Perhaps there is a cultural divide that prevents those of us not steeped in all things Japanese from seeing that RETURNER, which did boffo business in Japan, is actually a fine piece of filmmaking. Perhaps there are subtle nuances that we cannot appreciate despite our best efforts at trying to find them. And perhaps Madonna really can act, shes just ahead of her time. Such are the thoughts that bounce around ones brain when enduring a flick as stupefyingly dull as this one is.
Its certainly not for lack of effort. There is great deal of plot here, most of it warmed-over from other fantasy and sci-fi classics such as E.T. and STAR WARS, though, oddly enough, there doesnt seem to have been anything from Star Trek. Or perhaps I just nodded off for a moment.
It all begins with a plucky girl making a leap of faith into a roiling pool of plasma that copies closely yet fails to evoke any of the panache or the angst of the season 5 finale of Buffy. The girl is Miri (Ann Suzuki) and shes from 80 or so years in the future, come back to present-day Japan in order to head off an interplanetary war. For some reason, shes pinned her hopes for help in this mission on Miyamoto (Takeshi Kaneshiro), a slacker ninja-for-hire type. Perhaps its the way he shoots her with such conviction when she first tumbles into our time-space continuum. He leaves her for dead but she manages to track him down nonetheless and regale him with her tales of imminent apocalypse and dazzle him with some very low-rent high-tech gadgets. He remains unconvinced, a motif that will recur throughout the running time of this movie. Sure she can bend time, but shes just too darned scruffy to be taken seriously, I guess.
Theres also a computer savvy old lady who dispenses advice and firearms, an old nemesis of Miyamotos, a child-organ harvesting ring, a Chinese triad, an evil corporation and just scads more to act as filler between the action sequences. And while much blood is spilled, these are slow, predictable and executed by actors who exhibit all the verve of going through the motions while mentally putting together a list of things they need to pick up at the corner market on the way home. The best part, though, is when Miyamoto and Miri, on a tight deadline to save the world, stop so that Miri can have a makeover, perhaps because saving the world doesnt count unless youre wearing couture.
As for Miyamoto and Miri, shes supposed to be inspiring and cute, but she never rises much above annoying and dense. Hes supposed to be cool and cute, but hes more along the lines of a particularly dense dufus with a really good haircut. And together they, like the film itself, are like Saturday morning kid programming of the damned with none of the campy charm that the genre can sometimes evoke.
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