neumu [ cinematronic ]




	Returner
	Takashi Yamazaki Takeshi Kaneshiro, Anne Suzuki, Goro Kishitani, Kirin Kiki, Yukiko Okamoto 2002		Industrious American film studios are remaking successful Japanese movies such as "The Ring" and "Shall We Dance?" and adding English-language soundtracks to prodigious animated features from Japan. In a case of tit-for-tat, Takashi Yamazaki wrote and directed "Returner," a Japanese version of the American sci-fi blockbuster ... or five. Whether you call it plagiarism, recycling or homage, "Returner" is assembled from components of "The Terminator," "Independence Day," "E.T.," "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," "The Matrix" and other box-office champs. But the finished product has a stale, pasted-together feel. By leaping into a time vortex, scroungy-but-cute Milly (Anne Suzuki) is sent back to our era from the year 2084, a future when rampaging aliens will enslave Earth. Her mission is to stop the invasion before it starts. Her only ally is pretty-boy gun-for-hire Miyamoto (Takeshi Kaneshiro). Standing in the way is crazed gangster Mizoguchi (Goro Kishitani) who wants to steal the aliens' technology to rule the world. Milly, Miyamoto and Mizoguchi are the archetypes you'd expect. The gun battles and fisticuffs are fairly well staged. Yamazaki should return the rest of "Returner" to where he found it.