Jia Zhangke’s latest film, 24 City, opens with a scene familiar to anyone who has lived in a Chinese city – the imposing front gates of a large factory compound, cheery music on the loudspeaker, and workers on bicycles. Similar gates adorn the front of schools, government offices, hospitals, and any number of institutions. In the film, these gates happen to enclose the extensive compounds of a former military factory on the outskirts of Chengdu, in Sichuan Province. From a humming hub of socialist industry, the factory had since converted to turning out consumer goods, and finally, as the film opens, making way for a mixed-use condominium complex.

Proceeding at the gentle pace of a documentary, the director mixed interviews with real former workers and actors. As the camera wandered through the maze of now empty and forlorn-looking buildings, into people’s homes, along side them on buses, the interviews offered up bits of personal histories. Watching the film, I felt a sense of recognition – the same sense of mild sorrow I frequently could not place a finger on while living in China – that I was witnessing first-hand the passing of an era, with the remaining vestiges of socialism dismantled in grayish clouds of dust and re-birthed one apartment complex at a time.

When I lived in Beijing from the fall of 2007 to the summer of 2008, I passed daily by a block of shacks and one-floor storefronts close to the bus station, the subway, and as it turned out, the end station of the new airport express. As the weather cooled, the entire area sported the painted red character ,拆, to demolish, circled in more red paint. Walking through the bus depot involved an obstacle course, all the while being choked by omnipresent clouds of dust. The people who lived and worked in the shacks, almost all migrant workers, faced the demolition project with equanimity – the husband and wife team who sold youtiao and tea-eggs across the street operated their small business with little regard to the red sign of doom on their building. Until one day they were no longer there. By the time the Olympics rolled around, the entire area had converted to a verdant green park.

Jia Zhangke’s film reminded me of that experience, and of all the demolishing and dislocation which went into delivering the spectacle of a powerful new China, the same one that appears on the front page of New York Times as America’s largest creditor, that is already delivering 9% GDP growth and pointing the way out of a global recession. From “The World” (2004), set in an amusement part on the outskirts of Beijing, to “Still Life” (2006), which took place in the rubble and chaos of the Three Gorges Dam project, Jia’s films provide a counter to the carefully orchestrated image fostered by the Chinese state of a nation on the rise.

Perhaps because they strike too close to home, Chinese audiences have shown little interest in watching these forlorn films of dislocation and alienation. For escapism, CGI-effects and spectacle, they can turn to Chen Kaige’s The Promise (2005), Zhang Yimou’s Curse of the Golden Flowers (2007), House of Flying Daggers (2004), Hero (2002), and of course, the Hollywood blockbusters upon which these directors have based the big-budget spectacles. These are the films that get Chinese media talking.

Spectacle – these film share in common eye-popping color and visual schemes, special effects, international casts of stunningly attractive actors and actresses (inability to speak Chinese not a problem), and tenuous and more importantly, politically ambiguous narratives.

What is Hero (2002) but a tacit approval of tyranny, provided that the ends justify the means? Jet Li, the assassin of Hero, most recently made an appearance as the Dragon Emperor in The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (2008). In the climactic battle scene,  skeletons of  those unjustly slaughtered in the effort to build the Great Wall rise from the dead to fight the terracotta minions of the Emperor – but not before their general gives a short speech about fighting for freedom. Absurd, perhaps, but no more ridiculous than the dialogue uttered by the Korean actor Dong-kun Jang in The Promise. In the past year, in an interview with the China Film Journal, even Jia Zhangke did not rule the possibility of going to Hollywood. If he does move on to more commercial project, Chinese film would lose one of the few directors interested in portraying the nation in the throes of change.

Writing about the movie-going experience in 1920s Berlin, Siegfried Kracauer described movie theaters as “palaces of distractions” aimed at appeasing the masses. In the twenty-first century, Chinese directors have excelled at creating stunning visual images. What Chinese person could watch the opening ceremonies of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, directed by Zhang Yimou, without feeling even a little bit proud and awed at the country’s progress in the last twenty years? Behind the mass spectacle, however, lies a gate to a factory compound in Chengdu and in cities across China, about to be demolished to make way for condominiums. But that story, all too real for millions of Chinese, would hardly be a distraction.

DIY abortions on Thai TV

I don’t subscribe to the idea that all censorship is bad. As much as I appreciate freedom of speech and expression in the media and arts, I do believe in sensible censorship of the most extreme opinions and/or images. For example, I think it’s quite right that distributing material which incites hatred is a crime in the UK, and that the USA’s Freedom of Speech law, which allows for the same to go unpunished, is a little lax.

But if censorship is to be enforced, it has to be done with common sense, and it must also treat the public with a modicum of respect for its intelligence. Consequently, I think sweeping bans on certain major websites (such as in China), or on publicly expressing certain opinions about a very important part of Thai life and culture (which, for obvious reasons, I can’t discuss here), do more harm than good.

But before I get into any deeper political comment, it was actually a daft juxtaposition in a schlocky Thai horror movie that got me thinking about censorship. It was Long Kong 2, or Art of the Devil 2 in English, which was shown on the cable channel True Film Asia. I only watched a segment of the movie, which was evidently about black magic. What I saw – unedited – was a pregnant woman strapped down on a bed and subjected to the electrocution of her genitals with a cattle prod, followed by a forced abortion by repeatedly thumping her in the torso. The foetus was then crudely yanked out of her, slopped into a bowl and then dumped outside. Nice.

Now, I’m not easily shocked. I’ve seen plenty of gory movies. The scene, while obviously disgusting, didn’t really bother me. But what did get a reaction from me – that of incredulous laughter – was the follow-up scene of one of the bad guys relaxing after the crude abortion ritual by smoking a cigarette – and it was this that got censored! A mosaic blurred out the offending object – the cigarette – whenever the guy lifted it to his mouth (although it was fine to show it being carried in his hand – only actual cig-to-mouth contact was deemed offensive).

Electrocution of vaginas and bloody foetuses in a bowl? Not a problem! But god forbid any impressionable people see the despicable act of smoking a cigarette on TV at 11pm on a Friday night.

It’s not unusual to see mosaicing in Thai movies on TV. It is also used to cover up guns (similarly, it’s fine to see a gaping head wound, so long as you don’t show the weapon that caused it!). But what is curious is that the same censorship is not applied to foreign movies. So Hollywood’s finest are free to tote guns and smoke cigs on Thai screens, but local stars are not.

I’d love to hear the rationale – are Thai people more susceptible to influence when seeing one of their own smoking than they would be when watching a farang? If so, then don’t the powers that be consider that occult practices and home abortions might be slightly more dangerous than smoking? Certainly if I had a child or teenager, I know which images I’d be more worried about them seeing.

Then again, this is a country where prostitution is tolerated – promoted, even, in some places – yet pornography is banned, so perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised. Just don’t mention the ********.

The first hour of the film is made like a documentary of rural life in an Eskimo-like community on the northern Siberian coast. The other part of the film is a slowly progressive drama about a boy, his father and two other men going out for a boat trip to hunt some seals on a remote island off the coast. They are travelling in a handmade wooden boat, with only the sky to navigate from. After a successful hunting they head back for the village. However they are surprised by bad weather and are swept into a heavy fog that will last for days. With nothing to eat and the water supply running out, the men are starting to sacrifice themselves one by one for the little boy. This is a slow film, with almost no dialogue, but this is a unique piece of authentic social anthropology. Of course it is also a nice coming of age portrait about the boy. The film was made in 1990, an the director is Karen Gevorkian.

The Hawaii International Film Festival (HIFF) starts October 15 (that’s today) and runs through October 25.  If you haven’t already bought tickets, check out the online program guide for details.  Some screenings have already sold out, or are selling fast!

