Slash And Burn

Coming From Criterion

My friend Jon pointed me to Criterion's upcoming releases page on its website. Along with re-releases of Yojimbo and Sanjuro (now with extras!) in January, Criterion will be putting out Mikio Naruse's When A Woman Ascends The Stairs.

Here's what Criterion has to say about it:

When a Woman Ascends the Stairs might be Japanese filmmaker Mikio Naruse's finest hour--a delicate, devastating study of a woman, Keiko (played heartbreakingly by Hideko Takamine), who works as a bar hostess in Tokyo's very modern postwar Ginza district, who entertains businessmen after work. Sly, resourceful, but trapped, Keiko comes to embody the conflicts and struggles of a woman trying to establish her independence in a male-dominated society. When a Woman Ascends the Stairs shows the largely unsung yet widely beloved master Naruse at his most socially exacting and profoundly emotional.

Yup, can't wait.

Mike Yokohama: A Forest With No Name

Japanese Title: Shiritsu tantei Maiku Hama: Namae no nai mori
Director: Shinji Aoyama
Actors: Masatoshi Nagase, Kyoka Suzuki, Nene Otsuka
Year Released: 2002
Genre: Comedy, Thriller
See Also: The Most Terrible Time In My Life, The Stairway To The Distant Past, The Trap, Eli, Eli, Lema Sabachthani?

I still haven't found it, the transitional film that took Shinji Aoyama from unfocused genre filmmaker to visionary artist. Mike Yokohama: A Forest With No Name, Aoyama's feature-length treatment of an episode of the 2002 Shiritsu tantei Maiku Hama TV show ("Maiku Hama, Private Eye"), was made the year after Eureka, the film that put him on the international map. And while it's not as fascinatingly original as Eureka (it is an episode of a TV show, after all), A Forest With No Name still manages to be both clever and thought-provoking, and worth a look.

First of all, I have no idea why the lead character's surname was changed to "Yokohama" for this DVD release. In the TV show, as well as the three mid-90s movies in which Masatoshi Nagase portrayed the Yokohama-based private eye, he was Maiku Hama, an obvious ode to Mike Hammer, a repeated joke that's acknowledged with the claim, "It's my real name." In A Forest With No Name, he prefers to be called just "Mike," a difficult request in a country where people are routinely referred to by last names. His choice of name, his very vocation—these signal Mike as an individual, an outsider in a society that values group harmony over individual needs. Remember, the private eye is uniquely solitary and with no affiliation, operating outside of both the police and organized crime. Mike revels in his (anti-)position in society: he flaunts this with flashy punk clothes, returns bows of greeting with distancing hand waves, and takes every opportunity to project his voice, even in solemn occasions.

Mike's self-identity is thrown into confusion after taking a job to bring back a wealthy industrialist's daughter, who has entered a self-help commune and refuses to come back. After joining for the job, Mike is told by the enigmatic woman who runs the commune that there is a tree in the forest that looks like him. When he finally sees the tree (we never do, only a fantasy in which Mike appears in tree form), he realizes that maybe what he really wants, what he truly desires, is to be just another face in the crowd. Or tree in the forest, if you will.

For Aoyama, who revels in these kinds of identity conundrums, this is familiar ground. It will also seem familiar to anyone who's seen Charisma, Kiyoshi Kurosawa's 1999 thriller about a strange tree and its hold over a group of people. The two films are extremely different, yet both feature the symbol of the tree as a unique entity yet also something that's part of a larger community. That Aoyama used to be an assistant director (and something of a protégé) of Kurosawa's is more than mere coincidence. Did Aoyama rip him off? The films are different enough to warrant a negative answer. Let's just say that great minds think alike, and leave it at that.

Or should I say, leaf it at that?

—Adam Douglas

Otaku Alert: The loan shark at the beginning of the film is played by veteran character actor Yoshio Harada, who's appeared in 9 Souls, Izo, and Drawing Restraint 9, among many, many others.

How Much Do You Like Riki Takeuchi?

