Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

Vengeance of Mine was my first exposure to Shohei Imamura, a tautly amazing movie full of dark humor, fearful violence, sexual tension and deep questions about life (note: this movie, among any other, absolutely deserves to be released on DVD). Dr. Akagi explores many of the same themes from the angle of a more dignified and admirable protagonist, a widower physician in a small fishing village whose life work is to tend to the many locals who are falling ill with hepatitis, a disease whose pathology and means of transmission are not yet understood. It also presents an interesting view of wartime Japan in a village removed from the immediate devastation of the war, how life goes on as it typically does but with the war slowly intruding more and more into the people's daily lives until it literally explodes above their heads. The director's great talent, in my opinion, is how he never judges his subjects, whether because the person is a whore, a morphine addict, an embezzler, a dissolute drunkard or pervert. He depicts them as they are. The characters and situations depicted in this movie seem to me very authentic representations of the Japanese character, in its multiplicity, and that's part of what makes it a delight to watch. Dr. Akagi is the most intriguing one of all the characters, as he goes through not one but two personal transformations in the movie that are so subtle at first that you fail to notice them until the movie comes together neatly at the end yet leaves the question, what motivates us to do the things that we do in life, what's our purpose in life and what keeps us alive. Of course, the answer is never clear, and the movie does not shy from that reality. The cinematography is also very nice, especially the scenes with the whale at the end which are simply beautiful and imbued with mythos in a scene in which director wonderfully transforms the village whore and daughter of a fisherman into the mythical woman that reawakens Dr. Akagi to his life. Beautifully done. Only complaint: the jazz soundtrack is a bit overly intrusive and excessive. That should have been toned down a bit, but otherwise, a very moving and poignant film.

This film gives a fascinating look at life in Japan in the last months of WWII. Dr. Akagi brings a sense of humanity and compassion in an otherwise tired and spiritually bankrupt country. So, while the people are either giving up or shouting jingoistic sayings and insisting the war is NOT lost, he just goes about his job saving lives and crusading within the government for more attention and funding for the Hepatitis outbreak. Throughout the film he is tireless and decent. However, along the way, there are a lot of detours and other characters--some that work and some that tend to distract (such as the scene involving the prostitute and the whale)--taking this movie from a score of 8 or 9 and dropping it to 7. Nevertheless, it's still an excellent film and well worth your time--giving unusual historical insights.PS--an excellent companion film to this would be FIRES ON THE PLAIN (1959). This film shows Japanese soldiers in the Phillipines just before the country falls to the Americans. It shows the end of the war through the viewpoint of very tired, hungry and broken soldiers.

Imamura Shohei has come in to his prime at a point when most directors of his age begin their downward spiral. Along with his completely different although equally impressive film, "Unagi (the eel)" (1997) Imamura has made two of the greatest films of the 1990s. This particular entry into the Imamura canon deals with a Kyushu doctor during WWII. Of course, the film goes way beyond just that; it's a film that cannot be summed up in words, it's the kind of movie that you sit back and enjoy and you come out of smiling, for you've been entertained in a way most films cannot. "Kanzo Sensei" affects like a truly satisfying book does, something most films cannot come close to copying. If you dig it, rent "the eel" and look out for his next work coming soon to a theatre far from you and me--Japan. Let's hope his next one is as good as his last two, and that it is released in theatrically in the US. Highly recommended.

This movie is outstanding both as art and as philosophy. Artistically, Imamura has great range and is able to make quick switches of tone and style without losing the thread, or the audience. There is a similar yoking of divergent feelings in the relationship that develops between the two main characters. They are wildly incompatible to the end, yet together they form something that we know is right. Philosophically, Imamura does what no one in Hollywood would dare attempt. In the atmosphere of moral relativism that American films have promoted since the 60s, nothing is more preposterous than to hunger and thirst after justice. But Imamura's final film vindicates that hunger and makes us want to share it. The story's surprises are so intricately prepared that I can't say much more without ruining it, but I left the theater profoundly exhilarated.