Yamada: Way of the Samurai

Starring: Seigi Ozeki, Kanokkorn Jaicheun, Winai Kraibutr

Synopsis:

Based on a true-life historical figure: Yamada, a ronin who had left Japan after losing his lord and master, is retained by the Japanese Envoy to Thailand, where he assists the locals in defending the country from it’s oppressors in the south. However, one night when ambushing the enemy, he discovers that they are in fact Japanese in disguise. Before he can act on the information however, he and his men are attacked. Yamada would have died if not for the intervention of some Muay-Thai warriors, who take his wounded body back to their village to recouperate.

Hiding out in their village, Yamada finds himself at peace with the locals and trains in their martial art, using it to compliment his own style. Feeling indebted to the people, he volunteers to be one of the King’s own bodyguards, and must enter a gruelling tournament in order to be picked...

Review:

The Muay Thai martial art is one of the most brutal and direct fighting systems, which utilises eight parts of your body – your hands, elbows, feet and knees. When performed well, it can take your breath away. Yamada: Way of the Samurai contains many such scenes, and they basically save the film.

The film’s main problem lies in how little internal conflict there is with regard to Yamada’s “defection” (for want of a better word). He remains loyal to his own country in that he doesn’t reveal that his own countrymen are posing as enemy soldiers and raiding villages, because that would likely instigate a war. But in everything else, he embraces the local way of life. There is some local objection to letting Yamada train, but it is more a question as to his motive rather than an outright refusal, and the warriors don’t take much to be convinced. There is too much time spent by the film basically saying, “isn’t Thailand great?”

Luckily the lead-up to the King’s Bodyguard tournament livens things up considerably. As mentioned before, Muay-Thai is great to watch and the film’s cast is bolstered by a whole load of bona-fide exponents. These scenes are pretty brutal, with their elbow attacks and kicks. However, these scenes also have their problems.

The first is that the Thai fighters aren’t much actors, so their delivery of their lines is perfunctory at best. The second problem is kind of the opposite, in that Seigi Ozeki is an actor first and fighter second. When it comes to the film’s big climactic fight, this becomes very apparent as his fight scene is shot in relatively close-up and edited quicker than the fight containing his Thai counterparts, which is more fluid and shot at a longer distance.

The film’s villain is totally forgettable, and his true motives for trying to kick off a war are never explained. He’s evil, and that’s about it. Every now and then there will be a scene where he kills a few of his men for failing to find Yamada, just to show how evil he is.

Verdict

Anyone with a passing interest in Muay-Thai will enjoy the fight scenes, but there is little else here to grab the viewer’s attention.

5 out of 10 (MikeOutWest)

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