Most screenings are at Dole Cannery, with additional venues in Waikiki, including Queens Beach, Hawaii Theatre Center, and Royal Hawaiian Theater.  You may want to check out the movie trailers posted on YouTube too.

If you’re a budding film aficionado, then you may want to participate in a few seminars too.  HIFF is a fantastic multi-cultural melding of Asian and Pacific films (feature-length, shorts, anime, documentaries, etc.).  They proactively involve local educators and students in educational programs, seminars, and workshops.  Film as art and creative expression is alive and well in Hawaii!

I’ve always wanted to volunteer at a film festival (namely, the Austin Film Festival when I was just a few years out of college), but work always got too busy.  The years have flown by since then!  I’m volunteering at the theater next week, plus helping out at two of the October 24 seminars.  It’s exciting to be involved for the first time, and I’m already looking forward to HIFF 2010.

Hope to see you there…

Είδος: Ρομαντική, Σκηνοθέτης: Ki-duk Kim

Ρούλα: Για όσους δεν την έχετε δει ακόμα, και αν είστε οπαδός του ασιατικού κινηματογράφου, τότε είναι μια από τις must-see-before-I-die movies.

Παύλος: Παίζω ακόμη στο repeat το soundtrack της ταινιας…αν μπορούσα θα έπαιζα και την ταινία την ίδια…σταθμός σε περίοδο της ζωής μου…

Πληροφορίες, Ταινία, Υπότιτλος

Finally found the almost 7 minute trailer of Wong Kar-Wai’s 2046.
If you watch this, you might not like the english narrator.
But don’t forget there are some scenes that didn’t make it into the film IE the Futuristic scenes with Faye and Tony.
Longer shot of the futuristic city of 2046 (aka Hong Kong)
And a longer scene with Tony Leung and Maggie Cheung.
Here is the link to the trailer from 2003.
Also check out these “lost scenes” photo on this blog site.

Our Japanese friends are continuing down the path of making me scratch my head and go, “What now?” This is another video for this uh movie. It’s still called RoboGeisha and I’m still just as horrified, yet intrigued as before.

       A few quick notes about this film, Stacy takes place in a Japan of the near future where all the girls aged 15-17 throughout the world begin to die and return as flesh eating zombies. As the girls approach their deaths the girls experience a period of overwhelming joy and bliss known as Near Death Happiness (NDH), and once they return from death their bodies attract a bluish powdery substance known as Butterfly Twinkle Powder (BTP). A Stacy can be killed by most standard zombie killing methods but it takes several hours for a Stacy to die if she’s not “Repeat Killed”; To repeat Kill a Stacy and end her existence at once, she must be hacked into 165 pieces. Under UN and Japanese law a Stacy may only be killed by her loved ones or killed by the Romero Repeat Kill Troops (a group of government soldiers who travel around taking care of Stacies who aren’t disposed of by their families or loved ones). A single undead girl zombie is called a “Stacy”, and the plural of a Stacy are called “Stacies”.

        This film begins with a group of young boys placing flower on a young girl named Kana (age 16) and asking when she’ll wake up, and when a lady stops by to thank Kana for watching her kids Kana awakens as a “Stacy” and begins to chow down on the kids. As all this is happening another cute schoolgirl who is holding a wind chime watches from a distance. Just as the police pull up and proceed to gun down Kana the scene switches to a television show where a mad scientist type explains to the audience about NDH and BTP. The interviewer tries to get the scientist to explain the cause of the Stacy condition and he tells the doctor that many people say that the UN and other experts have no idea what’s going on. We also find out that if you hack the Stacie up they’ll die after a few hours but if you perform a “repeat kill” and hack the bodies into 165 pieces they’ll die right away.  Soon, the interviewer and scientist get in a fight over whether the repeat kill method is moral or proper.

      Then the scene switches to a puppet shop that contains three guys and a woman who might be their mother or some other friend are watching television reports of the growing Stacy problem, and how the government might soon have to start drafting citizens because they’re not getting enough volunteers for the Romero squads. As the guys get ready to head off to work, the woman comments over and over that this is the apocalypse, and the apocalypse is here. Back at the Kana scene, one of the older soldiers comments on how in just 10 short years all the men in the world are gloomy and depressed because the only beautiful things left in the world are girls who are about to suffer NDH and become Stacies, and in those 10 short years the world population has been cut in half and dropping rapidly.

       Then we see the one of the men from the puppet shop walking down the street listening to a neighbor yell at a young man for disposing of Stacy trash on the wrong day and the guy going off on the woman calling her a bitch and saying “I just had to kill my girlfriend and I don’t care what day trash pickup is”. Also, people are grasping at straws tying to save their daughters, even resorting to using unproven drugs on their daughters to try and arrest puberty. Later, the man hears a wind chime and see the young girl from earlier looking at him, and when he turns his head to see if she’s looking at someone else she disappears.

       When the young man returns to the puppet shop where he works, he finds it empty and soon the girl from earlier enters his shop and starts talking with him. Her name is Eiko (written as eternity) and she’s going to become a Stacy in about a week and she’s chosen him to repeat kill her. She looks at his puppets and says they’re just like her wind chime, beautiful but sad. The man introduces himself to Eiko as Shibukawa, and Eiko decides to call him Shibu-san. Eiko says she can tell that because he makes puppets because he’s never comfortably with someone sleeping next to him so if he agrees to repeat kill her she’ll make sure he’s comfortable with her next to him.

      Then the scene switches to a television commercial advertising the Bruce Campbell Right Hand 2, a lighter, more efficient tool for taking care of your Stacy problems. Then we see the two other guys who were with Shibu-san (Matsui and Arita) at a recruiting office for one of the Romero squads, they don’t seem too sure of joining the group but they do so anyways. Matsui gets assigned to the medical team and Arita gets invited to become the female commander’s assistant.

         Then the scene switches to three cute girls (around age 16) who are wanted by the police for committing illegal repeat kills, it seems that they’re trying to earn enough money to be able to pay someone who’s cute and famous to repeat kill them when the time comes. They earn money by intercepting after hours calls to the official Romero squads and doing the jobs for money.

        As we see Matsui performing his duties with the medical disposal team (burning Stacies), and we find out that the last couple of soldiers assigned to this duty committed suicide, we see Arita performing more pleasurable duties for the commander. She asks him why he joined the Romero’s , he tells her that his only sibling (Kana) became a Stacy and killed some kids and had to be put down by the Romero’s. Upon hearing this, the commander starts laughing at him and Arita gets flashbacks of him and his sister and a girl (Momo) she sets him up with. A few months ago Arita and Momo became pen pals and more, and now we see that Momo is a Stacy being held for experimentation at the medical facility. When Arita matches a picture of Momo and her friends to a Stacy in the medical facility all he can to sit and hold his head.

        Then the scene switches back to Eiko and Shibu-san who’s putting on a puppet show just for Eiko that deals with love, loss, and reunion. When the play reaches the reunion part we can clearly see that there’s more to the play but he stops because Eiko very emotional over the reunion and wants it to end on a happy note.  We now switch to the group of Romero’s who had to kill Kana cleaning up another job and one of the soldiers snaps and threatens the others soldiers saying how can you kill these young girls. Just as violence is about to take place, Eiko shows up and thanks the Romero troops, she tells them that we love you, and we would like you to love us, and when Shibu-san shows up she wants him to hack her up like they would. The one soldier completely breaks down, and another one says so this is what NDH is like? Yes, Eiko tells them, because we’re not angry, we forgive you, and we want to be killed by the ones who love us the most. Then Eiko and Shibu-san are sitting in a park with Shibu-san writing a play based on Eiko words, when she asks about this, he tells her that since her name is written as eternity once he finishes this she really will live forever, as they’re walking away Shibu-san and Eiko’s steps are in sync.

