Category: action

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action extreme literary adaptations thriller

Battle Royale: A Tale of Caution

A grandiose orchestra plays together with a dark and soaring choral ensemble as a news helicopter arrives loudly to the scene. An overtly excited newscaster tells us of a class of 9th graders chosen for a fiercely contested game whose rules we’ve yet to learn. Taken to the scene in a military vehicle by armored soldiers and swarmed by the press, a small girl in school uniform holds on to her doll as the newscaster reports that she is the winner. Covered head-to-toes in blood, the girl slowly raises her face and eerily smiles for the cameras in a series of jump cuts and flashes. This introductory scene shockingly sets the tone of Fukasaku Kinji’s grim horror action thriller: Battle Royale (Batoru rowaiaru, 2000). Fifteen minutes later, we witness the first of over 40 gruesome deaths: an adult is shot through the eye, a girl is stabbed in the forehead, and a boy’s neck is made to explode by a collar triggered through radio waves. I warn you that Battle Royale is not the kind of movie you should be watching if you are weak of stomach, or if old samurai films are the most violence you can handle in a day.

It was precisely the violent nature of the storyline which drew much of the controversy surrounding the film and the large audiences that made it a hit. The movie has an R15 rating (restricted for those 15 years old and over), an apparently rarely used rating in Japan even for violent films.[1] Fukasaku who disliked the rating, attempted to have the censor board review it once more, but the film sparked controversy at the Japanese Diet who called it “crude and tasteless”, so he withdrew the request out of fear for more censorship.[2] Though I must agree with the censor board and the Japanese politicians due to the film’s graphic nature, the film did manage to be a box-office hit grossing the equivalent of $25 million USD in Japanese yen, spawning a sequel, a number of mangas, and a possible future Hollywood remake. Such a success is worthy—if not of some level of appreciation—at least of respect.

The story—which is a bit convoluted because of the enormous amount of characters—happens in an alternate dystopic Japan where unemployment, inflation, and government tyranny lead teenagers towards delinquency and rebellion. To placate the rebellious youth and instill fear, the government passes the Millennium Reform School Act forcing one randomly selected class of ninth grade students to compete in a game of death and survival against each other with real weapons on a deserted island once every year. This year’s chosen class is Class B; forty-four students each with their individual teenager insecurities and quirks.

The film maintains cohesion by focusing on two specific characters: Nanahara Shuya (Fujiwara Tatsuya) and Nakagawa Noriko (Maeda Aki); friends together with the rebellious Nobu (Kotani Yukihiro)—the previously mentioned boy whose collar explodes. Prior to the game, Nobu incites an uprising at school and stabs the school teacher Kitano (appropriately played by Kitano Takeshi) in the leg. Unbeknownst to the class the sadistic Kitano becomes the head of the Battle Royale Program and is the one who kills Nobu both out of revenge, and to make an example out of him. Once the game begins, Shuya and Noriko are morally correct characters who do not want to kill, thus they stay together out of friendship and support. However, not all their classmates think alike and soon the carnage begins. Some try to hide, some gang up to hunt the rest, and another small group attempts an elaborate plan to deactivate the collars. The storyline unfolds as Shuya and Noriko bump into the different groups of students, and how their interactions with them lead to acts of revenge, jealousy, a few times of love, and more than anything, gruesome deaths. Meanwhile, from his base of operations, the emotionless Kitano watches the game unfold every now and then informing the surviving students through speakerphones across the island of the growing number of dead.

The controversy that surrounds the story most positively comes not just from violence and gore, quite common in modern film times, but because the plot revolves around perfectly normal teenagers who go awry under extreme circumstances. Such scenes as when five of the schoolgirls kill each other after an incident with a poisoned soup intended for Shuya, highlights the kind of tonal shifts that happen all throughout the film. We pass from moments of simple schoolgirl chit-chat, where one of the girls Sugimura Hiroki is pressured to reveal her feelings for Shuya, to a moment of pure violence that a western director like Quentin Tarantino would love.

In an interview to Fukasaku, the 70 year old director commented that his film is nothing but a fable, a parable, a tale of caution meant to educate. However, we should ask who is the film attempting to educate? Fukasaku wants to emphasize a generational gap: adults vs. youth. He mentions in the interview the gap that existed between his own generation who fought the war, and the younger modern one: “since the burst of the bubble economy… adults, many of them salary men and working class people… most of them started to lose confidence in themselves. And the children who have grown up and witnessed what happened to the adults, their anxiety became heightened as well”.[3] Perhaps we should then consider that the violence in the film exemplifies an exaggeration of the horrid and awkward journey that is growing up and becoming an adult.

