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The action is fast and tightly choreographed, but The Princess Blade never draws its disparate elements into a compelling movie.
All Critics (28) | Top Critics (11) | Fresh (16) | Rotten (12) | DVD (2)
Delicately rendered, if full of pretty banal sentiments, the film's softer central section is a necessary counterweight to the other two acts, which are largely shot in an oppressive blue filter. Mar 26, 2009 | Full Review…
Delicately rendered, if full of pretty banal sentiments, the film's softer central section is a necessary counterweight to the other two acts, which are largely shot in an oppressive blue filter.
Derek Elley
[Yumiko Shaku] doesn't project the confidence or menace that the role requires. Trying to pass her off as a stone-cold assassin is like casting Britney Spears as Marie Curie -- it just doesn't jibe. Sep 20, 2003 | Rating: C- | Full Review…
[Yumiko Shaku] doesn't project the confidence or menace that the role requires. Trying to pass her off as a stone-cold assassin is like casting Britney Spears as Marie Curie -- it just doesn't jibe.
Gary Dowell
Its corny streak brings the movie too close to cut-rate Chinese Opera epics than should be allowed. Aug 22, 2003 | Rating: 2/4 | Full Review…
Its corny streak brings the movie too close to cut-rate Chinese Opera epics than should be allowed.
Wesley Morris
Great movie, mediocre script. Aug 22, 2003
Great movie, mediocre script.
Desson Thomson
The cast, in its quiet, iconic way, is superb. Aug 22, 2003
The cast, in its quiet, iconic way, is superb.
Stephen Hunter
The Princess Blade would have been better off forgetting the love story and concentrating on the kick-ass action. Aug 8, 2003 | Rating: 2/4
The Princess Blade would have been better off forgetting the love story and concentrating on the kick-ass action.
V.A. Musetto
A fine remake of "Lady Snowblood," with Donnie Yen fight choreograpy to boot Oct 22, 2005 | Rating: 3/5
A fine remake of "Lady Snowblood," with Donnie Yen fight choreograpy to boot
Pete Vonder Haar
the film's opening action sequence is the first of several that are likely to have you thumbing the backscan button because they look so damn cool (and are so damn fast). Feb 21, 2004 | Rating: 4/5 | Full Review…
the film's opening action sequence is the first of several that are likely to have you thumbing the backscan button because they look so damn cool (and are so damn fast).
Brian Mckay
Action directors take note: This is how it's done. Oct 5, 2003 | Rating: 4/5 | Full Review…
Action directors take note: This is how it's done.
Marc Savlov
Sato seems to be trying to make several different movies at once, and none of them comes through strongly enough to carry the film. Sep 25, 2003 | Rating: 2.5/5
Sato seems to be trying to make several different movies at once, and none of them comes through strongly enough to carry the film.
Josh Bell
A brooding atmosphere -- which is critic-speak for 'everybody wears black, and the whole thing was lighted with a single 40-watt bulb' -- permeates this dystopian thriller. Sep 19, 2003 | Rating: 2.5/4
A brooding atmosphere -- which is critic-speak for 'everybody wears black, and the whole thing was lighted with a single 40-watt bulb' -- permeates this dystopian thriller.
Sean P. Means
It has stylish fighting, but the story doesn't live up to the talent of the fight choreographer. Sep 19, 2003 | Rating: 2/5 | Full Review…
It has stylish fighting, but the story doesn't live up to the talent of the fight choreographer.
Cherryl Dawson and Leigh Ann Palone
A cliched revenge story but enjoyable none the less. Pretty decent fight scenes and a good soundrack to boot. Enjoyable enough but not one I would strongly recommend. If you need to watch Japanese girls swinging swords watch 'Azumi' instead of this, after that watch 'Azumi 2' and if you're still not satisfied 'The Princess Blade' may help.
Super Reviewer
Japanese slash-'em-up based on comic book material. Disappointingly lacking in action during the middle parts where it gets a little slow, but when the action gets going it's pretty cool and stylishly choreographed, all masterminded by action star Donnie Yen. Would have been nice to have a little more fight sequences and blood spurting to go with it too. Overall nothing memorable here unfortunately, but it's not a bad film.
The heiress to the leadership of a clan of wandering assassins finds out that they were responsible for the death of her mother and cliches ensue. Based on a comic book, The Princess Blade is yet another in a long line of modern day samurai movies involving a bunch of MTV style sword waving, slow motion high kicks and pirouetting stuntmen, punctuated by deathly dull melodrama as two hard asses "learn to love". The fight scenes are adequately handled and the pretty cast nice to look at, but the hackneyed plot consisting of a constant trickle of dreary dialogue spouted by one dimensional characters means it's extremely difficult to give a crap what happens to any of them. Safe to say that the girl gets her revenge, the villain gets a good stabbing in the end and I wish I'd spent the previous hour and a half watching Azumi instead. Yawn.
Pretty cool.. Azumi is better though.. but I did enjoy the quickness when swords were drawn ^_^
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