        Back with Arita and Matsui we see that Matsui is working with the mad doctor from the TV show, and we also see that Matsui completely lost it, he says he’s in hell now, this is a living hell. The sick doctor has been able to tell that the Stacies do still have some brainwaves working, but the most interesting thing is the BTP. When the doctor begins to perform an experiment on a new Stacy with Arita’s assistance her vital signs and her BTP begins to react when she see a picture of Momo and Arita together. Her reaction also affect the other nearby Stacies, and it stops when the picture leaves her sight. As a Stacy that’s gotten free is about to get the doctor the commander steps in and kills her, the doctor tells Arita that the commander joined the Romero’s to kill girls who are younger and prettier than her, and the commander requests Arita’s services  after he’s done in the lab.

       The next morning Shibu-san wakes up next to Eiko, and he quietly watches her but becomes worried that she’s dead. Eiko soon wakes up to see a worried Shibu-san looking down at her and she asks him what’s the matter, and Shibu-san says he thought he lost her. Eiko looks up and smiles at him and asks Shibu-san to go shopping with her. When Eiko return to Shibu-san she’s carrying a wrapped box, he asks Eiko what’s in the box, and she says you shouldn’t make a girl tell, it’s a present, but she does spell out B-r-u-c-e. Eiko asks Shibu-san to take her to the nearby botanical garden and they head off together only to find the gardens closed.

      Back with the other groups, we see that the Romero Repeat Squad is on the trail of the three girl illegal repeat kill squad, and we also see that Matsui has totally lost it and is heading towards the Stacy holding room. He says that we’re just all puppets and god is the puppeteer, changing the girls into zombies to make us suffer. Matsui uses a pass key and unlocks the Stacies; they swarm him and eat him alive.

         The Stacies soon begin to overwhelm the military facility, Arita and the commander are trapped in her bedroom fighting off the Stacies, and at that very moment the three girls from the illegal repeat kill team arrive on the scene, it seems that they were hired by Momo’s parents to kill her because they feel sorry for their daughter. As the repeat kill team makes its way through the center the other survivors are cornered in a hallway, Arita and the commander leave to retrieve more ammo but she tries to runoff. Arita wants to help Momo so he fights with the commander and he shots her but he’s wounded in the process. In the hallway one soldier tells the other soldier (the brother of the commander) that he’s knows that the other guy loves his sister (the commander) but he really loves him, the brother says that he embarrassed but he grabs the other guy’s hand as the Stacies breach the barrier.

          Meanwhile, Arita hears Momo’s voice calling to him as a group of Stacies approach, one of the Stacies (Momo) begins to emit BTP when she see’s Arita. The commander is soon caught and eaten by the Stacies, and Arita grabs Momo’s hand and flees with her to the medical lab. Arita muzzles Momo and is about to runaway with her when the repeat kill squad catches them; they tell him to step aside but he refuses. One of the girls makes fun of him for trying to save a Stacy, and he tells her Stacy or not, she’s still Momo.  This causes some dissention in the repeat squad with one of the girls still wanting to kill Momo and another girl saying  why does it matter we’re all dead soon.

       Just as the group is about to kill Momo, the leader of the real Romero squad catches up with them and tells them to drop their weapons.  Next, the crazy doctor also steps in telling everyone to be quiet because they’re disturbing his important work, he’s almost got it. The illegal hit squad changes its mind and decides to protect Momo and Arita but are all mortality wounded by the leader of the real squad. When he asks Arita what the story with his Stacy, Arita hugs Momo tight and tells him that Momo is his lover and the leader shots both Arita and Momo down. The only remaining mortally wounded repeat kill squad girl says that she always wanted to be held that way when she was dying, and she takes her gun and shots the other leader.

      The wounded leader sits down and lights a smoke and tells the dead girls, the serial killer story he’s been speaking about throughout the whole movie, and one of the dead girls speaks to him in Eiko’s voice saying you did it, didn’t you? You must have been lonely? Did you love them, or did you want to love them? It’s OK, nobody blames you, and those girls probably loved you. Then all the dead girls tell him that they love him, and he goes insane, screaming and crying.

      At that moment, the doctor has managed to survive the carnage; he grabs some computer printouts and says that he now understands what brings the Stacies to life! It can’t be this, but it has to be true. The Stacies are brought back to life not because of a murderous intent but a craving for love, and they devour people because they crave their love. A few seconds later the Stacies break into the lab and eat the leader than they turn towards the doctor, and he tell them that he loves them, he calls them his lovers and his beloved daughters as they emit BTP before eating him alive. He dies laughing and seemingly in pleasure as they tear him apart.

        Back with Eiko and Shibu-san, we see that they have broken into the gardens and Eiko says they can stay until tomorrow, she says she used to come here with her twin sister (the girl who always wanted to be held at death), who was kind and beautiful, but no one noticed or understood her, she lived in a society where you couldn’t share your feelings or pain with someone. Eiko tells Shibu-san that he understands, he has to understand.  Shibu-san and Eiko dance in the garden then Shibu-san hugs Eiko and doesn’t want to let her go. A voiceover asks if society has intimated you (man), you need to tell them what you want, tell them how beautiful her soul is, Shibu-san is a missionary, and he needs to teach them to tell each other their true feelings. All this is going on as Shibu-san is finishing a sketch of Eiko, then the voice of Eiko’s dead sister and the other Stacies tell Eiko it’s OK to walk around the park until dawn because the loneliness has melted away.

      Then we see a glowing image of Eiko standing over the carnage in the medical lab where she leads the dead girls in saying that right now I’m at my prettiest, all the dead girls repeat this as tears flow from their eyes.

      The next morning in the garden, Shibu-san looks down at a dead but stunningly beautiful Eiko, Eiko has cried tears of blood that sharply contrast with the white gown she’s wearing. Shibu-san is finally able to read the inscription the Eiko placed on the paper strip attached to the bottom of her wind chime, it says “thank you, I’m sorry, I love you”, earlier Eiko told Shibu-san that she wrote her wish on that paper.

      Shibu-san carries Eiko out to the center of the park where he sits down and finishes penning in Eiko’s final words in the play he was working on. A few seconds later, Eiko begins to revive as a Stacy. Shibu-san opens Eiko’s gift, a Bruce Campbell right hand 2. Shibu-san tells Eiko that it was sad saying goodbye but they met again, he also tells Eiko “thank you, I’m sorry, and I love you”, and he keeps his promise to Eiko.

       Then decades later we get an epilogue from Shibu-san saying that in the many decades since the Stacies first appeared, the Stacies stopped chasing people, and men learned to love the Stacies. The first children born of their union were unlike any children ever born to humans, and he tells us that this was maybe the final stage of human evolution, they took over the world. Now there’s this bible that has his and Eiko’s story mixed together with the original puppet story, it’s a guide to the future, a story of love. We now see that Shibu-san is a very old man and that a statue of Eiko as a puppet sits in the park, and from one of her hands dangle a bronze wind chime with her wish to the world written on it. Shibu-san now says that the world is bound by love.  Well, that’s all for this movie.

On my blog I very seldom cover anything that’s not directly related to anime or anime culture. So with that being said, in this post I’ll be reviewing Stacy (2001), a Japanese schoolgirl zombie film where the social commentary packs more bite than schoolgirl zombies do.

      Stacy is a Japanese horror film that was originally release back in 2001, it was directed by Naoyuki Tomomatsu (a Japanese AV film director who is known for having a stormy affair with one of his AV actresses who just happened to still be in high school at the time), and Stacy is based on a novel written by Kenji Otsuki (a former member of the band Kinniku Shojotai). Horror and science fiction films have always been known for taking shots at the problems and conditions in mainstream society that normal, more traditional media have been afraid to address or discuss. Examples of this are Night of the Living Dead (1968, racism), Dawn of the Dead (1978, consumerism), Them (1954, problems with atomic testing), Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956, fear of Red influence in the US), and now I’ll add Stacy to this list as a movie taking a shot at the whole Otaku mindset of Moe and all it implies.