On the adult spectrum, the heartless Kitano becomes one of the most enigmatic and distressingly interesting characters of the film, because he illustrates the extremism and single-mindedness that often times comes with being an adult. To western audiences, the emotionless performance by Kitano Takeshi contrasts with his comedic appearances seen through reruns and dubs of the television show Takeshi’s Castle. The actor here plays the teacher Kitano completely straightforward; he is merciless, cold, calculating but at the same time dangerously unpredictable as he demonstrates at the beginning of the film when he delights himself in killing Nobu and one of the student girls. However, the teacher still serves a bizarre comedic purpose as his dialogue is ironic when he says things such as: “Sorry, it’s against the rules for me to kill isn’t it?”, or later on: “It’s tough when friends die on you, but hang in there”.  Dressed in sweatpants, Kitano spends his time doing stretching exercises and eating cookies, while outside his base the most despicable acts of murder are carried by his command. At a determined point in the movie (which I won’t reveal or it could spoil the film); Kitano reveals a gruesome painting that he has drawn. It is of the island, covered in the butchered bodies of the students and surrounding a heavenly image of Noriko. Kitano says that it represents his hope that she will be the only survivor of the game. This strange relationship between him and Noriko is showcased at several points in the film, such as when he saves her from the mischievous Mitsuko (the school temptress and femme fatale) and strangely offers Noriko an umbrella to protect her from the rain. There’s one more bizarre one in which we see them both talk and eat ice-cream by an idyllic riverside enjoying each other’s company. The scene appears slightly washed out and happens in between two shots of Noriko and Kitano sleeping separately, as if to say that perhaps the riverside scene is a dream that they are both currently sharing. Kitano’s strange behavior, obsession with Noriko and passive aggressive behavior are a few of the things in Battle Royale that make it an interesting study on the psychology of deranged individuals, but it also begs a comment on the psychology of grown people who having lived through extreme circumstances, become immune or desensitized by acts of extremity.

There is no doubt that Fukasaku’s Battle Royale has become a staple of Japanese cult cinema, because of the extreme acts of violence portrayed between teenagers. An adherence to such a taboo subject—essentially demystifying the innocence of youth—in favor of a view that portrays the journey of becoming an adult as a nightmarish path towards intolerance and indifference. If the story is a tale of caution it’s probably effective for its shock value as a form catharsis, but we should begin questioning ourselves for the reasons that a small group of devoted fans—such as I—find such horrible things, so attractive. Have we simply just not changed at all from those years when say Romans forced slaves in gladiatorial combat? Is Fukasaku’s final comment that we as a race are simply violent by nature and no amount of reasoning or morality will ever change that? I pray it isn’t so.

[1] Leong, Anthony (2001). “Battle Royale Movie Review”. Issue 33 of Asian Cult Cinima. Retrieved 2007-01-08

[2] Mes, Tom and Jasper Sharp. “Midnight Eye interview: Kinji Fukasaku.” 9 April 2001. Midnight Eye. <http://www.midnighteye.com/interviews/kinji_fukasaku.shtml>.

[3] Mes, Tom and Jasper Sharp. “Midnight Eye interview: Kinji Fukasaku.” 9 April 2001. Midnight Eye. <http://www.midnighteye.com/interviews/kinji_fukasaku.shtml>.

Categories
action chambara/chanbara jidai-geki

The Sight and Sound of the End of an Era

The sheer mastery of Yamada Yôji’s The Twilight Samurai (Tasogare Seibei) is made clear even from the first frame in this “meditative character-driven elegy” (Chi). Based upon the three short novels by Shuhei Fujisawa, the film is a gentle jidai-geki in the chambara/chanbara genre set in the final hours of Japan’s Edo period. Upon the loss of his wife to consumption, Iguchi Seibei (Sanaa Hiroyuki ) is left to care for his two young daughters Kayano (Itô Miki) and Ito (Hashiguchi Erina), and senescent mother (Tamba Tetsuro). Iguchi is caught between the value of giri or duty as a samurai, and ninjô to support his family. Tasogare Seibei, as he becomes known due to decision not to join his peers for sake at dusk, is soon overwhelmed by the responsibilities of providing for his family. As fortune would have it, Tomoe (Miyazawa Rie) his childhood love and a recent divorcee, enters the narrative to acting as a both a beautiful foil to the character of Iguchi, and a vehicle for Yamada to begin a discussion of class expectations, duty, hope and love in a time of great change for the samurai.

A major element throughout the film is Yamada’s deft use of light and shadow, in an ironic homage to the title, Twilight. Yamada uses these ‘two siblings’ not only to light a scene and the mise-en-scene, but to also to convey the subtext and emotion of each character. Each character ‘wears’ their light, as if it were an additional costume to add to their characterization. Yamada integrates warm, top lighting and natural sunshine to convey the peace Iguchi and Michinojo (Fukikoshi Mitsuro) feel as they fish by the riverside. He uses the natural light to emphasize the joy of Kayano and Ito as they play in the fields. This technique is again used as we see Iguchi open the sliding door of the bedroom, casting golden rays from the fire over the faces of the girls, displaying the pride and love their father holds for them. Tomoe too is characterized through light in the form of the ‘lantern in the night’ that Iguchi uses to walk her home, symbolic of her presence in his life.

In the final act Iguchi is forced to duel Zenemon Yogo (Tanaka Min), a local retainer who has disobeyed the clan’s order for him to commit seppuku. Again Yamada uses a skillful synthesis of shot, composition, and light to convey the deep subtext and visceral emotion between the two men. As Iguchi enters the hut in which Yogo is hiding, the viewer is made immediately aware of the silhouette of the trees outside the window that start to shake in the wind, aptly setting the tone for the scene. Iguchi cannot originally see Yogo who sits in the shadows. As the two men begin to talk, whispers of light start to stream across Yogo’s profile. They are at odds with one another, both aware of the mission endowed upon Iguchi. The two men sit back to back, a distance apart but are drawn toward one another in the deft use of the rack focus of the camera. They begin to establish commonalities, and Iguchi can for the first time begin to see his opponent’s eyes as light washes across his forehead. The two drink tea, and share suffering over the loss of loved ones to consumption. A strange familiarity is breed between the two men, cleverly articulated by Yamada’s technique of slowly lighting Yogo’s face, which is only fully seen for the first time in the climactic duel – a moment of ultimate bonding and understanding. Other notable techniques include Yamada’s use of diagetic and non-diagetic sound and silence, especially during the duels and domestic scenes. He not only plays between using sounds of chickens to symbolize and represent the household and sounds of field birds to represent nature, but also employs silence as a means to build tension.

