Holy snooglies. It is an amazing movie. If you only get to see two movies this Christmas/New Year's time, Return of the King and Last Samurai are the ones to see. I'd say that they're equally good, though the focus is vastly different.
RotK is Tolkein fantasy on the big-screen at it's finest. The Last Samurai is more of an internal struggle of a disillusioned man coming to grips with his past and finding his sense of honour and duty again. Cruise and Ken Watanabe both were excellent in their roles and the supporting cast of Japanese actors were great, though Billy Connolly's character was in the movie for far too short a time.
The Last Samurai has a lot of very impressive battles, but there is also a lot of downtime. I didn't find the movie dragging at all though. All of the quiet bits were there for a reason and were as powerful as the epic battles. The Last Samurai also serves as an excellent primer on Japanese culture as Tom Cruise's character has to deal with a lot of culture shock, which is handled very well.
There's also a character named Taka, which I thought James would get a kick out of.
And The Last Samurai has a sweet ninja attack. So does Return of the King, but Sam as a ninja isn't as believable as the black-clad dealers of death in Samurai.
That's Cruise and Watanabe.
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