Really, how much? $80 worth? Then go for it:

http://www.rikitakeuchi.com/fan/fan.html

Thanks to Jon for pointing this out to me. My life is infinitely more rich now.

Karate Bearfighter

Japanese Title: Kenka Karate Kyokushin Buraiken
Director: Kazuhiko Yamaguchi
Actors: Sonny Chiba, Yumi Takigawa, Yutaka Nakajima
Year Released: 1975
Genre: Action
See Also: Karate Bullfighter, Karate For Life

"Oh, man, this is going to be so fake!" So remarked my friend Brian as the promised title fight began. As the howling started (that being us howling with laughter, not the bear), I realized that this is what this film was all about. Not martial arts prowess. Not a loving ode to a visionary athlete. But an excuse to have Sonny Chiba fight a guy in a bear costume. I love Japanese cinema.

Karate Bearfighter (or Kenka Karate Kyokushin Buraiken, literally "Fighting Karate—Ultimate Truth Brutal Fist") is the middle film in a trilogy about Sonny Chiba's real-life karate mentor, Korean-born Masutatsu Oyama. Hard-drinking, hard-playing, and hard-loving, it seems that Oyama barely had time to practice, what with all the ass-kicking, binge-drinking and lady-loving he got up to in these pictures. Maybe not the most flattering portrait, but remember, these were the days of the jitsuroku eiga, the "true account" film, as popularized by Kinji Fukasaku's yakuza films. The more gritty and badass, apparently, the better.

If you haven't seen the first film, Karate Bullfighter, don't worry, this isn't Empire Strikes Back. The most important part—Oyama beating a bull to death with his bare hands—is reprised at the beginning of the film, and man is it rough. Rough like Oyama's life after that incident, which put him on the outs with the controversy-shunning karate society of post-war Japan. To make ends meet, Oyama takes a job as a yakuza yojimbo (body guard), which gives Sonny Chiba ample opportunity to saunter around in cool suits and sunglasses. I had no idea they were wearing sideburns like that in 1951.

There's all kinds of subplot about a guy and his girl wanting to go to Hokkaido to start a farm, and them getting killed by the yakuza. Oyama makes the trip north to intern their ashes but this is really just an excuse to get Oyama up to bear country. Like I said, it's all about the fight with that mangy bear suit. It finally does come, via yet another subplot, this time with a cancer-ridden alcoholic father, his annoying son, and a big hospital bill that can only be paid off with money earned from fighting a bear.

So Sonny Chiba fights the bear. Rather, he fights a guy in a really unconvincing bear costume. They don't even attempt cutaways to a real bear. Instead, they've got two costumes: one for running on all fours and one for standing. After jumping over the bear a few times, Oyama does a Moe and pokes the bear in the eye, which promptly topples over like fur-covered tree, and dies, leaving Oyama to get back to the business of kicking yakuza and rogue karate champ ass.

Karate Bearfighter isn't what I'd call a good movie. But it is what I'd call a fun movie. "Oh man, it's so fake!" Love it.

—Adam Douglas

Otaku Alert: Oyama's girlfriend, roundly ignored throghout the entire picture, is played by the lovely Yumi Takigawa, last seen getting whipped in School of the Holy Beast.

Go West, Miike-san

Kaiju Shakedown has this bit of news about (yet another) Takashi Miike remake, this one a re-do of Sergio Corbucci's Django. Entitled Sukiyaki Western: Django, the movie apparently features Quentin Tarantino in front of the camera, never a great place for that man to be. Hopefully he'll refrain from using the word "nigger" this time.

I've been waiting for the revival of non-American (and non-Italian, natch) Westerns. And it's not like the Japanese have never done a spaghetti western before. Kill!, anyone?

