Transplanted to the Japanese film industry, this adaptation of the 1952 original is an interesting if predictable homage about an ageing actor too old to play the acrobatic extra who always gets killed
The memory of Charlie Chaplin’s 1952 film Limelight is revived in this interesting if sugary cinephile homage – a kind of remake-adaptation transplanted to the Japanese movie industry. Seizô Fukumoto plays Kamiyama, an ageing actor who specialises in samurai films, always being the guy who gets killed. No one can die in a swordfight as acrobatically or dramatically as him: Fukumoto himself has had a similar career. But at 70, Kamiyama is getting too old for the job, and is poignantly reduced to playing the samurai in studio theme-park shows. At the same time, however, he finds himself mentoring a young extra and would-be actress Satsuki Iga (Chihiro Yamamoto), whose own career begins to take off.
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The memory of Charlie Chaplin’s 1952 film Limelight is revived in this interesting if sugary cinephile homage – a kind of remake-adaptation transplanted to the Japanese movie industry. Seizô Fukumoto plays Kamiyama, an ageing actor who specialises in samurai films, always being the guy who gets killed. No one can die in a swordfight as acrobatically or dramatically as him: Fukumoto himself has had a similar career. But at 70, Kamiyama is getting too old for the job, and is poignantly reduced to playing the samurai in studio theme-park shows. At the same time, however, he finds himself mentoring a young extra and would-be actress Satsuki Iga (Chihiro Yamamoto), whose own career begins to take off.
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- 2/4/2016
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
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