13 Assassins
Magnet Releasing | Release Date: April 29, 2011 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
84
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 33 Critic Reviews
Positive:
29
Mixed:
4
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Time Out LondonDavid JenkinsAug 16, 2016
The film is built as a long crescendo, opening at a level of considered, Zen-like reflection and ending with a prolonged cacophony of elaborate, town-wide annihilation. Read full review
100
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaMay 12, 2011
13 Assassins is, at turns, thrilling and funny, visually exquisite and emotionally charged. Read full review
100
SalonAndrew O'HehirApr 29, 2011
Visually spectacular, with wide-screen cinematography from Nobuyasu Kita, impressive, full-scale sets and special effects and exhausting, immersive action scenes, 13 Assassins is pretty nearly the samurai classic it sets out to become. Read full review
100
Los Angeles TimesKevin ThomasApr 28, 2011
Few filmmakers juxtapose cruelty and beauty as audaciously as Japan's Takashi Miike. A master director with great style and panache, Miike's latest, 13 Assassins, is a classic samurai movie, right up there among the finest in the genre. Read full review
100
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternApr 28, 2011
Right makes might in Takashi Miike's excellent-and exceedingly violent-remake of a 1966 Japanese classic by Eiichi Kudo. Read full review
100
Time OutJoshua RothkopfApr 26, 2011
A classically structured rampage that bears serious comparison to the definitive greats of Akira Kurosawa, 13 Assassins will floor connoisseurs of action, mood and the dignity of a pissed-off scowl. Read full review
100
San Francisco ChronicleG. Allen JohnsonApr 23, 2011
The well-crafted 13 Assassins, a remake of a 1960s samurai film, is one of his best; it shows that Takashi could be a great filmmaker if he'd only slow down. Read full review
91
The A.V. ClubScott TobiasJun 2, 2011
The great Kôji Yakusho stars as a revered samurai who decides that enough is enough, and sets about assembling the assassins of the title like a men-on-a-mission movie. Read full review
90
MovielineStephanie ZacharekApr 28, 2011
The picture does, in places, feel like an unspoken homage to Kurosawa, though it's certainly its own distinct creation. But I wonder if it more closely resembles another end-of-an-era picture, Sam Peckinpah's "The Wild Bunch." Read full review
90
The New York TimesManohla DargisApr 28, 2011
A stirring, unexpectedly moving story of love and blood. Read full review
90
VarietyLeslie FelperinApr 19, 2011
This at first slow-moving and then wildly kinetic actioner possesses a cool classicism that will appeal to offshore audiences as well as those at home. Read full review
88
The Seattle TimesTom KeoghAug 16, 2016
Miike misses an opportunity to add even more resonance by telling us a little extra about each of the samurai fighting the good fight. But he's also busy shooting nearly an hour's worth of complicated fight choreography. Enthralling as that is, Miike's greatest achievement here is in giving us reason to deeply care. Read full review
88
Washington PostSean OConnellMay 27, 2011
Does Guinness World Records have an entry for longest on-screen fight? If it doesn't, Takashi Miike's 13 Assassins just set it. And if a record actually exists, Miike's film just broke it. Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertMay 25, 2011
The film is terrifically entertaining, an ambitious big-budget epic, directed with great visuals and sound by Takeshi Miike. Read full review
88
Boston GlobeTy BurrMay 5, 2011
Epic in scope, ambition, and execution, it's a classic swords-and-samurai film with postmodern blood and guts, and it's completely satisfying. Read full review
88
New York PostV.A. MusettoApr 29, 2011
A must-see for Miike's passionate legion of fans. But even action buffs who've never seen any of his films before will be drawn in by this masterful exercise in cinematic butchery. Read full review
80
Screen DailyLee MarshallAug 16, 2016
Once the Seven-Samurai-style band of brothers is assembled, 13 Assassins is pure pleasure: and it culminates in a magnificent 45-minute showdown that has to be the best final battle sequence in cinema since, oh, Kill Bill at least. Read full review
80
The TelegraphTim RobeyAug 16, 2016
For the usually irrepressible Miike, it’s remarkably controlled, even restrained. And yet it involves 200 bodyguards being annihilated every which way, in a sustained frenzy of blistering choreographic skill that Hollywood won’t top all year. Read full review
80
CineVueDaniel GreenAug 16, 2016
For fans of samurai cinema, 13 Assassins ranks right up there with Yôji Yamada's The Twilight Samurai (2002) and Takeshi Kitano's The Blind Swordsman: Zatoichi (2003) as one of the finer additions to the sub-genre in recent years. Read full review
80
Chicago ReaderJ.R. JonesMay 26, 2011
This slam-bang remake of a 1963 feature by Eichi Kudo builds slowly, accumulating characters and themes, then explodes into a prolonged and masterful battle sequence inside a deserted town. Read full review
80
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinMay 2, 2011
Has a mixture of bloodletting and exultation that would make Sam Peckinpah sit up in his grave and howl with pleasure. Read full review
78
Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovApr 28, 2011
It's also a deeply moral antiwar film, if one chooses to view it that way. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineNick SchagerAug 16, 2016
Beginning with a series of traps before escalating into sword-to-sword skirmishes, Miike's centerpiece boasts sharp momentum and nasty muscularity. Read full review
75
Portland OregonianMarc MohanJun 2, 2011
It may not be the most memorable saga put on film, but as far as Miike is concerned, it doesn't have to be. Read full review
75
Miami HeraldRene RodriguezMay 19, 2011
A savage, insane movie - in the best way possible. Read full review
75
Orlando SentinelRoger MooreApr 27, 2011
13 Assassins is entirely too long and too talky. But the cat-and-mouse game of strategy, figuring out when and where to ambush the evil overlord's entourage, is fascinating. Read full review
70
Village VoiceNick PinkertonApr 26, 2011
Perhaps something important was spirited away with the 20 minutes of footage shorn for this U.S. release, but the combatants are scarcely distinguishable here even before disappearing under layers of mud and guts. Read full review
65
NPRMark JenkinsApr 29, 2011
There's nothing unexpected in this well-made picture, aside from the name of the director: Takeshi Miike. Read full review
63
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsAug 16, 2016
If what you seek from a samurai film is the friction between communal duty and personal honor, join the orderly queue to see 13 Assassins. But if what you seek is action, spend the talky first hour at a sushi bar before barging into the theater for the bloody good finale. Read full review
60
Total FilmMatt GlasbyAug 16, 2016
All politics and posturing, the first two-thirds of the film are stiff and uninvolving, and although the climatic 45-minute free-for-all is genuinely spectacular, it’s clear where the director’s heart lies. Read full review
60
The GuardianSteve RoseAug 16, 2016
Over the past decade, director Takashi Miike has churned out gleefully extreme films Audition, Ichi the Killer and Visitor Q, but it's difficult to detect much subversion in this sober, classical effort Read full review
60
The Hollywood ReporterDeborah YoungAug 16, 2016
Though it takes some time to sort out the large cast, the leads, all fine actors, eventually come into focus. As the good and bad samurai, Yakusho and Ichimura have the gravitas to take their roles seriously and perform a decisive one-on-one sword fight straight. Read full review
60
EmpireKim NewmanMay 2, 2011
A decent historical drama, with one of the best extended battle scenes (a full half of the movie is the face-off in the 'village of death') in recent memory. Read full review
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