Reviews

Ashura (2005)
The Assassin (1970)
Audition (1999)

Battle Royale (2000)
Black Cat's Revenge (aka Blind Woman's Curse) (1970)
The Bodyguard (1973)
Boogie Pop And Others (2000)

Café Lumiere (2003)
Casshern (2004)
Charisma (1999)
Cromartie High: The Movie (2005)
Cutie Honey (2004)

Daimajin (1966)
Deadly Outlaw: Rekka (2002)
Destroy All Monsters (1968)
Dogora (1964)
Doing Time (2002)

Eli, Eli, Lema Sabachthani? (2005)
EM: Embalming (1999)
Exchange Students (1982)

Female Convict Scorpion: Jailhouse 41 (1972)
Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion (1972)
Female Prisoner #701: Beast Stable (1973)
Female Prisoner Scorpion #701: Grudge Song (1973)
The 47 Ronin (1941, 1942)

Gamera, Super Monster (1980)
Gammera The Invincible (1966)
Gappa the Triphibian Monsters (1967)
Godzilla Final Wars (2004)
Godzilla, King of the Monsters (1956)
Godzilla Vs. Destroyah (1995)
Gojira (1954)

Hachi-ko (1987)
House (1977)

In the Realm of the Senses (1976)

Kamikaze Girls (2004)
Karate Bearfighter (1975)

Last Quarter (2004)
Legend Of The Eight Samurai (1983)
Linda Linda Linda (2005)
The Little Girl Who Conquered Time (1983)
Lorelei (2005)

Makai Tensho (1981)
Makai Tensho (2003)
Mike Yokohama: A Forest With No Name (2002)
Moonlight Serenade (1997)
The Mysterians (1957)

Nana (2005)
The Neighbor No. Thirteen (2005)
Ninja Wars (1982)

Return Of Daimajin (1966)
Ronin Gai (1990)

Sanshiro Sugata (1943)
Screwed (1998)
Shinobi (2005)
Snake Woman's Curse (1968)
Son of Godzilla (1967)
Space Amoeba (1970)
The Stairway To The Distant Past (1995)
Suicide Club (2002)
Sukebandeka The Movie (1987)
Sukebandeka The Movie 2: Counter-Attack of the Kazama Sisters (1988)
Survive Style 5+ (2004)
Swing Girls (2004)

Terror Beneath The Sea (1966)
Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989)
Tokyo Zombie (2005)

Vital (2004)

Wild Life (1997)
Wrath Of Daimajin (1966)

Zero Woman: Red Handcuffs (1974)

Searching For Shinji: Wild Life and EM: Embalming

Title: Wild Life
Director: Shinji Aoyama
Actors: Kosuke Toyohara, Mickey Curtis, Akiko Izumi
Year Released: 1997
Genre: Yakuza, Comedy
See Also: Eli, Eli Lema Sabachthani?, Shark Skin Man And Peach Hip Girl

Title: EM: Embalming
Director: Shinji Aoyama
Actors: Reiko Takashima, Yutaka Matsushige, Seijun Suzuki
Year Released: 1999
Genre: Thriller
See Also: Vital, Synesthesia

Shinji Aoyama, where did you come from? I know all about the apprenticeship with Kiyoshi Kurosawa, the experiments with 8mm film. But how did you go from Wild Life and EM: Embalming to Eureka and Eli, Eli, Lema Sabachthani? How did you go from barely competent genre director to world-class film star? I need to know. I must know.

I can't remember how I first came across Eureka. Maybe it was a rental on Greencine. No matter how I first heard of it, its effect on me was unmistakable and everlasting. The nearly four-hour, sepia-toned meditation on post-traumatic stress disorder was about as perfect a film as I had ever encountered. Here was a strong hand, a sure vision, a unique take on film that refused to compromise on presentation, length, or structure. It took its time and delivered. Eureka is a film to be enjoyed again and again; despite its length, it never grows tiresome.

And then I saw Eli, Eli, Lema Sabachthani? That this film is not on every hipster pair of lips from here to Tokyo is a major crime, for Aoyama has certainly tapped into something rare here. I show this movie (about noise musicians whose music keeps a suicide-inducing virus at bay) to my musician friends, and we all agree that this should be our testimony. Anyone who makes music (or any art, for that matter) will immediately recognize the loving attention paid to the creative process, and its ultimate participation in the will to live. Take away my will to create and I am dead. It's no small stretch then to see how the characters of Eli, Eli face the virus that threatens their existence, how each owns up to their own experience and will to live. If I'm having trouble explaining the film it's because this is the intangible stuff of life itself. When you're knee-deep in it, it's better to just revel in the experience than bother to jot down what's happening.