Yamada’s film brims with life and colour in a gentle discourse of dealing with love, family and duty in a time when the world of the samurai seemed fleeting.

Categories
action drama, melodrama gendai-geki yakuza

“Crows Zero”

Crows Zero also known as Kurozu Zero was an original manga series created by Takahashi Hiroshi, and its popularity was credited to the story of a group of students in high school known for violence and mimicking aspects of the Yakuza. The manga was brought to film by Miike Takashi in 2007, which cleverly transferred the hit manga to motion film. The main theme of the story is violence, and it is appraised by many as a clever adaption of social hierarchy and popular gang cultures. As Japan is infamous for their yakuza syndicates, this story entails the contrast between high school gangs and the real time Japanese mafia. Our main character in this story is Genji, played by Oguri Shun. Genji is the son of a powerful yakuza boss who sets out a near impossible goal to become the “ ruler” of an all boys school Suzuran. Serizawa, Tokio and many other unique characters composed the main portion of the two gangs featured in the movie.

Crows Zero has achieved a large fan base purely by creating a fantasy-like world for teenagers and young adults. The main focus of the film was an in depth view of an ambitious high school student with the dream to live up to his father’s success. The story focuses on internal political relations amongst rival gangs which parallels that of actual government. During Genji’s rise to success, he forms alliances as well as creating enemies which created multiple sub stories that went parallel to the main plot. Genji explores the complicated role of being the next ruler of Suzuran as his rival Serizawa defends his title.

The film appeals to a younger clientele, given the fact that the story originates from manga and comic scripts. The portrayal of a cool, dominant gangster lifestyle is always entertaining to get into. Crows Zero targets a particular group of youth that enjoys fantasy-like action films with multiple things happening simultaneously. Our main character, Genji is portrayed as a fearless fighter, capable of defeating many foes at once. As demonstrated during the scene where Genji was attacked at the courtyard, he was able to stand his own against dozens of thugs, eventually winning the loyalty of a boss named Izaki through brute determination. Genji’s surreal ability to endure extensive amounts of physical abuse as well as his ability to deliver punishment made him an appealing character. As a fan of gangster movies, Crows Zero has really captivated the portrayal of bad boys in a personal point of view.

The action scenes were most enjoyable as the camera angles successfully created a dynamic feel. There are many different angles used in the filming which created an interesting combination of scenes that elevated the action. Miike was able to interpret the action scenes of the manga into real-time action scenes, often switching point of views time to time. Miike was also able to achieve the first-person point of view, which puts the viewer close and personal in the fight. There were lots of special effects which created an exaggeration in the power of the punches and the cries of war added an authentic feel of shogun-style warfare. Prior to battle in most scenes, the leaders would unleash a furious cry and then charge. The exaggerated action was definitely on spot, and gave a surreal feel, which oddly as it sounds created a comical and entertaining value, opposed to a grim and gritty feel.

Crows Zero’s success gave birth to a second installment of the series. The movie is highly recommended for viewers that enjoy the yakuza-based genre. The clever camera angles and suspenseful action sequences added to the already popular gangster style film. The movie’s intermittent comical scenes and exaggerated action sequences gave a light and refreshing feel to the film, steering away from the average gangster film. The story includes love, politics and action which gives Crows a definitive advantage in pop culture demands.

Categories
action chambara/chanbara drama, melodrama jidai-geki

“The Twilight Samurai” (Tasogare Seibei)

The Twilight Samurai (Tasogare Seibei) is a film produced in the year 2002 and was directed by Yamada Yōji. This film can be categorized under the genre of jidai-geki and was an Academy Award nominee for best foreign language film including best director, best film, best actor and best actress. The main character of the film, Tasogare Seibei, is played by Sanada Hiroyuki, his lover in the film Tomoe is played by actress Miyazawa Rie, and Seibei’s two daughters Kayano and Ito are played by actresses Ito Miki and Erina Hashiguchi. Other supporting actors include Kobayashi Nenji, Ohsugi Ren, and Fukikoshi Mitsuru.

The story is set in the late nineteenth century in Shonai province, in the northeast of the Japanese archipelago. The main character of the film Iguchi Seibei is a samurai of the Inasaka Clan and was nick-named tasogare seibei by his fellow samurai because he is always the first one to return home (during sunset hour) rejecting his colleagues’ offers to go for drinks after work. The story opens with a scene of the funeral of Seibei’s wife and in the following scenes we see his struggle in raising his two daughters Kayano and Ito all by himself while also looking after his aging mother and taking care of the housework. Seibei is reunited with his childhood friend Tomoe and they develop feelings for each as the film progresses. Seibei agrees to a sword fight with Tomoe’s abusive ex-husband Kouda and though he only uses a bamboo stick while his opponent uses an actual katana, he wins the battle and forces Kouda to stay away from Tomoe in the future. In the latter part of the film, because Seibei is a low-ranking samurai and is used by his leaders as the “errands man”, he is forced to confront a renowned warrior in an opposite clan and to kill him so he unwillingly pays the warrior a visit and par-takes in another sword battle.

