while watching this film was the accuracy of it, from what I know of that time period and many traditions that were held at the time. I was very impressed with how traditional it was, the detail it went into, and the depth of the characters that were set up at the start of the film. Kai’s boundless devotion was admirable and heartbreaking, but perhaps more than that, so was Oishi’s.

Oishi spent the better part of a year in solitary confinement, in a pit that he had no way of even hoping to get out of. He was visibly weak when he was finally free, but he wasted no time at all. He spent no time in recovery, and instead set out immediately, leaving his loving wife behind so that he could find Kai, right his own mistakes to some extent, and save the girl he had sworn to protect, along with the legacy she carried. His character arc was absolutely splendid, and it is often rare that one has the opportunity to see so much growth.

On a more technical note, some of the cinematography in the movie was stunning, and the makeup on many of the actresses was incredibly well done. I was amazed at the transformation of Rinko Kikuchi in the film, so much so that I didn’t even recognize her until the credits were rolling and I saw her name.  Her acting was superb and made the film a delight to watch.

I’ll turn the lights out

Pre-Impressions of 47 Ronin

This is a movie that I have been looking forward to seeing for quite some time now. As a big fan of the work of Rick Genest, I cannot wait to see what he has in store for the viewers during this film, or what his acting skills are. As I have only seen him in small projects outside of this, it will be a treat to see him in a full-length film, especially one that fits into the criteria of our class as well as this one does.

This post is also going to be used as my opening post. I detest the generated posts that sites will put up for you when you first create them.