Samouraïs

who wouldn't love a French martial arts movie? The dubbing alone was the epitome of spoof, especially the hapless sidekick, a Tunisian-looking dude who was voiced by some sort of terrible Eddie Murphy/Martin Lawrence impersonator. Not much of the movie made any sense (in a good way), but quite frankly, whatever. It was what it was, and the fight scenes, I thought, were very good- especially the fight in the gym with the 7 or 8 identically dressed Japanese goons against the 20 or so sparrers- multiple styles, 1 on 1, 3 on 1, every other combination. Plenty of mean-looking cold-eyed warrior action, open-hand, sword v. baton, all kinds of good stuff. Go at it with open eyes and enjoy on every level.

Look, most of the review here say the movie is terrible...it isn't that bad. For what it is...a low budget direct to video release it is actually much better than a lot of releases that were low budget direct to video releases. The Manga like storyline is ok, the acting is tolerable, there is some good action and funny lines...I watched the english dubbed version which you have to look past. This flick isn't hald bad for what it is, if you can look past the flaws there is a decent story and some fun action scenes. It is not a film to be taken seriously, in some ways I think the director was making fun of the big budget star studded films, many of which were worse than this one. If you like Manga type action films, this one is probably worth your time...if not just move along.

Looks nice, has some nice fight scenes but at the end of the day is rather forgettable & pointless.

The sidekick character is annoying & the film could have lived without him.

Nothing special but on the same hand not the worst film i have seen 4/10

Having just finished watching this movie, I must say it was nowhere near as bad as most of the reviews would have had me believe. I suppose the most misleading thing about this movie is the title – it really has very little to do with Samurais at all. Basically, Samouraïs is mix of martial arts, supernatural action, cop story and techno thriller. I'll be the first to admit, the story is far from perfect, being very simplistic, and outrageously silly in a few places. Nevertheless, I did enjoy it. Anyway, let me break it down into pros and cons:

Pros – great fight scenes (for the most part); some truly fantastic visual effects and CGI; great "video game" sequences; and some clever (if bizarre) story elements.

Cons – the Nadir character is a truly stupid and annoying "bumbling sidekick", on a par with Jar Jar Binks; the fight scenes and violence were strangely sanitized in many ways, much more so than I would expect given the genre and subject matter; every attempt at humor and/or comic relief fails miserably (extremely unfunny and insultingly stupid); and as had been pointed out, the plot is very simplistic, and very implausible in many areas.

All in all, Samouraïs is worth a watch if you are a fan of martial arts action and/or supernatural action movies, but please don't see it with expectations of epic cinema or brilliant acting. Also, if you are looking for a "Samurai" genre movie, this certainly is not it. All that aside, an entertaining and easy to watch B-grader.

While it's nice that more French non-art movies are being brought to this side of the Atlantic, this is one that can be skipped. To be sure, it has a few nice martial arts sequences, and the production values are pretty good - in fact, some of the special effects are up to those in big-budget Hollywood movies. Unfortunately, the movie has some of the negative attributes commonly found in big-budget Hollywood movies - a story sorely lacking in explanation, annoying characters, blatant product plugs, and unfunny comic relief. But the main problem is that the story is slow-moving and downright dull at times. If you want to see a more entertaining French actioner, rent WASABI.