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| Aoi Yu as Rai in Raiou |
Man, I have just finished watching the most awesomest movie! Years ago I saw a super fun episode of Kuwazu Girai (which I detailed here) featuring Okada Masaki and one of my very, very favorite actresses, Aoi Yu, who were at the time promoting a movie called Raiou (The Lightning Tree) and the couple was so much fun and seemed to get along so well that when I found the movie up for grabs, I downloaded it right away!
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| Okada Masaki and Aoi Yu |
Now, you would think that after how much I love Aoi Yu, I would have immediately watched that movie as soon as I got it, but truthfully, when I read the movie summary stating Raiou as a story of “a girl and a boy in the Edo Period who fall in love but are separated by class status”, it didn’t really grab me and the movie fell onto the pile of “watch when I have time” flicks…before I knew it, I’d forgotten all about it!
So just the other day I was going through those old stacks of discs, and once again came across the movie and figured it was about time I checked it out! Even though the romantic storyline seemed basic, I reasoned that any movie with Aoi Yu is one worth watching! So I sat down to watch it and BOY I was I glad I DID! WOW was this movie GOOD! How come it took me so darn LONG to get around to watching this?!
First thing I gotta say is MAN, this movie is NOTHING like what the synopses I’d been reading had indicated- far from a typical romance separation by class, Raiou took that basic premise and took a MAJOR left turn with it, turning the movie into one featuring not only romance but Action, Adventure, and Human Drama!
Beyond the tale of a high class young nobleman falling in love with a peasant girl, we’ve got the male lead Narimichi (Okada Masaki) as a prince plagued by illnesses that not only make his sickly but prone to bouts of delirium as well, meeting Rai (Aoi Yu), a gruff wild-child raised in the mountains by the assassins who stole her away from her family when she was just a baby. Put these two together and you’ve got a whole new tale on an old tale!
And the second and probably most important thing about Raiou is the awesome acting, ESPECIALLY on the part of Aoi Yu, my GOSH can this chick ACT!!!! MAN, her scenes were always so gripping, emotional and intense- I have to say that by the end of the movie, I was just DRAINED! Man, NOBODY sells a character better than her, NOBODY! What will this girl do NEXT?!
