Knights of the Zodiac

A sixty million dollar exercise in divining what an audience used to the drip-fed introductions of American superhero films might find appealing in a long-running, Japanese multi-media property. A bizarre and, apparently, fruitless strategy, especially given how well regarded the franchise is in any number of non-English speaking territories. Despite this embedded popularity, director Tomek Bagiński's Knights of the Zodiac monkeys around with Masami Kurumada's Weekly Shonen Jump serial, bending over backwards to find some rhythm or pattern of storytelling well-worn (and multiplex friendly) enough to smuggle in a story about sainted martyrs drafted into a cosmic-level war against, and alongside, Greek Gods. The crueller - and therefore more exciting - aspects of the manga are eliminated outright; a worrying shift since the entire tale is predicated on a similar sort of violent, religious malevolence as Go Nagai's Devilman. 

The tournament travails of battered and bloodied orphans are nudged aside for two vaguely defined factions battling over fully-grown cage fighters who are able to, accidentally, tap into strange, mystical abilities. Mackenyu, the son of big screen madman Sonny Chiba, stars as Seiya, a promising young scrapper blessed with pop star good looks and computer-generated vapours that roll off his body like a pleasant fragrance. Although positioned within the story as brash enough to inspire enmity wherever he goes, Mackenyu's Seiya is not only bland but actually pretty obliging. The young hero grimly submitting himself to a training regime that covers him in photogenic gashes and bone-structure accenting bruises after only the briefest of heart-to-hearts with Madison Iseman's trainee Goddess Sienna. The only actor transmitting the combative self-assurance typical of the fight comic genre is Mark Dacascos as Mylock, Sienna's Alfred Pennyworth-style attaché. When battle is joined Dacascos' swirling movements betray a confidence that goes beyond that of a drilled dance; further proof (if any was required) that Hollywood missed a trick with the actor.