Christopher Lambert is a foreigner in Japan who gets caught up in a secret world of ninja cults and samurai warriors.... The Hunted is full of Japanese clichés - but that gives it its charm - the film *likes* Japan and enjoys sticking in such quintessentially Japanese scenery like castles, pachinko parlours, robotic toilets, the bullet train, taiko drummers (the famous drumming group Kodo appear), wooden bridges over rivers, paper screen doors, swordmakers, and of course ninja and samurai.
Lambert is charming throughout, his encounter with a mysterious lady in a nightclub is a sexy cliché, but Lambert's character is always likable and decent, and not stereotypically macho - he has to cower in a corner in some of the scenes where ninjas attack (although to be fair he was injured...) When Lambert manages to escape the first wave of (bloody) ninja attacks he goes to an island full of samurai who are dedicated to wiping out the evil ninja cult. In some ways it becomes a bit like The Last Samurai at this point, as Lambert's fish out of water has to learn how to handle a katana and bonds with a swordsmith.
It is silly, the dialogue is often weak, but it has some nice imagery of Japan, some brutal swordplay, and successfully keeps the film pacy and ... well.. cool. Ninjas are cool.
Having said that, it is low budget, the dialogue is often rubbish: (Cop: 'There are no ninjas in modern Japan!' {gets shot with arrow, dying} 'Looks like I was wrong! Lambert: 'Looks like?') Ho ho ho.
Lambert is charming throughout, his encounter with a mysterious lady in a nightclub is a sexy cliché, but Lambert's character is always likable and decent, and not stereotypically macho - he has to cower in a corner in some of the scenes where ninjas attack (although to be fair he was injured...) When Lambert manages to escape the first wave of (bloody) ninja attacks he goes to an island full of samurai who are dedicated to wiping out the evil ninja cult. In some ways it becomes a bit like The Last Samurai at this point, as Lambert's fish out of water has to learn how to handle a katana and bonds with a swordsmith.
It is silly, the dialogue is often weak, but it has some nice imagery of Japan, some brutal swordplay, and successfully keeps the film pacy and ... well.. cool. Ninjas are cool.
Having said that, it is low budget, the dialogue is often rubbish: (Cop: 'There are no ninjas in modern Japan!' {gets shot with arrow, dying} 'Looks like I was wrong! Lambert: 'Looks like?') Ho ho ho.