Hana

HANA (2006) - Sept. 9, 2006
An overlong but otherwise delightful film about a samurai who moves to a small village hoping to find leads in order to get vengeance against the man who killed his father. It sounds serious (and that's what I thought it was going to be) but it was actually a light-hearted comedy about the samurai and the quirky residents of the small, ramshackle village in which he resides. A lot of time is also spent on the blossoming relationship between the samurai and a single mother (though not quite enough to classify this as a romantic comedy). The residents of the town are endearing and became people I really came to care about, and the film was actually quite funny. My only real problem with this movie (though it's a big one) is that, at 127 minutes, it's just way too long. It overstays its welcome a little bit, and that's too bad because otherwise it's really good. ***