One of the most significant aspects of this film that really fascinates me is the lighting technique. From the very first scene (Seibei’s wife’s funeral in his house), it is quite evident that no special lighting effects were incorporated in shooting the scenes, rather the director seems to have very skilfully used the natural sunlight and worked his camera around furniture and actors to produce the full effect of the sun rays. This is especially evident in scenes that take place indoors (Seibei’s house, the office, class room, and Zenemon Yogo’s house). The characters’ faces in indoor scenes are never fully lit, even when there is a close-up take of the actor’s face we cannot really make out their full features because most of the time, the sunlight is not sufficient to illuminate their entire face or because they happen to be sitting with their backs facing the door or sometimes because a furniture or sliding panel would cast a shadow over them.  However,  the effect of the sunlight pouring in through the shoji, or cracks in the lattice fence of the house, and through open doors create quite a beautiful lighting effect for the indoor scenes and contributes to the often solemn or serious moods of the many indoor scenes.

The second aspect of the film that I thought was really impressive and contributed greatly to this film is the sound effects. This too was very minimalistic yet powerful at the same time. For the most part, there were not very many scenes in which external sound effects were used. Scenes would usually focus on the character’s monologues and the only other sounds we are able to hear in the background are of the cries of animals or the rippling of water. In fact, a lot of the scenes were very still that the ruffling of the kimono or the footsteps of a person would seem very prominent. However, I must mention that the most dramatic and beautiful sound effect was used in the scene where Seibei is reading a letter from Tomoe. As we hear Tomoe’s voice narrating the letter, there is a beautiful piano melody playing in the background and this is especially beautiful and powerful because in this scene, the rain is pouring so the combined effects of the sound of raindrops and piano melody make the scene quite moving. Part of the reason why the piano melody was used in this scene is perhaps because Seibei is starting to realize his strong feelings towards Tomoe. In most other scenes, such as of a group of people (the samurai or Seibei and his servant) travelling from one place to another (transitional scenes), there are melodies played by the shakuhachi in the background. This too was very alluring and complimented the takes of scenery in those scenes.

The scenery of rivers, lakes, and mountains in this film is beautiful, and the sound effect, lighting, costume all contribute to depiction of the time period the film was shot in.  Watching the actors in traditional Japanese kimono and hakama worn with straw sandals and geta and seeing the rustic looking houses with chanoyu as well as listening to the old-Japanese spoken all made me feel like I travelled back in time. I would definitely recommend this film to anyone who is interested in learning a little bit about the Japanese tradition as you will be able to get a glimpse into the life-style of a low-ranking samurai, and because there are many references to Buddhism, you will also be able to get a glimpse into the faiths of people during this period. It is a very educational film but more importantly, the storyline, along with the sound and lighting effects, will move you.

Categories
action yakuza

Severed Pinkies and Reconnected Brothers: Takeshi Kitano’s “Brother”

Following the overseas success of Sonatine (1993) and Hanabi (1997), Brother (2000) was director Kitano Takeshi’s first – and last – Hollywood collaboration. Starring himself, Omar Epps (audiences will recognize him as Dr. Foreman from the TV drama House M.D.) and Claude Maki, the film was meant to bring exposure and a wider international audience to Kitano’s films, but its reception was lukewarm at best.

Brother is a yakuza film almost to the point of parody – three pinkie fingers are lost throughout the duration of the film through the yakuza ritual of yubitsume (self-amputation of one’s little finger to atone for offense or disrespect), and there is no shortage of guns, katanas, or full-body tattoos. All the spectacle is there too – the film features a yakuza funeral (with the vigorous bowing of low-ranking members), a yakuza initiation rite, and a yakuza dinner during which one member commits seppuku (the slicing open of the abdomen), causing another to atone for the interruption by having yubitsume forced upon him.

The action scenes are equally unrestrained – lots of people are shot or otherwise murdered in the film. In fact, most of the characters do not survive until the end, and this has the effect of creating a silent intensity that is sustained throughout the film – the gunshots serve to punctuate the quiet segments of the film, but the calm moments themselves are a brooding foreshadowing of looming deaths, which is always just around the corner.

Kitano plays Yamamoto, a high ranking yakuza officer who is forced to flee Japan following the assassination of his boss and the defection of his yakuza “brother” (another equal-ranking officer). He leaves one brother behind for another, flying to Los Angeles to stay with his younger genetic brother Ken (Claude Maki), to whom he has been sending money so that Ken could study abroad. There, he finds that Ken has become a street-level drug pusher that has gotten in trouble with the drug cartel. In helping his brother the only way a Yakuza member knows how – by wiping out the entire drug cartel, Yamamoto begins to establish a criminal empire, eventually coming head-to-head with the Mafia.

Beneath the facade of graphic ultra-violence lie two themes that Kitano explores quite extensively. The first is the eponymous idea of brotherhood – both in the Yakuza and the genetic context. Yakuza is structured as a family, with the head called the oyabun (foster parent), and the members referring to each other as elder and younger brothers (kyoudai). The film draws a parallel and compares these adopted relationships with Yamamoto’s relationship with his only true genetic brother Ken. Both the gang members and Ken refer to Yamamoto with the term “Aniki” (older brother), and it is intentionally not clear what difference (if any) there is between a genetic and adopted brotherly relationship, as Ken becomes Yamamoto’s underling.

The other theme Kitano explores is that of culture and language. The very identities that unite a brotherhood also separates them as “others” – all of the organized crime groups in the film have prominently ethnic backgrounds – the drug dealers are Mexican, the Mafia is Italian, and the Little Tokyo gang are all Japanese. While Yamamoto’s own gang is not quite as ethnically homogenous, it is composed entirely of African-American, Japanese, and Latinos, highlighting an obvious absence of Caucasian members. This forms a pointed commentary on segregation and separation as a source of social conflict. The language barrier also drives the plot – many plot elements hinge on the fact that various groups cannot understand each other, best represented by the sound bite moment when Yamamoto massacres a room of Mexican drug lords then retorts coolly in Japanese, “I understand ‘f*cking Japs’, a**holes”. It was no surprise that that line appeared on the movie’s trailer.

