I love a good samurai flick, especially the classic old school style. At the same time when they look to flip the genre on its head it has potential to be something special. The latest Lone Samurai from Raze director Josh Waller stars Shogen Ito and Raid star Yayan Ruhian looks to bring its own voice to the genre, but does it have enough honor to make it worthwhile, or will it fail to survive the battle for survival?

​

Lone Samurai follows a 13th century samurai who finds himself shipwrecked on an island he believes to be deserted. As he contemplates his existence, it seems like a dignified death at his own hands might be his best solution. However, when he is captured by the murderous cannibal tribe that calls this island home, his survival instinct kicks in.

​

The film starts strong with its set up and a great visual yet simple fight on a ship. This is all the lead into the shipwrecked element that is the primary direction of this character’s journey. This takes the character in kind of a period piece of Castaway but with samurai lore and island tribal people for him to engage with. With knowing that the Uwais team and Ruhian involved hope for some big bad action, but the film is actually something altogether different.

​

The story spends most of the time watching him limp around from his injuries and fighting his own honor code. His journey is interesting and they take its time to allow the audience to experience his own fight for survival. The issue with this though is that very little happens for a lot of the run time. It gets a bit mundane at times waiting for something to happen, but thankfully most of the time watching his ways of survival is engaging enough to work.

​