You can imagine that I would want to repeat such a heady experience. To find its source and drink deep of it. So I went in search of other Shinji Aoyama films, other forms of this cinematic expression that so mirrored my own experience. What I found were two films so removed from Eureka and Eli, Eli that they may as well be from an entirely different filmmaker. What gives?

Wild Life, from 1997, is a comedic yakuza film in the vein of Shark Skin Man and Peach Hip Girl, a light-hearted deconstruction of the venerable crime genre that unfortunately overextends its reach. Hiroki (Kosuke Toyohara, whom I had previously seen in the TV version of "Densha Otoko") is a pachinko needle man, who spends his nights resetting the pins in pachinko machines. His skills as a former boxer are brought into play when a mysterious package throws his life out of whack. The plot gets out of control faster than the characters do, leaving the viewer to wonder how Aoyama is going to take control of the situation.

EM: Embalming, a 1999 film that presages both Vital and Synesthesia, sees Aoyama stretching into the realm of the psychological thriller. Like Wild Life, there's more plot than seems necessary, with Aoyama spending more time playing catch up with the plot points than developing mood, a move that seems at odds with his apprenticeship with Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Cure, Doppelganger), the undisputed king of atmosphere. EM: Embalming is like any number of mediocre, similar psychological thrillers—its uniqueness only arises when you consider it as part of the body of work of the man who made Eureka, which was released just one year later.

So how did Shinji Aoyama go from the hackneyed scripts and straight-to-video-like production of these two films to full-on artistic brilliance? I like to think it happened like this:

Late one night, in the midst of a shaman-induced psychedelic experience shortly after the release of EM: Embalming, Aoyama had a revelation: less is more. His busy, over-burdened scripts should be discarded, thrown on a bonfire. He should concentrate on minimalist screenplays, seemingly empty musings on what it means to be alive; on the meaning of family; on the mysteries of the universe. After emerging from this formative, psychedelic tunnel, he set about writing the script that would become Eureka. A chance meeting with avant-garde musician Jim O'Rourke cemented the title and set him on a path towards renewed forms of artistic expression.

OK, maybe it didn't go like that. Maybe Aoyama simply woke up one day and said, Right, time to get serious. That's cool too. No matter why he made the shift, the fact remains that he did, and, man, is the world ever a better place for it.

—Adam Douglas

Otaku Alert: Shinji Aoyama was discovered by Kiyoshi Kurosawa at film school.

Nana Mo Ichido

Kaiju Shakedown has kindly pointed out that Apple has the trailer up for Nana 2. It's no secret around these parts that I adored the first Nana, but I have my reservations about the sequel, namely the replacing of Aoi Miyazaki and Ryuhei Matsuda, both of whom are pretty easy on the eyes. Hey, at least Mika Nakashima is sticking around.

Yeah, just watched the trailer. I predict: crap. Nana reaching for the falling ichigo (strawberry) glass... ugh.

The Female Convict Scorpion Quartet

Title: Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion
Director: Shunya Ito
Actors: Meiko Kaji, Fumio Watanabe, Rie Yokoyama
Year Released: 1972
Genre: Exploitation
See Also: Black Cat's Revenge/Blind Woman's Curse

Title: Female Convict Scorpion: Jailhouse 41
Director: Shunya Ito
Actors: Meiko Kaji, Fumio Watanabe, Kayoko Shiraishi
Year Released: 1972
Genre: Exploitation
See Also: Lady Snowblood, Lady Snowblood: Love Song of Vengeance

Title: Female Prisoner #701 Scorpion: Beast Stable
Director: Shunya Ito
Actors: Meiko Kaji, Yayoi Watanabe, Mikio Narita
Year Released: 1973
Genre: Exploitation
See Also: Yakuza Graveyard, Battles Without Honor or Humanity: Deadly Fight in Hiroshima

Title: Female Prisoner #701 Scorpion: Grudge Song
Director: Yasuharu Hasebe
Actors: Meiko Kaji, Masakazu Tamura, Yumi Kanae
Year Released: 1973
Genre: Exploitation
See Also: Stray Cat Rock: Sex Hunter

I have a complicated relationship with Toei's Scorpion films. Let me be more specific: I have a complicated relationship with exploitation films in general. Being the sensitive guy that I am, I have trouble watching women get tortured, raped, all that, and yet being the male that I am, I can't help but be titillated by all the naked goings-on. And, being from the West, with a Judeo-Christian sense of morality, I can't help but feel guilty and ashamed for being turned on. I told you: complicated.

