Lupin the Third ~ ルパン三世

[spsn]

Watched this after work as my reward considering I've spent this week without watching any Arashi *gasp, how did I survive the week?*. Interestingly, though quite big as an anime in Japan, it didn't do as well as Kenshin, and you'd understand why when you watch it. I don't consider this as a total flop because there're some good and cool stuff in it, but unfortunately, there're lots of bumps in it as well.

First of all, I'm not a fan of Lupin. I'm a shoujo manga reader, so I rarely touch the shounen stuff and especially older shounen anime/manga's graphics are not, well, pretty. So, you can say that I have zero knowledge of Lupin except for the main characters, and that I learned from the glimpses of clips when it's somehow discussed on variety shows that I watched. So, if you're asking whether the movie is faithful to the anime/manga, I honestly have no idea, but I can tell you which part works and which part doesn't, from audiences point of view and I kind of understand why this one doesn't bait well on the hardcore fans either.

Shall we start with the good points first? Well, to be honest, there's not much. BUT, Shun Oguri really carries this movie. He's Lupin. The smirks, smiles, mischieves, it's really like watching the human form of Lupin. The movie is faithful to the anime style in terms the retro music, over the top gestures and impossible in real life actions. So, you see Oguri's movements here is bigger and more exaggerated compare his other movies and with that he makes Lupin looks human without taking out Lupin's characteristics. And surprisingly, Oguri speaks acceptable English!, not Engrish. His pronounciation is quite good and he doesn't have the extra vowel after the words, like what you'd usually hear when Japanese (those who are not so fluent) speak English. The movie did a good job by casting Ayano Go as Goemon. I think this is one of those rare moments when you'd see Ayano Go in the not so cool character. I like the scenes when Goemon has to stare at the security door simulation for days without sleep and his minimal expression (well, Goemon supposed to be silent but good with swords) is so funny here.

So now let's see what makes this movie loose its charm for me.

I'm OK with the story. They try to go for the 'big production' so we have something like 'international' setting. This means, we have multiple countries settings from Singapore (which explains now why I saw Shun Oguri's signature in the ramen shop near my office) to Thailand, Hong Kong and Japan. And this is when the problem starts. With so many locations, we end up with so many extra characters on top of the main characters. All these characters are literally extras! This is the difference compared to Kenshin. Kenshin stays true with the main characters, no new unnecessary characters. Everybody with dialogs in the movie plays a part and cannot be omited. Lupin is different, they even have extra characters on the main cast, which looks like there're lots of freeloaders in this movie.

There's no stopping now, let's move on to the languages. There're just too much English! Good for those actors who can speak better English, but we get to be tortured with those whose English are questionable. And worse, it affects their acting as well. I wonder why they don't do the Nodame style with the sign that 'from here on, all dialogues will be in Japanese'. This will be much better and we can save Inspector Zenigata from struggling with the English pronounciation. Still on the English part, Jerry Yan's English is the most cringe worthy, and his acting as well. OMG! I don't like him since Meteor Garden, but his role here as Michael Lee makes me dislike him more and yeah, he's one of the extra character that I'm talking about, totally unnecessary.

Since I've mentioned Jerry Yan, let's talk about why we have Jerry Yen, Kim Jun and Shun Oguri in 1 movie? How it is a very convinient coincidence that we have 1 actor each from Hana Yori Dango's Taiwan, Korean and Japanese version. I find this rather annoying if this is done on purpose. It's as if the movie does not even have the confidence that it'll sell and has to sort to this weird stunt. Why not might as well just cast Matsujun and Matsuda Shouta in it then we have 3 out of F4. That will bring in more money, or... they cannot afford it and have to resolve to the cheaper option?

How about the script? Lupin's dialogues is OK, the gaps and holes in the scripts come from Michael's dialogues, there are lots of unnecessary lines that he even struggles to say in English and that makes the scenes look awkward. Not only Michael's, the script breaks as well on Pierre's, and randomly on the bad guys. This is why I say I'm OK with the story but it's no wonder that it's not doing that well if we're watching people struggling with English trying to pronounce dialogues that don't even flow from one to another. Such a waste of what could be a good entertaining movie.

Now let's talk about the make up artist and the sytlist. Kuroki Meisa is beautiful. But at some scenes, she looks older and CHEAP. Why is that? I know Fujiko's character is flirty, but she's not slutty and cheap. Urgh. This pissed me off when I saw the ugly dresses and ugly make up. Doesn't do Meisa's beauty justice at all.

Lastly, earlier I mentioned that the movie is doing a good job in staying faithful to the anime style and that includes the retro music. BUT, this has the flaw and any Lupin anime fans will refuse to watch this movie if they know of this. Where's the original Lupin track? It cannot be heard in any part of the movie. What's Lupin movie without that distinctive music track? It looks to me that they may not use it due to licensing... if this is the case, that's kind of lame because you're being faithful to lots of things in the anime, but you neglect one of the most important items which identify fans with the anime.


So, I was right when I say I watch Lupin because of Oguri. He really saves this movie from being in chaos. This movie has an A+ for effort, but it fails in recognizing things that fans would want to see. Afterall such life action movie is targetted first to fans then to general public, right? Which is again, why Kenshin is so successful.

If Lupin gets another movie, I want to have Lupin vs Detective Conan and with Shun Oguri with double cast. After all, Shun Oguri is Conan way before he's Lupin LOL.