       When I first watched this film back in late 2001, the copy of the film I saw was of very poor quality and had a poor fan translation, but I was quite shocked at the brutal attack this film launched at the part of Japanese male culture that began to value and desire the image of pure innocence schoolgirls over the reality of actually trying to meet/talk with/date/ love the real thing.

       What actually cemented this evaluation in my mind was when I read the liner notes to the 20003 DVD release of Stacy, they were written by Patrick Macias where he directly introduced the idea that the director was taking a shot at the whole concept of Moe and its followers. 

So, here we go with the review of Stacy.

           Stacy is set in a Japan of the near future where about 10 years prior to the start of the film all girls between the ages of 15-17 started suffering from a condition called Near Death Happiness (NDH), when a girl comes down with NDH she experiences overwhelming happiness and bliss that lasts for a period of up to one week. Once a girl reaches the peak of NDH, she quietly dies, and then after a short period of time she reawakens as a zombie (a Stacy) that craves the flesh of the nearest living creatures. Stacies like most other zombies in this type of genre can be killed by normal zombie slaying methods, but in order to dispatch a Stacy right away you must chop/slice/dice/shoot the poor girl into 165 pieces.

       Needless to say, the events in Stacy have caused a sense of depression and impending doom to spread throughout the population. One character in the film expresses the thought that there’s no joy left in the world because the most beautiful things in life are about to die and become flesh eating zombies. The world population has already dropped by 50% in just 10 years due to falling birthrates and the killings caused by the Stacies. The Stacy problem has grown so large that military squads have been formed just to deal with the Stacies, and under Japanese and UN law a Stacy may only be killed by her loved ones (her family or lover) or the military squads.

        While the special effects, cinematography, writing, and acting in Stacy maybe over the top, and extremely campy this film contains real social criticism of otaku/Moe culture. Moe and Moe culture as described by Patrick Macias is, “an obsessive love and devotion to imaginary characters and ideals that do not, and could not, ever possibly exist……fresh-faced sailor-suited school girls are merrily prancing through the streets. You want to talk to them, proclaim your undying love to them. But largely owing to the fact that you’ve become more accustomed to dealing with anime characters of late, you can’t do anything but stare”   So, Stacy is the nightmare tale of how young women who are entering sexual maturity are perceived by a certain segment of the Japanese male population, and while Stacy is a gory, nilelistic, and depressing it does offer a hopeful path to the future through the relationships of Eiko/Shibukawa & Arita/Momo.

       While most of the primary and secondary characters’ lives and stories are interlinked in one way or another the main thread is how Shibu-san (a man with mildly antisocial traits) learns to fall in love and accept the companionship of Eiko (a teenage girl entering the NDH phase of becoming a Stacy). The Shibu-san character in Stacy is a stand-in for male otaku society, a man who will socialize with other people, but, prefers the company of, and feels most comfortable in the presence of his puppets.  Eiko represents all young Japanese girls who are leaving their childhoods behind and are becoming young women who desire love, companionship, and sex.

         One might ask, “Where did the Stacies come from, or what’s causing the Stacy problem?” The Stacies are creatures that only exist in the mind of the otaku, and they’re born as a self-protection mechanism that only reinforces the okatu’s unnatural fear of rapidly maturing girls. Many times in the film the young girls express the thought that they’re becoming their prettiest as they approach the NDH phase of life, and at this point the young girls are shown expressing the desire to have boyfriends, be held, and be told that someone loves them. While these girls are leaving behind their childhood and beginning to feel the joy in their newly approaching womanhood, this is viewed by the male as NDH and the harbinger of doom for the girls. At moment when the girls switch over from the cherished innocent schoolgirl that the male watches from afar to a maturing young woman is the point where the girl dies in the males mind and awakens as a flesh craving Stacy.

        The males in the film see the girls in NDH as a source of infinite sadness while the girls experience the condition as joyful. There’s a point in the film where Eiko comes upon a Stacy killing squad where many of the members are experiencing a almost PTSD reaction over their latest dispatch of a Stacy and she merrily prances around the group laughing and chatting away with them, and when one of the soldiers asks her if this is what NDH is like? Eiko responds with yes, we’re not angry (her and the Stacies), we’re happy, we love you, and we know that you really love us too or want to love us. Eiko answer confirms to the viewer that while a Stacy wants to love, and craves love, the males view the Stacies as horrible monsters. The reactions of the males to the Stacies is quite similar to the reaction that General Jack D. Ripper from Dr. Strangelove has towards  a woman’s sexuality, he feels that women are trying to rob him of his life essence, so he views women as life sucking monsters, OPE, POE.

       There’s at least two points in the film where the director takes shots at the otaku habit of collecting and cherishing statues/figurines more than the real deal. The funniest one is when a television infomercial crew is pitching the Bruce Campbell Right Hand 2 chainsaw and one of the additional special bonus items is a free special edition figurine of the pitch girl holding the chainsaw and one of the pitch guys says that he’ll just take the figurine and the pitch girl gives him a dirty look that basically says you’d rather have the figurine over the real deal that’s standing next to you. The other shot the director takes at the figure culture is when Eiko sees Shibu-san’s puppets and makes the comment that she can tell that he’s more comfortable around the puppets than real people. Eiko then goes on to comment that she can tell that Shibu-san has never been comfortable with the thought of having someone (real) sleeping next to him.

        While all this discussion of doom and gloom might discourage you from watching the film, don’t be totally depressed, the film does end on some hopeful notes. The film does show the males the way out of their self-created nightmare world. Firstly, Arita seemed to have cracked the riddle of the Stacies, when Arita first saw Momo as a Stacy he was repulsed by her appearance and Momo acted like a normal flesh eating zombie, but when Arita comes to the conclusion that he still loves and cherishes her, Momo is drawn to Arita and her TWP reacts to his love, it seems that Arita’s love for her has quelled her flesh craving. Arita also shows his love for Momo when he chooses to stand in the way of the military officer who wants to shoot her, he tells the officer that he doesn’t care if she’s a Stacy, she’s still Momo and he’s her lover, Arita and Momo die together in each other’s arms under a shower of bullets. A dying girl who’s in her NDH phase (Eiko’s sister) witnesses the couples’ death and comments that she always wished she could be held like that, in a lovers’ arms.

      Also, males are shown the path out of the darkness by the relationship that Eiko and Shibu-san develops. Both Eiko and Shibu-san have needs that can only be filled by developing a relationship with each other, Eiko who’s in her NDH phase needs Shibu-san to love her, she needs to be repeat killed by a lover when she becomes a Stacy.  Shibu-san as Eiko can recognize is more comfortable with puppets and he needs to learn to how love and enjoy real human contact with a woman. So, Eiko makes a deal with Shibu-san by getting him to agree that she’ll make him comfortable with having another human sleep next to him and he’ll do her the honor of being the loved one that’ll repeat kill her, thus begins their dance of life, love, death.  At first, Shibu-san is put off and somewhat perplexed by the strange creature that’s now filling his life, and as Shibu-san begins to listen to Eiko’s hopes, dreams, feelings and joins her in conversation he gradually loses his fear of her. At this point Shibu-san still views Eiko as a creature beyond his reach, he’s always several steps behind her, more like an observer of a rare object than her lover. But, as times passes, Shibu-san and Eiko spend more and more time together and a strange thing happens Shibu-san is soon walking next to and in step Eiko. By the next morning we see that Eiko has kept her promise to Shibu-san, he awakens next a sleeping Eiko and she’s no longer an object of mystery but a beautiful young woman that he touches and caresses and doesn’t want to lose. Eiko in her short stay with Shibu-san has taught him that while human contact might be scary and uncertain it’s much better than being surrounded by puppets.

