Wasabi

The goal of this film is to entertain. And it works. Leave your brain at the door and enjoy. The soundtrack is appropriate and good. Jean Reno is at the apex of coolness and Ryoko Hirosue is hip and refreshing. One could say the movie is some kind of techno-cop film that takes some aspects of the traditional French cop movies and push it to the limit during a crazy few days in Tokyo. Great to see the mega-city by the way. The movie is a cross between your typical James Bond and a modern Japanese action flick. Seen at home, in Toronto, on April 4th, 2006.

74/100 (**½)

WASABI (2001) is a variation on fish-out-of-water action comedies like the RUSH HOUR films, with a nod to more deadly serious Japan-set predecessors like the Michael Douglas starrer, BLACK RAIN (1989). Written by Luc Besson, it tells a tale of a French cop called to Tokyo for the reading of his old girlfriend's will only to learn that the girlfriend died under suspicious circumstances, that a cache of $200 million is involved, and that he's the father of the dead woman's daughter, of whom he's now the legal guardian until she turns 20 in two days. There is plenty of formulaic cartoonish action capitalizing on the no-nonsense cop's tendency to hit or shoot first and ask questions later, but it's balanced by some delightful interaction between Hubert, the gruff, if sentimental, middle-aged cop, played by Jean Reno, and Yumi, the terminally cute, endlessly trendy Japanese daughter, played by pop star/TV-film actress Ryoko Hirosue.

Some scenes manage to combine the action and father-daughter antics seamlessly, as in a department store shopping trip, where Yumi runs ecstatically from one section to the next while Reno quietly ferrets out and knocks unconscious each of nearly a dozen Yakuza thugs tailing them, all, miraculously, without attracting her attention. In a later scene, he has a French Intelligence comic relief sidekick (Michel Muller) show him cases of advanced weaponry while Yumi changes into her purchases in an adjacent room, bursting through the doors in a flamboyant display of each new outfit, while the two men scramble to hide the hardware from her view and tell her how great she looks.

The script is just as contrived and implausible as it would be in the hands of Hong Kong or Hollywood filmmakers, who've all done similar material, but it's handled with a light enough tone and given over sufficiently to the lead performers to make it a pleasant if undemanding experience. It's always a treat to see Reno in a starring role and he's quite believable and charming throughout in a patented movie star role that Bruce Willis might have played in Hollywood or Lau Ching Wan in Hong Kong. The lean and wiry Ryoko Hirosue (all arms, legs, nose, and chin) is `kawaii' to the nth degree--like a saltier, earthier Audrey Hepburn--and steals the film whenever she's on camera (which isn't often enough!). The character is quite volatile and given to wild mood swings punctuated by tears one minute and sly grins or girlish squeals the next. She's quite a fashion plate as well. The actress reportedly learned her French dialogue phonetically, but she handles it like a pro, as if she'd been speaking it much of her life.

The story is about a french policeman with personal working practices that his boss doesn't like much. Jean Reno does very well in this role. His character is the centerpiece of the whole movie. You can also see a snapshot at the Japanese way of life, even though it is adapted to the movie a lot. Not to make this into a long and boring comment, I think you should see this to have a good laugh if you like Jean Reno and his humor.

`Wasabi' is a high-spirited French action comedy with a Japanese name. This Luc Besson production stars Jean Reno in a wonderful performance as a tough-guy French cop who is as quick to use his tongue as his overeager fists. One day, out of the blue, Detective Fiorentino discovers that he has a 19 year-old daughter by a Japanese woman who left him almost 20 years ago, breaking his heart in the process. The girl, Yumi, turns out to be an orange-haired free spirit who hates cops and has been led to believe that her father raped her mother. Much of the film is spent with Hubert and Yumi getting to know one another, as they uncover secrets about her mother's past that seem to have made the young woman the target of some rather unsavory characters.

The plot is the least of the matter in this film. As directed by Gerard Krawczyk, `Wasabi' is really all about style. Besson's screenplay is fitfully amusing, doling out cleverness and cutesyness in roughly equal measure. Cinematographer Gerard Sterin brings out the colorful richness of the urban Japanese landscape and editor Yanne Herve doesn't linger longer on the jokes and sight gags than is absolutely necessary. These elements help to compensate for the somewhat desperate air that afflicts the screenplay from time to time.

The prime asset of `Wasabi' is Jean Reno's performance. Reno perfectly mines the comic potential inherent in the material through the tone of weary cynicism and superiority to all around him that he conveys throughout. As an actor who has played this type of rogue-cop character many times in his career, Reno obviously relishes this opportunity for a little good-natured self-ribbing. And he does a splendid job.

`Wasabi' is little more than a piffle when all is said and done, but Reno makes it worth seeing.

As others have commented, this is certainly light entertainment, not heavy on elaborate plot lines. I actually saw this movie today on a flight from Japan, and found it delightful. It certainly is a film that was pitched to a French Audience, tossing in simplified bits of Japanese pop culture (Witness: I have never encountered so many Japanese that could speak French, as in this movie). Nevertheless this is what I liked about the movie:

1. The interplay between Fiorentino (Jean Reno) and his sidekick Momo (Michel Muller) was consistently humorous throughout, with Muller delivering the punchline, and nearly upstaging Reno throughout. My favorite scene is when Fiorentino is eating generous gobs of Wasabi (hence the name of the film), and Momo, not wanting to be outdone by his mentor, nearly gags to death on the stuff. I was laughing out loud -- maybe because it reminds me too vividly of the first time I ever ate sushi, and nearly died doing the same thing as Momo!!

2. Ryoko Hirosue, who plays Yumi, the previously unknown daughter to Fiorentini, is one of the current hot young faces in Japan, and has appeared in many TV dramas and movies. She certainly provides all the eye candy I could ever wish for in this film. But I must admit a certain new found-respect for her acting abilities, as she pulled off her lines in French flawlessly, while maintaining her trademark cuteness and capturing the carefree attitude of today's Japanese youth. She provided a foil of a different sort for Reno, her bright colors (pink hair, pink everything) offering a striking contrast to Reno's darker, demure look.

The Yakuza were portrayed as mindless goons in this film, and there are certainly better films out there if you want to know more about Yakuza, but it appeared that they played their role, which was to showcase Reno's machismo, in a humorous way, something along the lines of Jackie Chan films -- they are more like props in the film than anything else.

All in all, I was entertained by this film, which is all I was looking for during my 11 hours crossing the Pacific.