My justification, at least in terms of the Scorpion films, is that they're so damn good. More than just mere women-in-prison films, the four Scorpion flicks starring Meiko Kaji repeatedly transcend the genre into art-house levels of beauty, surreality and expressionism. That they happen to feature a lot of naked flesh is beside the point.

Meiko Kaji had already been made a star by Yasuharu Hasebe's Stray Cat Rock series, in which she played the leader of a gang of bad girls, by the time Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion hit theaters in 1972. Based on a manga by Toru Shinohara (who also wrote the strip that Zero Woman was based on), Female Prisoner #701 is the sordid tale of Nami Matsushima, a woman who is forced to take the fall for her corrupt policeman boyfriend. Now known as Sasori (Scorpion), she's the baddest con on the (cell) block, a near-mute force of nature that can't be broken or held down. The character's overwhelming silence was apparently the idea of Kaji herself, who disapproved of the manga character's foul language. All of her acting is done with her eyes, piercing orbs of hate that see all.

Shunya Ito was a first-time director for Female Prisoner #701 but you'd never know it from watching the film. There's a steadiness and sense of confidence that belies his lack of experience. Right from the start he obviously knew what he was doing, and what he wanted from the series. Genre is toyed with and trumped: the obligatory shower sequence turns into a kabuki-inspired escapade, complete with wild makeup and stage-like lighting.

The surreality reaches dizzying heights in the second film, Female Convict Scorpion: Jailhouse 41, which largely takes place outside the prison. Sasori has been in solitary confinement for a year, yet she refuses to be broken. She manages to escape prison with a group of girls while doing forced labor in a quarry. They escape across a volcanic landscape, eerily vacant and desolate. Things get increasingly weird from here, with more kabuki and stage-like elements arriving incongruously. All the while, Sasori silently observes. At one point, a woman breaks away from the group to find her family. In the foreground is a close-up of Sasori's face, her eyes the focus; the background is a rear-projection of the con running through a forest. Imagine Bunuel burying his politics and instead making a genre picture. That this is only Ito's second picture is remarkable.

For his third, Female Prisoner #701 Scorpion: Beast Stable, Ito largely abandons the whole scale oddness of the second in favor of social commentary. Sasori is now on the run in the real world. The film begins with her hacking off the arm of a detective that had the unfortunate luck of being handcuffed to the Scorpion. Sasori is helped by a kindly prostitute with a revolting home life—her brother, brain-damaged from an accident at the plant where he worked, regularly has sex with her, not aware of what he's doing. That she puts up with it is meant to be more indicative of her unfortunate position in society than of her lax morals. It's a much more sad and plaintive film than any other in the series, yet no less stylish.

Shunya Ito was replaced by Kaji's Stray Cat Rock director Yasuharu Hasebe for Female Prisoner #701 Scorpion: Grudge Song, her last contribution to the series. A suitable subtitle for the film could be "Sasori In Love." After escaping from the police, who catch up with her at a wedding, Sasori, badly injured, is rescued by a man who works at a strip joint. The two bond over a shared hatred for the police and soon are falling in love, but when push comes to shove, her lover caves and turns her over to the police. The resulting act of vengeance is made all the more poignant by the fact that they shared feelings. This poignancy is not enough to elevate Grudge Song to the same level as the previous three films, which far surpass this entry's pedestrian approach.

As with many exploitation films of the '70s, the overwhelming theme of the Scorpion films is revenge. Sasori is a character completely driven by vengeance. Yet, she is principled, caring, and even loving, as the last film reveals. Despite a lack of character-revealing dialogue, she is shown to be a complex, complicated person. It is to Meiko Kaji's credit that she was able to carry four films in near silence. As with Jean-Louis Trintignant in Sergio Corbucci's excellent western, The Great Silence, the eyes say it all.

Meiko Kaji's four Scorpion films were followed by two New Female Prisoner Scorpion films (1976, 1977), the straight-to-video Scorpion Woman Prisoner: Death Threat (1991, by Toshiharu Ikeda, creator of Evil Death Trap), Scorpion's Revenge (1997), and Scorpion: Double Venom (1998). Meiko Kaji would go on to make the two Lady Snowblood films, as well as two pictures for Kinji Fukasaku, Yakuza Graveyard and Battles Without Honor or Humanity: Deadly Fight in Hiroshima.

—Adam Douglas

Otaku Alert: Yayoi Watanabe, who played Yuki in Beast Stable, was also in Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion as well as Grudge Song (and not to mention School of the Holy Beast). How could I have missed her in all those films?

Destroy All Monsters

Japanese Title: Kaiju soshingeki
Director: Ishiro Honda
Actors: Akira Kubo, Jun Tazaki, Yukiko Kobayashi
Year Released: 1968
Genre: Kaiju
See Also: Godzilla Final Wars, Gojira, Terror of Mechagodzilla

I can't fathom why anyone would prefer a dub to subtitles. Even a good dub. As a kid I remember seeing movies like Treasure of the Four Crowns and being really weirded out by the fact that the voices didn't match the mouths. I wasn't sophisticated enough to understand what was happening, I just knew I didn't like it. So I would much rather have watched a subbed version of Destroy All Monsters (or in Japanese, Kaiju sohingeki, the more literal "All Monsters Attack"), but hey, you take what you can get.

And what I got was a whole lot of hilarity.

It really is amazing how a truly terrible dub can make the difference between a bad movie and an uproarious movie. Witness the Sandy Frank versions of the Gamera movies on MST3K, or the ADV DVD of Destroy All Monsters (which doesn't even have a menu or chapters!). Odd pauses, sidelong glances and frequent, unnecessary statements of agreement ("That's right") are all the result of shoehorning English into the rhythms of Japanese without caring about how it appears on-screen. But when you've got a less-than-moderately entertaining movie like Destroy All Monsters, a truly horrendous dub can do wonders.

Yes, that's right, I said, "a less-than-moderately entertaining movie." For all its Toho kaiju star power and legendary status, Destroy All Monsters is kinda lame. I'd much rather watch King Kong Vs. Godzilla or even director Ishiro Honda's eleventh-hour return to the Godzilla franchise, Terror of Mechagodzilla. Cheesy though it be, Terror manages to be more exciting than Destroy All Monsters, even with all the monsters running around in the latter.

It's the year 1999 (how quaint). Aliens release all the monsters from "Monsterland," an island off the coast of Japan and use mind control to make them attack the cities of the world. Godzilla, Rodan, Mothra (in larva form), a T-Rex-looking guy called Gorosaurus, Anguiras, and a bunch more from various Toho franchises (Godzilla and non-Godzilla alike) get busy around the world until some boring guys in yellow fire suits save the day by taking out the aliens' moon base. The film culminates with the monsters—now freed of the humiliating mind control—battling with Gidorah, the go-to space monster for invading Toho aliens. I love Gidorah—love Gidorah—but he doesn't get to do much here. In fact, he gets his ass kicked pretty quickly. The Gorosaurus drop-kick is hot, but really, I expected more from a movie called Kaiju soshingeki.

So what have we learned, other than you shouldn't get too excited about an exploitation movie's title? That female aliens in silver bathing caps, even if they have a three-headed monster at their disposal, can't defeat the power of badly dubbed boring guys. Amen.

—Adam Douglas

Otaku Alert: Andrew Hughes, who played the token white guy, Dr. Stevenson, was appointed by international court after WWII to defend Japanese war criminals. I'm not sure if this role was his reward or punishment.