       While things might be looking up for Shibu-san we can see that this isn’t going to end well, Eiko kept her promise to Shibu-san, and he’s going to have to keep his promise to her. But, this wasn’t a simple love story of boy meets girl, Eiko chose Shibu-san because he’s a puppeteer, a storyteller, she acts as Gabriel to Shibu-san’s Muhammad, she came to teach Shibu-san how man and the Stacies can coexist and save the future. She asks Shibu-san and society as a whole what happened to create this perverse system, has society intimated man? The answer is simple, tell them how beautiful their souls are, and tell them how you feel, tell them what you want, tell them that you want to love them, because they want to love and be loved. After Shibu-san keeps his promise to Eiko we see that he’s spread to word, man’s learned to love the Stacies, and the Stacies no longer chow down on people. The children born to the union of men and Stacies now are the dominate population; the circle of life goes on.

         The main message in this film is when you see the real thing sitting there by herself don’t just stare and run back to your room and frap to the latest Moe anime, get some courage up and walk over and say hello, chat with her for awhile, because Stacies may be scary but they want to love, and be loved too.

Save the future by loving a Stacy.

Katherine Jackson, mother of the late king of pop Michael Jackson, and Ai-tsao, the protagonist in the Taiwanese film Artemisia may be from worlds apart. And yet they are not so dissimilar.

Last week, I watched the film Artemisia on Link TV. (Watch it online at www.linktv.org). It is the first fictional film by young Taiwanese director Chiang Hsiu-chiung. The story centers around motherhood and changing values among different generations.

Ai-tsao is a woman who is trapped in the middle of her family dynamics. On the one hand, she has to handle her aged mother who has stereotyped and difficult attitudes towards people, especially those who are different from her. And on the other hand, she has to deal with the sexuality and life choices of her young adult children which are very alien to her.

The film "Artemisia" highlights the hidden strength of motherhood.

Taiwanese opera star and actress Pan Li Li is superb in the role of Ai-tsao. She creates a sympathetic, subtle character without resorting to histrionics. On the whole, Artemisia is a also a movie that is not glossed up. It is an unhurried film with a realistic feel and is quite a pleasure to watch.

In an interview screened after the movie, Chiang explains why she chose the title “Artemisia”. She explains that artemisia is a medicinal herb common to Taiwan, and in Latin, the word also has a maternal meaning. “The herb is very much like most traditional mothers in Taiwan. Ordinary yet very potent,” she says.

This description reminded me of Katherine Jackson, Many close to the family says that she was a rock in Michael Jackson’s life. If you followed the alleged molestation trial against Michael in 2005, you would see her arriving every day. On some days, she walked slowly, probably due to some problems with her leg. But there she was: this quiet, stoic woman, to offer support to her son.

Michael’s famous lawyer at the trial, Mesereau, talked about this in a report in the Los Angeles Times on June 30: “She would tell him that the truth would prevail, that God would help him. She just kept him strong,” defense lawyer Thomas A. Mesereau Jr. recalled. “She never missed a single day of testimony, and it was a five-month trial.”

In the wake of the tragic passing of her son, she had quietly stepped in again and took care of her grandchildren and her son’s estate. A Superior Court judge appointed her special administrator of her son’s estate, and also granted her temporary custody of Michael’s three children.

There is a scene towards the end of the film where Ai-tsao displays this kind of quiet, primal courage. And as a character in the film describes it: she’s like a wolf with a samurai sword.

Katherine Jackson was the rock in Michael Jackson's life. Pic shows her at the 2005 trial with son Jermaine.

It feels rather unusual to review a coming of age film from Malaysia, but this film from 2007 was no disappointment. This is a great Asian film about two boys, Li Ahn and Li Ohm. Throughout the film the main focus is on the lives of the two brothers, when they are in school, meeting new friends and so on. It took a while before I realised that they actually lived with their father, who mostly is at work and just come home to sleep what it seems. The boys have to manage themselves pretty much, even though they´re a bit too young for that. However later on in the film we´ll follow some new development of the relationship with their absent father.

* Country: Malaysia

* Release: 2007

* Director: Liew Seng Tat

* Actors:  Zi Jiang Wong (Li Ohm), Ming Wei Lim (Li Ahn)

* Award: Tiger Award, Rotterdam International Film Festival (2008)

This review would not have been possible without the valuable support of CVMC. I would like to thank them for supporting my blog by providing the DVD of  “Flowers in the pocket” .

Check out lots of other coming of age films at cvmc.net, the oldest movie rental service on the internet – since 1998. Specializing in hard to find & rare films from around the world!

Photo: ***** (excellent)

Acting: ***(good)

Story: ***(good)

Soundtrack: **(below average)

Total: ****(very good)

Director: Peter Chan (2002)

Lanuage: Chinese w/ English subtitles

This movie is the 3rd short film on the DVD “Three Extremes … II,” a follow-up to the Japanese DVD “Three Extremes.” I’ve read some poor reviews of the second DVD, mostly complaining that the follow-up films aren’t really “extreme” like in the first.

It’s true that the films aren’t as horrific or gory as the original “Three Extremes,” but that doesn’t make them any less watchable. (By the way, Netflix reviews aren’t very helpful, IMHO. I’ve seen people give 1 star to a great movie solely because it was subtitled and not in English. Everyone’s got their own criteria for what makes a good or bad film; you may think that my reviews are BS. But I watch so many horror films, that I totally need to start writing them down because I sometimes forget if I’ve seen one

All three films on this DVD are good, but the standout is “Going Home,” a Chinese-language film by Peter Chan. I could say that I wish it were longer, but the length was completely appropriate to the story (that’s a novel idea in filmmaking, isn’t it?) With such standout, lush cinematography, great acting, and such a visceral soundtrack (and in some pivotal scenes, lack of a soundtrack, which I’ll talk about a lot in later posts), who wouldn’t want this film to go on and on?

“Going Home” is about a man who is keeping his dead wife alive, bathing her everyday, doing her hair, talking to her; all in the belief that very soon, she will resurrect. It’s a love story, obviously, but also about Western vs. traditional medicine; belief systems; and connections that transcend not just life, but physical form.

An amazing story right there. Add to it a boy who goes missing, a mysterious toddler girl with the most striking pale face and bright red coat, and a cop (the boy’s father) being held against his will in the man’s apartment and you’ve got a really great way to spend 90 or so minutes.Watch till the end and keep your bathroom breaks to a minimum. There’s a twist at the end that will completely fuck with your head and fall totally in love with this film.

What I really love about this film (and actually about so many foreign films), is the peek into other cultures that I get. The Western civilations’ way of dealing with death is in such contrast to most Eastern civilations; it’s fascinating to watch it played out in such an authentic way. Ghosts; resurrection; possession — all these things are a given in most Eastern cultures. In Western cultures, they are mocked and ridiculed. That basic difference is the major reason, for me, that Asian horror is much more interesting to watch. You don’t have to get past the first 45 minutes of “how can this be? ghosts aren’t real!” kind of crap that weighs down even the best Western horror films.

Eric Tsang plays Wai, the man caring for his wife, steals every scene he is in. Though is appeareance is very much the serial killer stereotype for American films, he is gentle and kind to the policeman he holds captive. His tenderness with his dead wife is truly heartbreaking and I couldn’t help but feel such sympathy and empathy for his character. I wanted her to resurrect. I wanted him to have his wife returned to him, despite the complete and utter creepiness of his daily ritual of bathing her and immersing her in Chinese herbs.