The film does not take itself too seriously – to best enjoy it, it is best if you don’t take it too seriously either. The blood effects have either not aged well, or were a conscious choice by to distance the audience from the brutality (as in his recent film, Zatoichi). The film starts slow, but very quickly ups its tempo into an arpeggio of killing blows. Yet after a while, the deaths blur into each other, the quality lost in the quantity, the meaning lost in the chaos. The acting is also spotty at points, complete with rigid English dialogue that sounds like subtitles being read – ironic for a film in which the language barrier was meant to be a plot device – not its shortcoming.

Categories
action chambara/chanbara jidai-geki literary adaptations

“Lady Snowblood”

Lady Snowblood/Shurayuki-hime (1973) is director Fujita Toshiya’s filmic adaptation of a manga originally published in Weekly Playboy. The film transcribes the title and plot from the manga written by Koike Kazuo and illustrated by Kamimura Kazuo. Kaji Meiko, in the lead role brings to life Kashime Shurayuki (Shurayuki-hime). The film’s cast also includes Nishimura Ko as Priest Dōkai, Kurosawa Toshio as Ashio Ryūrei, Daimon as Kashima Gō, Akaza Miyoko as Kashima Sayo and Okada Eiji as Tsukamoto Gishirō.

The film is the story of a young woman, Shurayuki, on a mission to avenge a crime committed against her family.  The crime is conveyed via a flashback sequence depicting Gō Kashima with his wife Sayo and young son Shiro (Uchida Shinichi) taking a walk on an idyllic sun-filled day. In a sudden attack, Kashima and son are murdered. Sayo is spared her life, only to be raped by the aggressors later. The film opens in a women’s prison, where Sayo, having been arrested for killing one of her aggressors, lies in a cell giving birth to Shurayuki.

Conceived out of suffering, she is born into a far-from-reconciled tragedy. Shurayuki is literally born in a prison cell, the symbolic significance of which becomes obvious when her mother dies of complications from childbirth. Sayo’s dying words utter Shurayuki’s fate: “For me there are things left undone…So I must let this child wreak my vengeance for me”. As sure as her words are spoken, Shurayuki is raised by Priest Dōkai, who trains her to become an assassin.  Her physical training is largely in the art of sword-fighting. She also receives mental training, largely in the philosophy of filial piety and fulfilling one’s destiny. At the age of twenty, fully trained, she begins her hunt for the perpetrators of the crime.

A significant aspect of the film is the articulation of Shurayuki’s isolation. Rhetorical devices such as dialogue are one manner in which this is achieved. However, specifically filmic elements are also employed. For example, Kaji Meiko’s first on-screen appearance is a canted angle shot of the title character hurrying through snow. Noticeably, there is no one else in the shot with her.  As she walks out of the frame, there is a jump cut to the next scene. This time, Shurayuki approaches the camera, walking against a wall located along the left of the screen. This shot appears to convey that Shurayuki must sequester herself. Keeping close to the wall, face hidden behind an umbrella, one seems to experience her heightened sense of awareness. It is as though having been born for a very specific pre-destined purpose; Shurayuki exists within the vacuum of her vengeance duty.

Another significant stylistic element is the employment of self-reflexivity. The film refers to its source not only in the appropriation of the plot, but in the editing of the narrative as well. For example, the film consists of four chapters, which invokes a literary nuance. Further, the film is visually inter-cut with photomontages, manga images, and even moments of anime. What results is an interruption of the filmic narrative, which appears to function as an appeal to the plot’s origins in popular culture. As such, the film reveals that although it is seemingly of the jidai-geki genre, it is in fact being told in the present. This is not unlike the way a manga in its very form reveals its contemporary perspective.

The film is a must-see for any Quentin Tarantino fans; the most avid will likely have already seen it. The Kill Bill trilogy is based quite intimately on Lady Snowblood. In juxtaposition, the similarities between the two films reveal how truly avant-garde Fujita’s vision was.

Categories
action drama, melodrama extreme

“Battle Royale”

Battle Royale, directed by Fukasaku Kinji and released in 2000, is a controversial film which depicts middle-school classmates being forced to brutally fight to the death, and the moral struggles that naturally arise from this twisted game. The film stars Kitano Takeshi as the cold and complex teacher overseeing his class’s battle, and Fujiwara Tatsuya as a student of the class, and the main protagonist. The violent and explicit content involving 15 year olds created much controversy around the film, and perhaps due to this it collected more attention and has now become a sort of cult-classic. If you don’t mind the amount of death and violence in the film, it actually offers something of interest for most of its viewers—whether it be discussing the nature of humans and morality, or simply enjoying the creative carnage.

