Description
A bilingual forum for sharing information, recommendations, and opinions on classic and current Japanese films.
往年や最近の日本映画についての知らせ、すすめ、意見を伝えるためのフォーラム。
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Comments on 日本映画/Japanese Film
Jul 29, 2008
May 22, 2008
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n_lisney says: Tony Takitani
I picked this up at the library a few months back, because it's one of my favorite short stories of Murakami Haruki's. The film did not disappoint: it's very subtle (the New York Times called it a 'delicate wisp of a film with a surprisingly sharp sting'), beautifully filmed, and generally delightful =)
May 21, 2008
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Jrim says: 心中天網島/Shinju Ten no Amijima
I plucked Masahiro Shinoda's Shinju Ten no Amijima off the shelves at my local DVD shop last night, largely because it had Japanese subtitles and I liked the pictures on the cover. You'd me amazed how easy it is to narrow things down by this method. Anyway, suffice to say that my luck was good this time: this is a really, really cool film. It's based on the play by Chikamatsu Monzaemon, a playwright who started off in kabuki before ditching it for bunraku puppet theatre.
Shinju Ten no Amijima is one of Monzaemon's bunraku works, and Shinoda concocted an ingenious way of representing this in a live action film. After a brief introduction sequence of documentary footage from a real bunraku theatre, the main story is played out by real actors - except they're constantly shadowed by bunraku puppeteers. These hooded, black-clad figures lurk in the corners of scenes, sometimes taking centre stage to adjust the limbs of the protagonists or hand them props.
The scenery of the film has the fluidity of a theatrical set, too: a back wall is flipped to reveal a different scene, or parts of the background reappear in different configurations later on. There's a great scene towards the end where the raging Jihei (Kichiemon Nakamura) flails around his home, knocking down walls and pillars like... well, the flimsy bits of set that they actually are.
The play itself is one of those ripe old love tragedies (the denouement of which is given away in the stunningly over-obvious English title), though it's rendered a lot more interesting by Shinoda's headfucky decision to cast the same actress, Shima Iwashita, as both Jihei's prostitute lover Koharu and his betrayed wife, Osan. Great score from Toru Takemitsu, too, mixing koto with gamelan and Arabic reed instruments.
May 01, 2008
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evergreendazed says: Ichikawa Kon's BonchiHi all,
お久しぶりです。It's been quite a while since the last message, and this one is not very interesting, I'm afraid. But I'm wondering if anyone here has seen Ichikawa Kon's 1960 movie "Bonchi." I'm reading the novel by Yamasaki Toyoko now, but can't find a copy of the film on DVD. I'd love to hear anyone's opinion of the film. Thanks!
Dec 10, 2007
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Skyrin says: Kataude mashin gâru
My brother just sent me a link to this, bloody madness I tell you. O_O Website: http://twitchfilm.net/site/view/disfigured-school-girl-heavy-weaponry-first-machine-girl-trailer/
Sep 26, 2007
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thedudemeister says: ＡＵＤＩＴＩＯＮ〈オーディション〉
Miike takahashi realy has outdone himself in this movie, Shigeharu Aoyama has a fake audition to get a new wife and gets more than he has bargained for. the atmosphere and suspense is brilliantly done slowly you suspect that something is wrong with Shigeharu Aoyama new soon to be wife, the ending is extremely graphic, miike always does something unexpected at the end of his movies.
http://www.jmdb.ne.jp/2000/dx000520.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audition_(f ilm) -
thedudemeister says: ユリイカ(EUREKA) by 役所広司,宮崎あおい,宮崎将, and 斉藤陽一郎
A great movie, a tragical event makes a bond between the survivors of a bus hijacking.
the survivors try to live on but cannot take up live as they used to. they meet up again and go on a bustrip through japan, trying to deal with their trauma's
except for the bus hijacking, the rest of the movie is very slow.
Sep 12, 2007
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I watched this last night, and I swear to God it's one of the strangest Japanese films I've ever seen. Conceived as a star vehicle for early 80s super-idol Hiroko Yakushimaru, it tells of a high school girl who inherits her family's yakuza clan. What follows is alternately kitsch, brutal and downright surreal - culminating in the infamous scene in which Yakushimaru's character guns down a room of yakuza then coos "kaikan" ('pleasant feeling').
I suppose this is no less weird than Aya Ueto starring in a hyper-violent manga adaptation, but there's something about セーラー服と機関銃 that really takes it to another level of oddness. A lot of this is down to Yakushimaru herself, forever squeaky clean (and squeaky voiced) as everyone around her fucks, shoots and stabs each other. Then there's the direction: Shinji Somai apparently thought he was shooting an art flick, so riddled is this with off-kilter shots and techniques (the most audacious being a 5 1/2 minute sequence in which Yakushimaru shoots the shit with some hoods and a few of her schoolmates before wandering off and hitching a ride with some bosozoku - all filmed in a single take). And then, of course, there's scenes like this...
Aug 23, 2007
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Monument of Japanese action movie -
Monument of Japanese action movie
osa
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Jo3y
Anatole
Josh3419
人間椅子
わたしの渡世日記〈上〉
野獣死すべし
And the photo is from an interesting Imamura Shôhei film set in Osaka, Nusumareta Yokujo/盗まれた欲情, which is not subtitled ... just added for some visual interest.