''Wasabi'' is a 2001 French action-comedy film directed by

Gérard Krawczyk Gérard Krawczyk (17 May 1953, Paris) is a French film director. He is of Polish descent (his grandparents were from Częstochowa). Filmography Director * ''Homicide by Night'' (1984) * ''Je hais les acteurs'' (a.k.a. ''I hate actors'') (1986) ...

and written and produced by

Luc Besson Luc Paul Maurice Besson (; born 18 March 1959) is a French film director, screenwriter and producer. He directed or produced the films ''Subway'' (1985), '' The Big Blue'' (1988), and ''La Femme Nikita'' (1990). Besson is associated with the '' ...

. The film stars

Jean Reno Jean Reno () (born 30 July 1948), is a French actor. He has worked in American, French, English, Japanese, Spanish and Italian movie productions; Reno appeared in films such as '' Crimson Rivers'', ''Godzilla'', ''The Da Vinci Code'', '' Mission: ...

, Michel Muller and

Ryōko Hirosue is a Japanese actress and singer, best known to international audiences for her roles in the Luc Besson-produced ''Wasabi'' and the Academy Award-winning Japanese film '' Departures''. She also starred in the 2008 comedy series '' Yasuko to Kenj ...

. In France, it was released as ''Wasabi, la petite moutarde qui monte au nez'' (''"Wasabi, the little mustard that gets right up your nose"''). The film gets its title from a scene where the protagonist, Hubert Fiorentini (Reno), eats a whole serving of

wasabi Wasabi ( Japanese: , , or , ; ''Eutrema japonicum'' or ''Wasabia japonica'') or Japanese horseradish is a plant of the family Brassicaceae, which also includes horseradish and mustard in other genera. The plant is native to Japan and the Russ ...

at a Japanese restaurant without flinching.

Plot

A woman (later revealed to be a transvestite), dancing provocatively to the enjoyment of other nightclub patrons, is abruptly hit in the face by Hubert Florentini (Reno), a commisaire of the French Police. Florentini drags her out of the club in handcuffs, assaulting other patrons who come too close to free the captive woman or attempt to hinder his exit. Unfortunately, one of these patrons includes the chief's son. Florentini is chastised for the violent and unorthodox methods that he uses to accomplish his goals and is put on paid leave from the force. Despite his success and his seemingly enjoyable lifestyle of fighting crime, playing golf, and being the object of a beautiful woman's (Bouquet's) attentions, he has been unable to forget his one true love, Miko, a Japanese spy he met 19 years prior. Upon receiving news of her death, he is summoned to Japan by her lawyer, Ishibashi (Haruhiko Hirata) for the reading of her will. Ishibashi informs Florentini that he has inherited the guardianship of Yumi (Hirosue), a fiery, adorable and eccentric Japanese/French teenage girl over whom he has custody until she reaches adulthood in two days (the age of adulthood in Japan being 20). Yumi, who was led to believe she was the result of her mother's rape and subsequent abandonment, hates her unknown father. Florentini realizes Yumi is his daughter, but does not tell her as she would probably flee from him. Florentini uncovers evidence that Miko was the victim of foul play. He discovers that Miko had stolen a small fortune from the

Yakuza , also known as , are members of transnational organized crime syndicates originating in Japan. The Japanese police and media, by request of the police, call them , while the ''yakuza'' call themselves . The English equivalent for the ter ...

, a fortune now destined for Yumi upon reaching adulthood. Florentini summons the help of Momo (Michel Muller), a former intelligence colleague living in Tokyo. He helps Florentini with further investigations into Miko's death and in guarding Yumi from the Yakuza by supplying him with two metal suitcases of weapons. The Yakuza try to attack Yumi in an arcade, but Florentini, who has been observing their positions, kills all of them. Later, Yumi discovers that Florentini is her father as she is captured by the Yakuza. As they take her away and prepare to execute Florentini, he uses golf balls to knock out his would-be executioners and knock out the rest in mêlée combat. With the help of former intelligence colleagues, Florentini and Momo free Yumi from her kidnappers when they attempt to withdraw money from Yumi's bank account by replacing the bank's staff and customers with their own men. During the rescue attempt a gunfight breaks out and all of the Yakuza are killed by Florentini single-handedly without any casualties to the good guys. Following the ordeal, Florentini takes a flight back to France, having promised Yumi he would be back in a month. But just before the plane takes off, a group of customs officers enter the cabin with two familiar metal suitcases in hand, asking for their owner.

Cast

as Hubert Fiorentini *

as Yumi Yoshimido (

Nihongo is spoken natively by about 128 million people, primarily by Japanese people and primarily in Japan, the only country where it is the national language. Japanese belongs to the Japonic or Japanese- Ryukyuan language family. There have been ...

: 吉堂由美, ''Yoshi dō Yumi'') * Michel Muller as Maurice "Momo" *

Carole Bouquet Carole Bouquet (born 18 August 1957) is a French actress who has appeared in more than 60 films since 1977. In 1990, she was awarded the César Award for Best Actress for her role in '' Too Beautiful for You''. She was the face of Chanel No. 5 ...

as Sofia *

Ludovic Berthillot Ludovic is a given name and has also been a surname. People with the given name A * Ludovic Albós Cavaliere (born 1979), Andorran ski mountaineer * Ludovic Ambruș (born 1946), Romanian wrestler who competed in the 1972 Summer Olympics * Ludo ...

as Jean-Baptiste #1 * Yan Epstein as Jean-Baptiste #2 * Michel Scourneau as Van Eyck * Christian Sinniger as Squale * Jean-Marc Montalto as Olivier * Alexandre Brik as Irène *

Fabio Zenoni Fabio is a given name descended from Latin ''Fabius'' and very popular in Italy and Latin America (due to Italian migration). Its English equivalent is Fabian. The name is written without an accent in Italian and Spanish, but is usually accented ...

as Josy * Véronique Balme as Betty * Jacques Bondoux as Del Rio * as Takanawa (

: 高輪, ''Takanawa'') * as Ishibashi (

: 石橋, ''Ishibashi'') * Edilberto Ruiz as Guacamole

Production

The film was shot in Tokyo, Japan.

Reception

''Wasabi'' was met with mixed reviews, with a 43% approval rating on

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wan ...

Roger Ebert Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert beca ...

gave the film one-and-a-half out of four stars, commenting that "Reno does what he can in a thankless situation, the film ricochets from humor to violence and back again, and Ryoko Hirosue makes us wonder if she is always like that." On

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

, the film holds a score of 53 out of 100, based on reviews from 15 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Despite some exhibitor expectations, it only opened in second place at the French box office, behind ''

American Pie 2 ''American Pie 2'' is a 2001 American sex comedy film directed by James B. Rogers and written by Adam Herz and David H. Steinberg from a story by Herz. A sequel to the 1999 comedy film '' American Pie'', it is the second film in the ''American ...

'', with a gross of 18.6 million Francs ($2.7 million) for the week. It reached number one in its second week with a gross of 9.4 million Francs. It grossed $6.7 million in France and $10.4 million worldwide.

References

External links

* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Wasabi (Film) 2001 films 2000s action comedy films EuropaCorp films 2000s French-language films 2000s Japanese-language films French action comedy films Films directed by Gérard Krawczyk Films scored by Éric Serra Films set in Paris Films set in Tokyo Films shot in Paris Films shot in Tokyo Yakuza films Films produced by Luc Besson 2001 comedy films Japan in non-Japanese culture 2000s French films