The film’s events are set in a fictional, modern Japan that is mired in societal and economic failure, with a notable conflict between the adult and youth generations. The film opens with this statement: “At the dawn of the millennium, the nation collapsed. At 15% unemployment, ten million were out of work. 800,000 students boycotted school. The adults lost confidence and, fearing the youth, eventually passed the Millennium Educational Reform Act, AKA: the BR Act.” This BR(Battle Royale) Act, which forms the basis for the whole film, is an extreme law that states that at the end of every school year, one class among all of Japan’s school classes is to be randomly selected, taken to an abandoned island, given weapons, and told to kill each other. Furthermore, each of the students is fitted with a collar that explodes upon removal, and can be detonated by those overseeing the event.  The last student remaining alive wins and is allowed to return home, though, if there is no single winner after 3 days, all the collars are detonated. The film follows a class selected by the BR Act, and mainly focuses on two of the 15 year old students: Nanahara Shuya, a good-natured boy, and Nakagawa Noriko, a quiet and more reserved girl. While various other characters’ confrontations are also shown, most of the film shows these two students’ cooperative struggle to survive in a battlefield of both classroom friends and enemies.

What the film succeeds mostly in is presenting an original, thought-provoking scenario while also pleasing more casual viewers with intense action and a plot that is rather simple, though housed in the genuinely interesting idea of the BR Act. The intensity of the film is undeniable, as naturally frequent shootouts and skirmishes breakout. However, even simple dialogues between characters become life-threatening, as the students must cautiously guess their classmates’ intents while struggling to decide their own. The idea of the film, the BR Act,  beckons violence and allows for a lot of creative freedom regarding the actual events within the battle, and the content reflects this. The variety of characters and the humorous variety of weapons given makes for scenes one may never see in any other movie, such as a chubby student wielding a crossbow, torn in indecision and crying as he chases and flings deadly arrows at his colleagues. This short scene highlights the success of the film: one can enjoy contemplating the complete reversal of morals and the mental struggle as friends are forced to kill each other to survive, or one can simply enjoy the brutal, creative combat that consistently arises. The film does have a morally-sound hero that is likable, so other viewers can enjoy taking a strong focus on the plot and the protagonists’ struggles, rather than the gore, violence, and philosophical discussions in this film. In this sense, though it is perhaps too explicit for some, this is a film that offers a lot to enjoy for a wide audience.

A clear and prevalent theme of the film is morals being either embraced or forgotten, and the struggles inherent in coming to decide on one way or the other. The true nature of human beings is brought into question as we view what feels like a social experiment, where any law and authority is completely removed. It is interesting to watch what the different students come to value when faced with this game. Many value those they love, making it their mission to protect friends, or admit their feelings to their high-school crushes. Many hold onto their morals and commit suicide early on, unable to participate in such an illicit game. Some become independent killing machines, seeking revenge or pleasure, such as one girl who uses her sexual power to tempt and kill male classmates, or another student who just enjoys everything about the game. We essentially see a mini-society where power and authority is decided by who is willing to kill and who isn’t. Power is there for those who want it, and the film really seems to ask its audience if they would embrace such power, or hold onto the moral beliefs that keep much of our human society in order.

I highly recommend Battle Royale to any viewer who is not too discouraged by the amount of death and violence. The film is definitely original, and presents a scenario that one cannot help but contemplate inserting themselves into and speculating on their own actions. For many, the ingenuity of the film alone is appealing enough, but in content it succeeds in presenting intense and creative action, though often crossing the line for some. There are some scenes that do feel out of place or too contrived; this is not a perfect film. Having said that, its flaws should not hinder the overall experience too much, and the film offers enough to think about and enjoy for a wide range of audiences.

Categories
action drama, melodrama jidai-geki literary adaptations

The Winds of Change, Akira Kurosawa’s “Ran”

After a monumental career, Kurosawa Akira directs his last great epic in 1985’s Ran. Although Kurosawa would continue making films after Ran, they would not approach the scope and scale of this highly celebrated film. Set in ancient Japan, the film is a jidaigeki (period-piece) about an aging warlord ceding power to his three sons. The story, itself an interpretation of William Shakespeare’s King Lear, focuses on the themes of aging, regret, and change. To portray these themes it was necessary for Kurosawa to enlist highly talented actors. This was especially true for the complex lead role of Lord Ichimonji whose gradual self-destruction is brilliantly realized by Tatsuya Nakadai. Alongside Nakadai are Terao Akira, Nezu Jinpachi, and Ryu Daisuke playing his sons Taro, Jiro and Saburo respectively. Shinnosuke ‘Peter’ Ikehata also makes an appearance as Lord Ichimonji’s inseparable jester.

The film opens with a hunting expedition in the mountains held by Lord Ichimonji, his three sons, several advisors and his jester Kyoami. Lord Ichimonji, after a startling dream, uses this occasion to express his plan to abdicate the throne. The decision to hand power to his sons is met with mixed reaction. His youngest son Saburo becomes increasingly insolent, vehemently speaking his mind and is ultimately banished. Because Saburo is now out of the picture, Lord Ichimonji leaves all his power and territory to his two eldest sons Taro and Jiro, with the intention to live out his remaining days as their guest. This change to the balance of power quickly gives rise to conflict as Jiro is envious of his elder brother’s superior position, and Lord Ichimonji does not adapt well to his new lack of authority. In the chaos that ensues, Taro and Jiro plot each other’s demise while Lord Ichimonji is shunned by both and left to wander the countryside. The brother’s conflict quickly leads to war, and Lord Ichimonji, consumed by guilt for his past atrocities, grows increasingly insane. As the film progresses, many lives are lost, and the sins of Lord Ichimonji’s past haunt him in his quest for solace.

