Strong and Moving!

Good concept, poorly executed.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

When You first look at the cover you expect some hazy film, with a half baked plot and horrible fight scenes. Well this exceeds even the best movies I have seen. For a once a period piece that doesn't put me to sleep like so many foreign films.Abe no Seimei who by far has just made my top ten list of characters I love,the actors bring there character to life. Not only that but for once the leads in the film are handsome. The plot only adds to this splendid movie, while it includes everything that someone would want in a film. From beginning to end I was captivated and enthralled. Slight reminders of the mummy returns, though they don't intend to show any.It has it all from a cursed family to your angry evil spirits that take over the soldiers, unrequited love until its too late, a great love story, simply beautiful costuming, great music and of course you can't forget demons. The filming is clear and pristine, while lighting only adds to the appeal. The final fight while being not only being played out well, bridges that fine between overdone and short but sweet. Somewhere in all this wonder they have a great deal of character development and leave no big gaps to be filled. The only true question you will have is how quickly can I get this DVD delivered.

I was amazed at the hypnotic affect of this movie.It was so beautiful and enthralling and entertaining.So much so that I had to find it on the internet and must buy it for my library as well as Onmyoji II which was even better!I can hope we have not seen the last of this wonderfully beautiful and compelling story and cast.I read the subtitled version and I still cannot wait to see it again.I am excited that My Japanese Fiancé has never seen it and I cannot wait to send it to her.I would recommend this movie to anyone who likes Beautiful stories in a historical context.The special effects added to the story without being distracting.I cannot praise it enough to express how much the movies effected me.

I rented this movie expecting it to be cool in certain ways, which only goes to prove the old adage: never judge a DVD by its cover. Especially not in a dusty, abandoned corner of your local Blockbuster. In any case, Onmyouji was pretty much not-cool at all in any of the ways I had anticipated coolness; its wholly unique brand of cool came from somewhere else, somewhere unexpected, somewhere completely different. In the end, that's what won me over -- Onmyouji is the cool you just don't expect.Most of that cool stems from the acting and, therefore, from the characters themselves; the former operating on multiple levels of "fantastic" and the latter managing to intrigue, amuse and inspire great fondness by the movie's conclusion. I think the main joy of watching Onmyouji is Nomura Mansai's stellar performance; you get the picture early on that he's the real deal. He moves like some otherworldly spirit gracing his audience with his at once delicate and wry presence; some sort of living embodiment of mono no aware with a smirking edge and quirky eyebrows. I felt instinctively that it was an honor just to be watching him on my living room TV.Sanada Hiroyuki, while I felt sometimes that he'd stumbled onto the wrong set by accident and then figured "Hey, what the hell, maybe I'll get paid," delivered a wonderful performance as well. I was a fan of his before this movie, and I remain a fan.The special effects and some of the stages may be a bit on the cheap side but part of me feels that it was an intentional super-awareness of the movie-as-a-stage. The whole film watched and felt like traditional Japanese theatre, and not just because of Nomura Mansai's traditional Japanese theatre aura. As some sort of wild throwback to Murasaki Shikibu's classic and the literary tropes of Heian court culture, this film is a definite winner. Listen not to the people who were expecting a grand and lavish cinematic spectacular; this movie wanted to look like a stage and so it created one, on which its excellent stage actors excelled.

An extraordinary period piece, Onmyoji masquerades as a simple fantasy morality tale, but it has many more layers than are immediately obvious. There's an enigmatic quality to the characters' relationships that actually makes the viewer think about what's taking place between the characters. Not only is it a strikingly beautiful film, but the performances are flawless all around. The story is fresh, the actors are interesting. With a couple of very minor exceptions, the special effects are interesting in a way that they often aren't in the standard American blockbuster. In some ways it's what Star Wars - wished- it were, but isn't. Now that Onmyoji is available on DVD, I hope it becomes more accessible in America. This film easily deserves the level of success attained by Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon