"Mr. Zwick has absorbed the lethal agility of Akira Kurosawa; what registers just as powerfully as the sureness of the combatants is the ugly futility of the battles themselves."
New York Times

"THE LAST SAMURAI affords the sort of fizzy enjoyment that can come with epic movie endeavors, including a meticulously detailed world unlike our own, an excellent supporting cast and some pulse-pounding fights."
Los Angeles Times

"...[A] rousing, smoothly assembled historical fantasia....A handsome epic..."
Entertainment Weekly

"[With] some of the most impressively realised battles this side of Middle Earth."
Sight and Sound

"Beautifully designed, intelligently written, acted with conviction, it's an uncommonly thoughtful epic."
Chicago Sun-Times

"THE LAST SAMURAI is another stirring Civil War-era epic directed by Edward Zwick."
Widescreen Review