Among the key themes Kurosawa addresses in his film is the concept of change. The film’s title itself, Ran, can be roughly translated as ‘chaos’. Although there is much chaos found within the film, all the chaos stems from change, and the evolution of order into disorder. One way Kurosawa represents change is by continuously returning to brief shots of the sky, and more specifically of clouds transforming. In the opening scene of the film, Lord Ichimonji takes a nap after a day of hunting wild boar. During this nap Kurosawa inserts a brief but telling shot of the clouds shifting. As implied by the foreshadowing, change is quickly instituted as Lord Ichimonji awakens from his dream and announces his plan to abdicate. Kurosawa often returns to this device throughout the film, and the transformation of the clouds becomes more rapid and threatening as the conflict they oversee escalates.

A large portion of the film deals with Lord Ichimonji drifting through the countryside tortured by his past and his inability to change it. During his descent into madness, the only person to remain by his side is his jester Kyoami. Kurosawa utilizes Kyoami to not only provide contrast to Lord Ichimonji’s rambling, but also to narrate the film. In this manner, Kyoami is like a cryptic benshi, explaining the plot development through metaphor. In one scene Kyoami orates a seemingly random story of a bird choosing to look after a snake egg because it is white and pure. After the egg hatches, the bird is attacked. This story reflects the situation of Lord Ichimonji being betrayed by Taro and Jiro who had previously appeared more innocent and loving than Saburo.

In addition to excellent character development, beautiful cinematography and an engaging musical score, Ran also includes several elaborately staged battle scenes. These scenes are brought to life through the use of countless extras, filling the ranks of Kurosawa’s impressive armies. Similar to his previous films such as 1980’s Kagemusha, Kurosawa seems intent on showing the brutality of war and focuses on the casualties more so than the action itself. This element of action serves to drive the plot and is also highly entertaining on an purely aesthetic level.

Throughout his career Kurosawa was responsible for making several epic films of this proportion, and the accumulation of his experience and artistry is well displayed in Ran. Because the film delivers on both an intellectual level, and is engaging to watch due to the excellent acting performances and thrilling battle scenes, audiences of a wide range can enjoy this classic of Japanese cinema.

Categories
action chambara/chanbara gendai-geki

“The Machine Girl”: Guns, Gore, a Girl and More!

Iguchi Noboru’s The Machine Girl (2008) is a fast-paced action film that defies genre conventions.  The film follows Ami, a college student who exacts revenge on school bullies and their yakuza connections after they kill her brother and cut her arm off. The film’s combination of choreographed fight scenes, excessive gore, and playful humour provides a stark contrast to Japanese filmic tradition. His excessive use of violence is characteristic of Japanese cinema, however, the excessive gore is indicative of how desensitized to violence modern audiences are. The film uses several parodist elements in order to redefine Japanese film, making it self-aware. The juxtaposition of iconic imagery also suggests a change in Japanese film. Iguchi uses excessive violence, parodist elements, and the juxtaposition of iconic imagery to subvert Japanese filmic tradition.

Excessive gore and violence is certainly part of Japanese filmic tradition, however, Iguchi takes this aspect of Japanese film and makes the violence even more over-the-top. Anderson and Richie in their book The Japanese Film: Art and Industry state, “Pointless killing is one of the main features of the Japanese film, whether chambara or modern gangster movie” (318). They go even further explicating that “Japanese films also tend to accentuate the attendant gore” (Anderson 318). Anderson and Richie use the noise of bones breaking as a kid jumps on his chest in Nikkatsu’s Beyond the Green (1955) as an example. This example pales in comparison to the gore and violence in Iguchi’s The Machine Girl.

In one scene, Ami shoots one of the hitmen for the yakuza in the face. As her machine gun goes off we are exposed to the bits of flesh coming off, slowly exposing the facial muscles. The blood spurts everywhere almost like a fountain from the man’s neck. The hitman is still alive, and we are made aware of this through his frantic running and screaming. This attempt to make the gore even more over-the-top is an active attempt to point out how violence is ingrained in modern culture. He suggests that nowadays it is not enough to see a person get shot; to provoke a response, that person must have his flesh slowly blown away as he screams in agony.

The film’s self-reflexivity lends it to be a critique of the way Japanese culture is portrayed in contemporary media. Roland Kelts in his book Japanamerica: How Japanese Pop Culture Has Invaded the U.S explicates how Japanese culture is portrayed in the United States. Kelts argues that the American conception has a lot to with manga and anime, describing it as “playful, colourful, cute, and sometimes crazy” (208). The Machine Girl definitely plays with this conception of culture to convey a sense of irony.

In the film, Ami searches for one of the bullies who killed her brother. After an extended fight with the bully’s parents, the mother dips Ami’s hand in tempura batter before deep frying her arm. Ami slowly reveals her arm which looks like a giant piece of tempura. The scene is cartoon-like, clearly parodying manga and Japanese anime. However, the scene is still brutal as it does depict a young girl getting her arm burnt. The anime-like aspects of the scene are contrasted by the harsh screams of Ami, a character that the audience identifies with. In introducing the brutality into this parody, Iguchi suggests that there is something wrong with this conception of Japanese culture. Although it can be seen as playful, colourful, and sometimes crazy, there is a sense of brutality underlying the superficial conception of Japanese culture.

Iguchi uses contrasting imagery to explicate the state of Japanese cinema, suggesting that it is not immune to the effects of an increasingly globalized culture. The katana, a sword used most often in chambara films, is iconic because it represents a whole genre of Japanese film. Although the katana is used in the film, Ami primarily uses a machine gun. The machine gun is also iconic; it is a product of the 80’s action film in the United States. In the final scene, a bloody Ami walks towards a katana with a machine gun for an arm. The camera slowly revolves around Ami as she lifts the sword upwards; as the camera revolves we are shown more of the machine gun until she strikes her final pose; katana and machine-gun pointing straight at the camera. The scene is the synthesis of American and Japanese filmic tradition. Ami openly accepts both weapons, clearly accepting the globalized nature of film. By combining these iconic images Iguchi seems to be a proponent for the integration of western tropes into Japanese cinema.

