Kitaro and the Millennium Curse (2008)

My understanding of Japanese is minimal, and I saw this in the theater raw without subtitles, but even so it was a gigantic improvement over the first movie with Eiji Wentz. Don't let the first one deter you! This film seemed to be shouting "We got a budget!!" and they almost put it to good effect. Wentz didn't make my spine tingle nearly as much as in the first movie, and the other actors performed admirably. This cast was chock-full of comedians and flavors-of-the-day--a little cringeworthy at times, but not wholly off-putting. The expanded cast contained some really admirable stars and even some simple enough jokes that I could comprehend them. The action sequences were actually pretty satisfying--Wentz as Kitaro fighting So Ji-Sub as Yasha was one of the best-done fight scenes in the movie. As usual the writers pushed the 'romance' angle because of Wentz, but in this movie the girl took some respectable initiative. As a big fan of GeGeGe no Kitaro, this movie isn't near the animation or manga whatsoever, but it stays mostly true to the mood. Overall it was cute and quite enjoyable.