Eugenia Yuan plays the wife, Hai’er, and although she has very little “acting” screen time, the time she does have really shines. The video-tapes scenes of her blew me away.

There are a few little holes here and there but nothing to detract from the visual and emotional intensity that’s pulled off with just a few actors and a couple of sets. I highly recommend rentin the “Three Extremes … II” DVD and skipping right to “Going Home.” I watched that short four times while it was here at the house, and I’ll probably buy it.

No rating system for these reviews yet, but I usually rate a movie on whether or not I should shut my laptop while I’m watching it.

During “Going Home,” the laptop was shut off and put away.

A magnificently crafted hybrid of Chinese historical epic, F/X enhanced martial arts spectacular, mystical romantic tragedy and live-action anime, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is a film that defies genre while embracing traditionalism. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon takes place in 19th century China. Li Mu Bai (Chow Yun Fat) is prepared to retire from the lifestyle to settle down. He gives his mystical sword, Green Destiny, to his partner in arms Shu Lien (Michelle Yeoh) to entrust to a nobleman. Soon after, Green Destiny is stolen by a young thief. It turns out the thief is mentored by none other than Jade Fox, a legendary thief who murdered Li Mu Bai’s master and stole his training manual.

The fight scenes in this movie are really something to see.  As if exempt from gravity, the combatants propel themselves across rooftops with nothing more than the slight touch of their toes. They run up walls, spin in the air and exchange an astonishing array of kicks and blows so rapid as to almost become a blur. It’s Peter Pan meets Jet Li, with an underlying sense of the metaphysical. Li Mu Bai, the embodiment of the Wuxia ideal, naturally wants revenge upon Jade Fox for her crimes against his master and his school; more than this, though, he wishes to take Jen as disciple to be Wudan’s first female student – largely because without Wudan discipline she will surely become a villain far worse than her mistress.
 

And yet while a single shot can be so marvellous as to make your jaw go down and your eyebrows go up, often director Ang Lee will linger on them too long. Suddenly the beautiful can seem to be the very silly indeed. If you can allow yourself to get sucked into the fantasy world then this is a film you have to see it – it’s a reaffirmation of spectacle and the beauty of cinematography. The action begins, ironically, with no action at all, just the emotions that play on the faces of two lovers who have never acted on their feelings.

Crouching Tiger is not just about fighting and revenge, but also of redemption and love.  The actors are well cast, and director Ang Lee coaxes great performances from most of them. As Li Mu Bai and Shu Lien, Chow and Yeoh smolder with their characters’ repressed passions. The actors incorporate the spirit of swordplay in their performances and alternate between slow, taut exchanges and lightning flashes of intense emotion.  Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is a native language masterpiece for the remarkably versatile director Ang Lee.

Believe it or not, Bruce Lee sadly died before this film could be completed. But with the help of a willing crew and a stunt double, Game of Death was finished. Ironically, even though Bruce Lee isn’t featured throughout the entire film, it ranks up as one of my favorite Lee movies of all time. After Way of the Dragon, Bruce Lee began filming the ending battle sequence for a film he planned to call Game of Death. But Hollywood came calling so Lee shut down production on the film to begin Robert Clouse’s Enter the Dragon instead. In the film, Bruce Lee (though it’s mainly Korean actor Kim Tai-Jung) plays Billy Lo, a sensational martial artist on the verge of superstardom in the Hong Kong film industry. Billy’s got it all: fame, money, and a fine girlfriend. But, all is not as peachy as it seems.

Because of his up and coming fame, he is hounded by a syndicate attempting to sign and exploit potential stars. When the syndicate drags Lo’s girlfriend Ann into the conflict, Lo is forced to fake his own death in order to buy him enough time to find and shut down the syndicate and reclaim his life and that of his girlfriend. Overall, the film’s staging is pretty bad, and it’s horribly obvious they’re using a double for Bruce. I don’t think the film’s a wash though, because the stuff with the real Bruce really shines. You see, it is the last half hour of the film that is one of the best scene in martial art movie history.

The way to enjoy Game of Death is to realize that the movies plot is crafted entirely to drive the story to the final showdown in the tower against NBA Legend Kareem Abdul Jabbar. The last half-hour is where Bruce is shown uncut, beating down on all the bad guys in the film one-by-one. The final scene showcases all of Lee’s amazing talents, from his weapon style to his grappling ability. Game of Death is still the last real movie to showcase the charismatic presence of the legendary Bruce Lee. As a story, Game of Death is not especially good, or even thrilling. But the fight scenes are, occasionally, pretty spectacular.

Even though the stand-ins and extras were sub-par, the work done to flesh out thirty minutes of actual Bruce Lee footage into a full movie was interesting and rather ingenious. Instead of filming a separate scene for Lo’s funeral, they used actual footage of Bruce Lee’s real life funeral for the scene. Lee’s death was indeed a tragedy, and the talent that was lost is irreplacable. Using his own specially crafted style of karate called Jeet Kune Do, Lee changed the face of martial arts films for the better and is responsible single-handedly for the rise of other famous martial artists.  Without Lee, and films like Game of Death, Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung, and the iconic Chuck Norris would not be around today. Game of Death is a great testimonial film to one of the legends and this film deserves to be remembered.

It is interesting to note that in the film Iron Monkey, no one actually dies, although much pain is inflicted. It’s also a PG-13 movie that pushes the limits of blood acceptable in a film not rated R. This is a kung-fu flick, with amazing bits of fighting, of course, but it also kicks ass in that figurative sense: it’s fast and funny and elegant; it has a mythic sweep and a breezy, sophisticated graphic-novel sensibility, with its antiauthoritarian hero who can be the rebel while still claiming the moral high ground because the authorities around him are all immoral jerks who so richly deserve the comeuppance they’re about to get.

Yuen Wo Ping’s dazzling, gravity-defying kung fu choreography in Iron Monkey may look familiar to anyone high on the action he staged in The Matrix. Iron Monkey delivers a simple and satisfying good vs. evil buddy story with mind-blowing action sequences and what may be the best villain entrance ever. For moviegoers already familiar with Hong Kong martial arts movies, you should know what to expect and you should find yourselves right at home with this flick.

Although the fights are performed with great technical proficiency, they are quite repetitious. Still, they are the best parts of the movie. The rest is slapstick that is overacted with a vengeance. On their own, the characters are kind of endearing, but the minimal plot gives them little to do but leap about.

In a city where poor, desperate peasants are taken advantage of by greedy merchants and corrupt bureaucrats, the Iron Monkey swoops around by night, playing Robin Hood, ensuring that the people have enough to eat and their masters get smacked on the nose. For the cherry on top, it’s got a kid fighting a refrigerator-sized grownup. How could anyone not love Iron Monkey? Slight Recommendation.

Welcome to a double feature special here at Japan Cinema.  Today we wrap up Chan Park Wook’s Revenge Trilogy. Oldboy, the other film in the trilogy was reviewed last month which can be viewed here. For those keeping track, this trilogy is NOT reviewed in order (#1 – Mr, #2 – Oldboy, #3 Lady), and obviously, they don’t have to be viewed in order.

Sent to prison for 13 years for her part in the kidnapping of a child, 19 year old Lee Geum-Ja discovers that her accomplice Mr. Baek is actually responsible for her incarceration and has betrayed her.  Unlike Oh Dae-su’s torturous, unjust imprisonment in Oldboy, Geum-ja’s time in jail is not only partially justified but also a fruitful time full of social networking for the vengeful woman. By the time Geum-ja is released at the beginning of the film, she already has amassed so many friends and favors from fellow inmates in prison that there is very little actual legwork to do in the matter of extracting her revenge.