Iguchi Noboru’s The Machine Girl is an outlandish film that is entertaining to watch. I would recommend this film due to its originality and over-the-top gore. It’s cartoon-like violence and unrealistic special effects make the gore bearable. Although the film is clearly exploitative in nature, it does have academic value. Iguchi actively subverts Japanese filmic tradition through over-the-top violence, parodist elements, and the juxtaposition of iconic images. The film is a throwback to both American and Japanese film, but in borrowing elements from these filmic traditions Iguchi creates a film that is certainly unique.

Bibliography

Anderson, Joseph L., and Donald Richie. The Japanese Film: Art and Industry. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 1982. Print.

Kelts, Roland. Japanamerica: How Japanese Pop Culture Has Invaded the U.S. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006. Print.

Categories
action extreme

“The Machine Girl”

The Machine Girl is an action film from Nikkatsu Productions, directed by Iguchi Noboru, and stars Minase Yashiro as the main character Hyuga Ami , a high school girl out to avenge the death of her little brother. The movie also stars Sugiura Asami as Sugihara Miki and Ishikawa Yuya as Sugihara Suguru, parents of Ami’s brother’s friend, who help Ami with her revenge. The main antagonist in this movie is played by Shimazu Kentarou, who is Kimura Ryugi, a yakuza leader of a gang that was descended from a ninja clan. This is a simple action B-movie with lots of gore, but I found the draw of the movie lies not in its excuse plot or static and stereotypical revenge-story character behaviour. The draw was in the quirky character designs, which I shall elaborate on later. The movie starts off with a gang of students bullying a boy by practising throwing knives at an apple above his head. They are about to bombard him with knives, but our protagonist, Ami, intervenes. She tells them that their gang killed her brother, and proceeded to cut off one of the bullies’ arms. Then she shows them her missing left arm, which she then attaches a machine gun to, which is the movie’s way of telling us that she’s the titular character. After the bullies are dead, Ami begins a flashback which tells us how she lived before, how her brother died, and how she lost her left arm and gained a machine gun. The movie then shows us Ami’s revenge against those that killed her brother, with some bizarre fight scenes and lots of blood thrown in.

When they are first shown, the good main characters look very ordinary while wearing their everyday clothing. The bizarreness starts when they pull out their weapons. The main antagonists almost always look gaudy. In Ami’s first scene, she pulls out what looks like a kusari-gama, which is a sickle-like weapon for ninjas, and while it’s not a commonly seen weapon, is not very impressive. However, the kicker is her arm-mounted machine gun, which, in its first appearance, Ami spectacularly makes a show of putting it on her arm stump. I’ll admit that I thought that looked really cool, albeit a little cheesy. The mildest example of the villains is Kimura Sho, the person bullying Ami’s brother, who wears a standard boy’s school uniform, but with a clearly expensive leopard fur jacket. Even unnamed characters get a chance at being weird; one of the bullies’ parents look like a typical husband and wife, although more good looking than most couples would be when their son is of teenage age. The father suddenly pulls out a golf club to attack Ami, and then uses two as the fight continues. What I find to be the most ridiculous of the designs is in Kimura Violet, Sho’s mother. She wears a lightly decorated kimono but with its chest area exposed, thus showing her bra, which is typical attire for a sexy villain. However, her bra itself is a different story; it’s a drill, and it functions as her weapon. If this doesn’t get you to go, “Wait, what?” you need to tell me what you’ve been watching as it is clearly more ridiculous than this movie.

The lighting during the scenes is another aspect of the film I’d like to talk about. It’s easy to notice that during the ONE true happy scene in the movie, which is when Ami plays basketball for the first time in the movie, that the lighting is much brighter compared to the rest of the movie. The colours are much more vivid and you can actually see colour in the faces of the characters, which is best seen in the following scene where she jokes around with her brother. The rest of the movie looks like it was filmed through a grey filter to show the grimness of the situation. This is especially evident in the very first scene where Ami saves the student from the bullies, where, except for the blood, it seems like the film is black and white. The second time we see Ami play basketball still has an uplifting mood, but this event is after we find out her brother was being bullied, and the lighting is no longer bright. Then the movie throws a more complicated situation. Ami, when starting her revenge, gave us a happy psychotic smile as she kills the family of one of the bullies, but the lighting is bright, perhaps to suggest that, while the movie is going towards a less depressing tone, it’s not going to return to the innocent tone it had at the beginning.

I’d give this movie a solid 7 out of 10, as I really liked the general weirdness feel of the movie, which most Hollywood action flicks don’t have today. The characters are kind of unlikable, but I don’t think the director wants us to like them, seeing as they’re all morally deficient in some form or another. While some villains can be extremely likeable due to how awesome they are, like Heath Ledger’s Joker in The Dark Knight, none of the characters here, including the protagonists, was able to pull that off. The one thing I really liked about this movie compared to Hollywood is the camerawork during fighting, which, unlike Hollywood, is not shaky and focuses really well on the actions being taken. This serves to highlight the mediocre choreography and emphasizes the gore. So if you’re sick of being unable to see anything during fight scenes in movies, as long as you can handle cheesy special effects and fighting, movies of this genre may be a good place for you to start. This movie is definitely not for the faint of heart, however, especially with all the bizarre tortures and deaths.

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