Comment by hajile

Interestingly, The Last Samurai was extremely popular in Japan. It sold more tickets in Japan than the US (even though the US population was over 2x as large in 2003). This is in stark contrast with basically every other Western movie representation of Japan (edit: I think Letters from Iwo Jima was also well received and for somewhat similar reasons).

From what I understand, they of course knew that it was alternative history (aka a completely fictional universe), but they strongly related to the larger themes of national pride, duty, and honor.