It is no secret Oldboy is my favorite movie of all time so I won’t knock any of these films in comparison because that wouldn’t be fair, but this film doesn’t even attempt to make Sympathy for Lady Vengeance its equal in terms of outlandish style and impact. This film is less about revenge for revenge’s sake and more about the possibility of salvation or redemption, and whether after such acts of brutality it can ever truly be attained.

Hate and revenge – the uglier aspects of of human nature – are Parks’ bread and butter so there should be no surprises that when Geum-Ja goes about exacting her revenge. Park delivers the goods in thrilling, comically amoral fashion. In this manner, Park has fashioned a rare revenge melodrama, playing the traditional female emotions of guilt and remorse for breaking up her family off the male-oriented revenge genre film. While the female focus is refreshing, what is not are the clichéd notions of what a woman is fighting for, what draws out the bloodlust in a normal female. The details of the plot are tried, clichéd, and outdated. Otherwise, this is a intelligent, unsettling film, and Park deserves much credit for not simply repeating himself.

Ryu’s a young man who has had a rough life so far. Not only is he deaf and mute, but also his beloved sister lies on her deathbed desperately in need of a kidney transplant. In desperation, Ryu gives every penny he has to a gang of underground organ-dealers. But when they rip him off and a legitimate kidney becomes available at the hospital, Ryu and his political activist girlfriend Cha Yeong-mi (Du-na Bae) are forced to find the money elsewhere. Ryu doesn’t have the cash but he does have an idea – he and his friend decide to kidnap his boss’ daughter and hold her for ransom. Ryu and his pal execute their plan and abduct the girl and it looks like things are going pretty smoothly at first as her old man has no problem whatsoever ponying up the cash to get her back. They release her, but for reasons that shouldn’t be explained here for fear of spoiling the film, she doesn’t wind up back in his possession immediately and because of this, he ends up going on the warpath to track down and take care of the kidnapping duo.

The film turns into a spiral of revenge, leading to an inevitable climax. Along the way Chan Park Wook presents images alternately beautiful and stomach-turning, it’s hard to watch this film and not be impressed by the directors stunning eye. Some scenes have an almost hypnotic calm to them, and Park will sometimes cut away to a long shot while the most graphic violence is happening before switching to a close-up for the gruesome aftermath. In many ways Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance is an exercise in shock, but it’s not without heart.

It should also be mentioned that because the film moves so slowly at times, the final half hour is all the more intense because when Park hits you over the head with some of the tricks he pulls in this film, you really don’t see it coming and feel it all the more. There are a couple of truly cringe-worthy moments in this film that, if you haven’t seen it before, come right out of left field and sucker punch you when you least expect it – and it’s a great feeling when that happens. Although I have said it before, I will say it once more, nothing touches Oldboy.  However, this film is as disturbing and exhilarating a piece of filmmaking as you’ll see for some time. As far as trilogies are concerned, this ranks up there with Star Wars and the Matrix Trilogy.  Next time you find yourself in a move marathon, watch these 3 films and you will experience the ultimate rollercoaster ride. Recommended.

I’m just going to put it out there….I’m a black woman living in the United States who loves Asian film.  While I can’t approach the encyclopedic knowledge of my Hong Kong film big brothers Kozo and Sanjuro at Love HK Film (much love to the masters!), I do know a little something.  I’m not who people think of as the typical fan of Asian film, but I know that the actual audience for Asian film goes beyond the guys and includes all colors.  This is a space for anyone wanting to discuss Hong Kong, Korean and Japanese film, especially those of us living in the United States.  It’s  a little different for us. We can’t just go down the street to catch the newest John Woo film, so we are never on the cutting edge. Instead, we live in the land of Hollywood, and while I love the big summer blockbuster film, I also love my Asian film, which just isn’t as available.  But, armed with a region-free DVD player, we do ok.  This is a place for us (and every other fan of Asian film ) to do what we love to do:  talk about Asian film!.     So let’s talk!

Next week, this film gets its high def treatment for the first time by hitting the shelves on blu-ray format.  Ichi the Killer solidified Takashi Miike‘s status as the go-to guy for Japan Cinema that relies on stylistic violence, gore, and over-the-top yakuza stereotypes.  For a long time, I had heard about what a terrifically screwed up movie it was, but I had never had the opportunity to see for myself. More importantly, though, I knew after seeing it that I would be doing a review about it on this blog.  Even by Miike’s standards of excess, ‘Ichi the Killer’ is not for the faint-hearted, with its frequent scenes of torture, dismemberment, rape and body horror.

The story of Ichi the Killer revolves around the Anjo Gang. It seems that Boss Anjo, who was last seen entering a hotel room for some “alone time” with one of his girls, has turned up missing. Not only that, but 300 million yen is missing with him. The other yakuza in the syndicate just assume he stole the money and ran off with the girl.  Ichi then enters, who is a fragile-minded guy a charcter named Jijii has been using as a hitman. He’s no normal hitman, however, and has to be carefully manipulated into doing anything. Jijii managed to plant false memories in Ichi’s head through hypnosis convincing him that he was bullied throughout high school and the only girl who ever protected him was gang-raped right in front of him while he just stood there powerless to do anything about it.  I guess you can see where this is going.  The two sides of the coin link up and alot of violence and torture insue.  Horray!

Yet tempting as it is to dismiss the film as little more than a stylish compendium of ultraviolent sensationalism made with Miike’s characteristic verve, this would be to ignore the film’s high level of sophistication and the incredible intellectual demands which it makes on viewers. It would have been really easy for most actors, upon reading the script for Ichi the Killer, to decide to play Kakihara with campy exuberance. Surely a sadomasochistic yakuza hitman who dresses like The Joker from Batman would be pretty excitable. Asano is not most actors, however, and plays the role with a scarily calm demeanor.

Unlike Kakihara, the role of Ichi had to be played over the top, and Nao Omori was up to the task. This film is a slick, fast-paced yakuza flick with a heavy dose of the absurd and a heavier dose of the grotesque. It is a furious, frantic and at times very funny piece of bravura filmmaking. Sure you’ll go in anticipating the violence but there really is more to it then that.  I’ll let you be the deciding factor to judge that, all I can do is give this film a thumbs up. Recommended.

A Tale of Two Sisters follows the return to society of sisters Su-mi and Su-yeon after a spell in a mental institution. Arriving home in the countryside the sisters are devoid of any warmth toward their father, and are slightly less than outright hostile to their stepmother. One night Su-mi has a terrifying dream, while something enters Su-yeon’s room and pulls off her bed cover. Both girls and their step-mother are affected by the house’s atmosphere, with only the father seemingly unaffected. What is causing the strange occurrences and visions? Is the house haunted? Why do the girls hate their step-mother so much?

Unfortunately, I can’t possibly go into any more plot details as it would spoil the film badly. Again, I put the spotlight on a Korean film, but I must admit I am not a big fan of horror movies to begin with because asian horror cinema has succumbed to plenty of cliche’s over the years. K-Horror, of course, is the not so imaginative equivalent of J-Horror. For fans of the Japanese horror scene, certain elements of the film may feel familiar, especially with the infrequent appearance of an Onryo – in Japan, the manifestation of a vengeful spirit, usually female, that was, of course, so iconically captured in The Ring, Dark Water, The Grudge, and others.

Suffice to say, there’s a twist in the tail. In fact, there are several, which is why I would suggest reserving any real judgement or momentary criticisms of proceedings until the very end. Instead of giving away important plot details, I will say instead that this movie has solid acting all the way around.  Having said all of that, there are a few minor criticisms that could be made. Firstly, the film is slow. I have no problem whatsoever with slow films, and didn’t object in the least, but I can imagine that some people would find it takes too long to build up steam.

