The Last Samurai

780 Words2 Pages

The movie, The Last Samurai, filled the theatres in 2003 with its suspenseful plot, exciting battle sequences and historical reference within the script. In the film, The Last Samurai, Americans were portrayed as an influential world power. Thus, a troubled American, Nathan Algren (Tom Cruise) is hired to teach the Japanese, American war tactics in order to fight in combat against the Samurai. Through a brutal journey of battle and strife, Nathan is faced with the life or death situation of fighting for his new home and for the last of the Samurai or battle for the land, he is not proud to call his own. The film makes use of the time period, politics, technology, and violence to illustrate the horrors of the real, America.

The film takes place shortly after the civil war and on the brink of the gilded age with Nathan Algren being the hero. Algren is hired due to his experience in fighting Native Americans. It is apparent throughout the film that Algren is troubled by the atrocities that he and his fellow Americans committed towards the indigenous. Thus being the fight that witnesses the pure evils of America. The Samurai are similar to the Native Americans in several ways. They both have simple ways of life, and they both were fearless in battle. During the gilded age, men and America grew to be concerned on becoming industrialized and a dominate world power. There, the need for world domination, money and power caused for greed and ruthlessness to overpower the vicinity of, what was once glorious America. The Americans during this time, were known as one of the greatest armies, due to the fact that they had overcome adversity and fierce adversaries from their past. Their ability to do so came from their innovations in technolo...

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...n influence and ruthlessness towards their own people.

The Last Samurai depicted the Japanese monarchy in the light that they had attempted to destroy their system of feudalism, which they had in place for thousands of years, with that of monstrosity. The movie differentiates between warriors who fought for honor and loyalty, battling against red, white and blue savages who only fought for greed and power. This is the lasting label/influence that America has to offer the world; monsters who destroyed anything in their paths at the cost of receiving false success. Americans have done their fair share of unethical acts to get to their position of power in the world. By influencing and sharing their methods with Japan, they extended their reach of corrupt innovation. With this help, Japan did to its own people what Americans had done to the people of their homeland.

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