Having now seen and reviewed) the original 1987 Hachiko Monogatari I have come back to this remake with fresh eyes and an upwardly revised opinion. While I still believe this movie in no way reaches the true potential of the "story" I think it at least matches and may even exceed the quality of the original.
Perhaps of greatest surprise to me are the choices the director made in what he took from and what he rejected from the original story. He has moved the story from 1920's Tokyo to 2000's small town America, and this is not an unreasonable choice. However once the link with the original Japanese story has been so fundamentally severed the world is your oyster as far as story details go so having made that choice it does seem a little perverse to make the dog not just Japanese but an Akita, as in the original. The essence of Hachiko is essentially a love story between a dog and his master, and it matters not one whit if they are in Japan or America, if the master is a Professor of agricultural engineering or of music, or a street cleaner for that matter. It does not matter if the dog is an Akita, a Pekinese or a Great Dane. What is pivotal is the portrayal of a credible relationship between the dog and his master, and to achieve this the casting of both man and dog is absolutely paramount. The Akita is a magnificent animal but if these two movies are any indication it has a stoic personality that presents a challenge to a filmmaker who has only 90 minutes to bring the character to emotional life. Presumably the Japanese market for whom the original was intended knows this personality and compensated for it. In this American version the director cunningly introduces a Japanese character who is able to inform the viewer of the Akita's character, which somewhat mitigates and explains the dog's relatively passive behaviour, but nevertheless it still would have been nice to see a greater level of visible connection between the dog and his master.
As I indicated in my other review the conundrum of this story is how to present it without inferring at least some hint of abandonment on the part of the master's family. I think this version does a better job of this than the original, and certainly the character of the Master's daughter and her partner are far more sympathetic than the original, although there is still some lingering unease as to how a dog can remain essentially a stray within the community for a decade or so. In both movies the subplot of neither wife not really wanting the dog is totally unnecessary and simply wastes precious time that should have been devoted to developing the personalities and relationships of the dog his master.
Richard Gere is not called upon to do much before he pops off but never the less does a great job. He presents a far more consistently sympathetic character than his counterpart in the original, although to be fair his Japanese counterpart is saddled with having to exist in the less relaxed context and culture of 1920's Japan. It has to be said the director's conception of a music professor as someone who plays music with all the sophistication of three blind mice for beginner piano, and who supervises very strange dances is more than a little naive. We also have to suspend credibility in the first 10 minutes in which Hachiko makes his way from Japan to a small American town – like people always send puppies randomly half way across the world in a rickety kennel with no documentation, no quarantine, no nothing, right? And they are routinely dumped on top of carts of luggage and accidentally dropped by people who seem to be deaf and blind...why did they even bother with this part of the story? This a waste of time that could have been better used to develop the man/dog relationship.
In summary a solid if not magnificent re-telling of the Hachiko story and probably as good as can be achieved while sticking to the Japanese framework.
Perhaps of greatest surprise to me are the choices the director made in what he took from and what he rejected from the original story. He has moved the story from 1920's Tokyo to 2000's small town America, and this is not an unreasonable choice. However once the link with the original Japanese story has been so fundamentally severed the world is your oyster as far as story details go so having made that choice it does seem a little perverse to make the dog not just Japanese but an Akita, as in the original. The essence of Hachiko is essentially a love story between a dog and his master, and it matters not one whit if they are in Japan or America, if the master is a Professor of agricultural engineering or of music, or a street cleaner for that matter. It does not matter if the dog is an Akita, a Pekinese or a Great Dane. What is pivotal is the portrayal of a credible relationship between the dog and his master, and to achieve this the casting of both man and dog is absolutely paramount. The Akita is a magnificent animal but if these two movies are any indication it has a stoic personality that presents a challenge to a filmmaker who has only 90 minutes to bring the character to emotional life. Presumably the Japanese market for whom the original was intended knows this personality and compensated for it. In this American version the director cunningly introduces a Japanese character who is able to inform the viewer of the Akita's character, which somewhat mitigates and explains the dog's relatively passive behaviour, but nevertheless it still would have been nice to see a greater level of visible connection between the dog and his master.
As I indicated in my other review the conundrum of this story is how to present it without inferring at least some hint of abandonment on the part of the master's family. I think this version does a better job of this than the original, and certainly the character of the Master's daughter and her partner are far more sympathetic than the original, although there is still some lingering unease as to how a dog can remain essentially a stray within the community for a decade or so. In both movies the subplot of neither wife not really wanting the dog is totally unnecessary and simply wastes precious time that should have been devoted to developing the personalities and relationships of the dog his master.
Richard Gere is not called upon to do much before he pops off but never the less does a great job. He presents a far more consistently sympathetic character than his counterpart in the original, although to be fair his Japanese counterpart is saddled with having to exist in the less relaxed context and culture of 1920's Japan. It has to be said the director's conception of a music professor as someone who plays music with all the sophistication of three blind mice for beginner piano, and who supervises very strange dances is more than a little naive. We also have to suspend credibility in the first 10 minutes in which Hachiko makes his way from Japan to a small American town – like people always send puppies randomly half way across the world in a rickety kennel with no documentation, no quarantine, no nothing, right? And they are routinely dumped on top of carts of luggage and accidentally dropped by people who seem to be deaf and blind...why did they even bother with this part of the story? This a waste of time that could have been better used to develop the man/dog relationship.
In summary a solid if not magnificent re-telling of the Hachiko story and probably as good as can be achieved while sticking to the Japanese framework.