The first of the original 3 Rurouni Kenshin live-action movies is absolutely brilliant. It's mostly a very close adaptation of the section(s) of source material that it covers; the occasionally-silly humor and OTT feel of certain elements are well-done and form a nice balance with the serious parts; the directing, filming, acting (including an especially impressive performance from the actor playing main character Kenshin, as he actually did all of his own fight scenes and stunts! ?) are all excellent; and the action is *perfection* (not to mention that said action somehow manages to be realistically bloody when called for without being excessively graphic, which is pretty impressive in and of itself). There were of course some cuts and condensing of plot due to the restrictions of the movie's length, but they were minor and didn't affect enjoyment (or mine, at least, which is saying something coming from an adaptation-faithfulness stickler like me ?). Indeed, literally the only complaint I have is that Kaori is quite a bit more badass in the manga than she is here; however, I could live with that simply due to the sheer awesomeness of the rest of the film. It's an excellent standalone movie that is easy to enjoy whether you're a fan of the manga or not, and I definitely recommend it.

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...Now, that said, I was *EXTREMELY* disappointed with the 2 followup movies, and you can read my thoughts about that on their entries. However, thankfully, this first movie is self-contained, so you can easily just watch it on its own without losing anything (and that is exactly what I would suggest).