As I stated before, I am not a fan of horror movies. Not because I hate being scared, but because there are very few movies that can actually put me on the edge of my seat. I don’t want this to come across as a negative review (this blog only focuses on movies I enjoy) as this is a very well crafted, cleverly constructed and entertainingly spooky film. If, like me, you found JU-ON a real disappointment after all the fanfare surrounding it, I think it’s safe to say that not only will you not feel let down by A Tale of Two Sisters, you might just love it. Slight Recommendation.

Seibei Iguchi (Hiroyuki Sanada) is a samurai of the lowest rank. His income is miserable and he has to take care of his two daughters, as well as for his senile mother. The death of his wife deprived him of his only savings, but Iguchi gets hope and pleasure out of the fact that he can watch his two daughters grow up. Director  Yoji Yamada seemingly comes out of the blue and creates a fantastic modern samurai flick.

Despite being a lowly-ranked samurai, life is adequately comfortable, in an era of change and the coming of the end of the Meiji era. His life takes a turn when childhood sweetheart, and recent divorcee Tomoe Iinuma, re-enters his life. Protecting her from her violent ex-husband, love is rekindled between the two again, but Seibei, conscious of his low ranking status, is reluctant to declare his true feelings for Tomoe.

If you’re expecting to see many swordplay from the Twilight Samurai, you might be a tad disappointed. There are only 2 fight scenes in this film, one with Seibei using a wooden sword to teach Tomoe’s ex-husband a lesson, and the other, a fight to the death with a clan rebel in the confines of an old house. The violence, while still dished out in sharp bursts, has a very real quality typically ignored by big budget martial arts productions: a perfect illustration of which has Seibei, towards the end of the movie, step over the body of a slain samurai assassin who is now frozen in rigor mortis and covered in flies. Somehow, by infusing the film with such ‘realism’ the story gets anchored and becomes more authentic.

Although the movie easily could have run the risk to be slow-paced or even tedious with its running time of 129 minutes, the director succeeds in telling this extraordinary tale by pinpointing the essence of what he wants to say through the life of the characters. “The Twilight Samurai” isn’t only Iguchi’s nickname, but also describes the era in which he is living. The world is facing a new dawn, a world in which samurai serve no purpose anymore and don’t have any right of existence. It is beautifully filmed, and is no wonder that it was was recognized with many awards in Japan’s Academy Awards in 2004. This is a simple and yet very complex masterpiece of a drama, that you shouldn’t miss. Recommended.

I must admit, I am not a big Zhang Yimou fan.  His previous effort ‘Hero‘ really ‘wowed’ me but I went in thinking this was going to be, at best, another ‘Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon‘ knock-off.  I came away from the film very impressed and it captured by big screen love of asian films.

House of Flying Daggers is an incredibly beautiful film. There is a dancing game that involves hitting a circle of drums with overlong sleeves, there’s a fight in a field of wild flowers, and of course, there is the inescapable crossing of swords while flitting around a bamboo forest. Admittedly, I was not quite as captivated by the film’s narrative as I was by its visuals. House of Flying Daggers deals with the fairly standard themes of its genre – loyalty, honor, courage and romantic betrayal.

For the most part, the film is simply entrancing, and the story is very easy to get caught up in. As the tale of a blind rebel princess on the run with a double agent, the film is a resounding, heartfelt success. Takeshi Zang is remarkably charismatic, in the way that only really big stars usually seem to manage, and Ziyi Zang is as always, stunning.

Finally, it becomes clear that all Zhang Yimou really wants to do is stage beautiful death scenes. “Hero” had more than I could count, and he doesn’t hold back here, either. Too bad it all feels generic. It’s impossible to shake the feeling that Zhang Yimou desperately wishes he, not Ang Lee, had made “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.” Unfortunately, his narrative doesn’t have any of that movie’s zing. If things couldn’t get any worse, the transfer on the Blu-ray release is subpar, though the soundtrack is excellent. Even with all those mishaps, you could be doing a lot worse if you veiwed this piece of cinema. The action is light-years beyond any of the other Asian cinema we’ve been gifted with in recent years, and the cinematography and set pieces every bit as beautiful. House of Flying Daggers is lush and tragic, without becoming completely goofy and overwrought. Slight Recommendation.

If you’re fan of both westerns and samurai films, then you’re probably well aware that the two genres have a history of influencing each other. A taciturn stranger who’s good with a weapon comes to a lawless rural town that serves as the battleground for two avaricious warring clans. His services are courted by both sides, but he remains a wild card and ends up taking down both gangs for his own purposes.

One of the four films that bizarre genius Takashi Miike directed in 2007,Miike’s made a movie that’s almost completely about the movies, to the point that the film happily smashes through the fourth wall to acknowledge us as we watch it. Just in case the line hasn’t been crossed enough by playing out a medieval Japanese story with American western tropes, Miike really goes nuts by having Quentin Tarantino appear in the film. There’s even a bullet-curving scene that nails that perfect collision of cool and ridiculous that Wanted whiffed by a country mile. There’s plenty of silly to go around, and the falseness could get grating if Miike wasn’t so keen to let us in on the joke.

Now I don’t always think it’s fair to criticize a foreign film for having non-English actors stumble through English dialogue, but in this case, it was clearly a stylistic decision by Miike and I think it was probably a mistake. It is very hard to follow what is being said because many of the actors are simply speaking phonetically (even Miike himself doesn’t speak English), and although it is initially amusing, it really starts to drive you nuts after a while. It also doesn’t help that the dialogue itself is somewhat nonsensical at times, but thankfully there are English subtitles. For me, the one redeeming aspect of this movie was the visuals. The oversaturated flashbacks have a really vibrant look to them, and the highlighted reds pop within the rest of the sepia-toned footage.

While not one of his ’safe’ films, unlike Ichi the Killer, Sukiyaki Western Django is only as violent as you’d expect a western to be – lots of squib hits, but not much by way of over the top mayhem. Even his trademark perversity isn’t on display here; there’s a rape scene, but it’s downright subdued and classy. Miike’s films generally attempt difficult balancing acts with variable success. With Sukiyaki Western Django, he’s nailed it damn near perfect. Strong Recommendation.

The Shinjuku Incident, starring Jackie Chan in a non-Kungfu-sidekick role, finally has a website up and running!  Here’s a synopsis of the film, which IMHO, gives away too much of the plot:

The foreign migrant communities in Tokyo live shadowy lives. The Japanese neither acknowledge nor welcome them. They are shunned by the mainstream society, hounded by the yakuza, and go about their days under fear of being discovered and repatriated.

It is an alien world for Steelhead – an honest, hardworking tractor repairman. Steelhead had decided to take the perilous journey to Tokyo after he lost contact with his girlfriend, who had arrived in the city earlier.

Trying to exist in the underbelly of Tokyo long enough to find Xiu Xiu, Steelhead has come to realize the migrants had to stand united if they wanted to go about their lives without fear of oppression by not only the Japanese underworld but also gangs formed by foreigner.

In his search of a decent living, Steelhead unwittingly finds himself pit against the Japanese yakuza. Ironically, he also discovers that Xiu Xiu has adopted a Japanese identity and married Eguchi, an ambitious up and coming yakuza chief.

Steelhead wins the respect of his friends by establishing a base for them and forms an uneasy alliance with Eguchi. When he helps Eguchi dispose of a rival, he is given the control of Shinjuku’s night establishments. But, uninterested in living a gangster’s life, Steelhead finds a new love and takes the chance to start a tractor repair business outside Tokyo. However, his peace is shortlived when word gets to him that his former compatriots were now being used by Eguchi to front the yakuza’s drug business.

Steelhead feels responsible for this turn of events and feels obligated to bring Eguchi down. He also has to bear in mind that if he goes after Eguchi, he would be destroying the newfound life of the woman he once loved. In any case, can one simple migrant take on the yakuza alone?