{"id":35649,"date":"2021-08-18T10:30:00","date_gmt":"2021-08-18T14:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=35649"},"modified":"2021-09-03T15:49:04","modified_gmt":"2021-09-03T19:49:04","slug":"yakuza-princess-2020-fantasia-film-festival-2021","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2021\/08\/18\/yakuza-princess-2020-fantasia-film-festival-2021\/","title":{"rendered":"Yakuza Princess (2020) [Fantasia Film Festival 2021]"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Many times whenever a movie is adapted from a graphic novel, the movie should have a good jumping in point where you can easily follow along. The problem with \u201cYakuza Princess\u201d is that it feels like you almost have<\/em> to read the original graphic novel to understand almost anything going on here. \u201cYakuza Princess\u201d isn\u2019t a bad movie per se. It\u2019s a beautifully filmed adaptation with excellent visuals by Vicente Amorim, it\u2019s just that you will probably have a tough time following along with the mythology and motivations behind the characters if you never read the original material.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Based on the acclaimed graphic novel “Samurai Shiro” by Danilo Beyruth, and set in the expansive Japanese community of Sao Paulo, Brazil \u2014 \u201cYakuza Princess\u201d follows orphan Akemi (played by pop star MASUMI), who, upon turning 21, discovers that she is the heiress to half of Japan’s expansive Yakuza crime syndicate. After forging an uneasy alliance with an amnesiac stranger (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) who believes an ancient sword binds their two fates, Akemi unleashes war against the other half of the syndicate who wants her dead.<\/p>\n

From there, much of the film involves Akemi and her protector Shiro; they flee from the Yakuza and evade attempted assassinations while she struggles to come to grips with her past, and her legacy that involves the mythical katana and upholding its secrets and potential. Everything that unfolds feels so out of context, injecting this uncomfortable idea that the audience has to refer to the graphic novel to understand anything happening. This not only makes the movie feel woefully under cooked, but drops an unnecessary chore on to our laps. I have nothing against samurai fiction (I love it, actually), but \u201cYakuza Princess\u201d so be so much broader and easily accessible, and it just isn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

The chaotic city scape becomes heightened the moment Akemi realizes she holds a fate that is nearly inescapable. Vicente Amorim, again, offers some beautiful visuals and dynamic action sequences, and paints Brazil as this dreamscape filled with menacing characters and intense violence. Director Amorim took obvious inspiration from \u201cJohn Wick\u201d injecting bold hues of red, purple, and blue, while also enhancing the full motion comic book effect until the very end. That said, \u201cYakuza Princess\u201d was often cold, and monotonous and never quite packed enough substance with the action scenes. Despite the strong turns by MASUMI and Rhys-Meyers, \u201cYakuza Princess\u201d never feels whole; it instead feels like one chapter in a planned saga that you have to play catch up with.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not keen on going along for the ride,\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Fantasia International Film Festival runs every year, and this year runs virtually from August 5th until August 25th.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Many times whenever a movie is adapted from a graphic novel, the movie should have a good jumping in point where you can easily follow along. The problem with \u201cYakuza Princess\u201d is that it feels like you almost have to read the original graphic novel to understand almost anything going on here. \u201cYakuza Princess\u201d isn\u2019t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2497,12],"tags":[58,64,113,240,349,367,391,631,703,890,1008,1087],"class_list":["post-35649","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fantasia-fest","category-movie-reviews","tag-action","tag-adaptation","tag-asian","tag-crime","tag-fantasy","tag-foreign","tag-gangster","tag-martial-arts","tag-mystery","tag-samurai","tag-supernatural","tag-thriller"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35649","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35649"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35649\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35747,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35649\/revisions\/35747"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35649"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35649"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35649"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}