I think this is one of the best thriller mysteries I've seen. First off, it's got two stars that I really admire -- Sean Connery and Wesley Snipes, and I think they're at the top of their game here. Additionally, the rest of the cast is very good, as well. Harvey Keitel, never one of my favorites, plays a dirty cop here, and does well. Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, a Japanese actor I don't usually care for is very good here, as well. Kevin Anderson, not a well known actor, does well here, although I don't remember him much in other films. Mako, another Asian actor I don't usually care for, is good her as a Japanese corporate executive. John Morton, another questionable actor, does nicely here as a corrupt state senator. And, Stan Egi, an Asian actor I have never seen before, is quite good as an ultimately disgraced high-ranking employee of the large Japanese corporation.I think the story line is very good. Enough twists and turns that it keeps you guessing, but they all seem logical. And the weaving together of two very different cultures makes it all the more interesting.Keep your eye open fairly early on in the pic, and you'll notice Wesley Snipes zipper is down! My only real criticism is the ending. As is often the case, I think it all ends too quickly. Is Snipes fully exonerated? Does the romantic interest stay with...well, we'll let that little surprise wait for your viewing of the film.Highly recommended.

I just have read the fantastic novel in a week and i'm glad our dad picked the movie adaptation ! This karaoke bar opening may be disastrous but i discovered that Crichton has worked on the screenplay. So the movie looks really like the novel but it's more easy to follow, more polished, and above all, it offers new scenes but also new facts about the case and the characters as well! I don't know if Crichton wrote originally with Sean in mind but he's perfect here, as the old wisdom cunning sage (even if it's Giorgio(s suit is awful). However, Snipes has nothing for him : he looks a Jar-Jar, not bright, good for kicks only and that wasn't the liaison agent i followed in the novel.

I have not seen this since it was first releases when I was a teenager. I remembered liking it, and I have a soft spot for old Sean Connery so gave it another go when it was on TV.Plot In A Paragraph: During a party at the United States offices of a Japanese corporation, a woman is found dead, apparently after a violent sexual encounter. Police Detectives Web Smith (Wesley Snipes) and John Connor(Sean Connery), a former police Captain and expert on Japanese affairs, are sent to act as liaison between the Japanese and the investigating officer, Smith's former partner Tom Graham (Harvey Kietel).Whilst it was not as good as I remember Sean Connery does what you would expect of him in his mentor role, and he does it well. Wesley Snipes was a solid reliable actor in the early to mid nineties, and here is no exception. Whilst Harvey Keitel rarely disappoints and Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa does a fine job as Eddie Sakamura, a powerful man who may or may not be mixed up in it all. I always enjoy seeing Mako on screen. Tia Carrere has a small role, while Steve Buscemi has a smaller one as the aptly named Willy 'the Weasel' Wilhelm.My one complaint was an unnecessary romance between Snipes and Carrere at the end of the movie.

Michael Crichton is the king of details when comes to his books. His stories go down to the absolute detailed mechanics of their subject so that we arise knowing a little more about it then we did when we started - This is a guy who does his homework. Rising Sun was about eccentricities of a competitive Japanese conglomerate. He really got inside this world and gave you a feel for what it must be like on the inside.What aggravates me about 'Rising Sun' as a movie is that it seems to have been adapted by someone who learned by watching cop-buddy movies. It takes place in Los Angeles where a new Japanese conglomerate is just getting started. A woman is found dead in a conference room strangled to death and the killer seems to be the girl's lover Eddie Sakamura (Cary Hiroyuki-Tagawa) who is a shrewd businessman with some ties in the criminal underworld. But in order to keep the new conglomerate from looking bad right from the start, they decide to call in a crime expert.Enter John Conner (Sean Connery), a worldly-wise detective who is able to figure things out just by observation the way Sherlock Holmes might have. His Watson is Web Smith (Wesley Snipes) one of those slick movie cops who constantly insults his partner and throws out a stream of glib one-liners because well – he's a black movie cop.This combination is what sets the movie on the wrong track. For most of the movie Connery uses his knowledge of Japanese culture and motives to gather information while Snipes stands by and tosses out a joke and gives the wrong information. Why was this necessary? Why does the sidekick have to be wrong all the time. Why isn't he able to counter Connery's information with his own knowledge? I could imagine a good sidekick being played by, say Giancarlo Giannini. You would have two very intelligent men working together instead of the approach of having Snipes say something stupid and Connery countering it.And what about the dead girl? There is never an attempt to give us much emotional interest in her. She is just a sexy model, killed in a kinky murder to be the movie's McGuffin. There is actually more time spent on the video of the murder then on the victim. A video disk was taken of the killer with the face blotted out and covered with the image of someone else, but who cares? This is a movie with so little emotional interest.