this week's armload
...is smaller and yet, no less invigorating.
- A Snake of June
[2002, Japanese, dir: Shinya Tsukamoto] A brief (77 minutes long) but deeply engaging drama about a married couple brought closer by creepy and erotic circumstance, A Snake of June is only for the adventurous filmgoer, and I'm not being lewd here when I say that. No innuendo intended: the film is one that if you have very mainstream sensibilities, you will not like or understand or complete or stand for it. A history of foreign film, pornography and marital crisis will lead you to a better appreciation of it, though those elements certainly are not required. Nor are they indicative of the film itself. It may seem creepy and lurid, but becomes erotic and freeing in an overtly sexual way. It may seem to supplant a steady (if staid) marriage with conflict, but ends on a happier and healthier note than most marriage dramas. Finally, it is artfully made without thumbing its nose at the viewer.
Considering it comes from the director of Tetsuo: The Iron Man, it's downright serene, cinematically-speaking. Of course, renting Tetsuo as a primer to the director's work would be challenge enough. This is one of the best films I've seen this year, and it's caught me by surprise in a big way. Sometimes those are the most rewarding ones.
- Gantz/Samurai Champloo
Two anime series with two distinct problems: one never delivers on the promise of something unique, and the other delivers almost too well.
Gantz is a tale of two teens who are killed in a freakish subway incident, but wake up to find themselves in a small apartment with several strangers and a black sphere. They are dead, it would seem, and yet the sphere gives them instructions to go into the city and destroy an alien being. Once done, they are given a score, and then sent back to their normal lives...until it's time to take part in another hunt. This sounds far more interesting than it appears, mainly because of the execution of the narrative. For a half-hour show in which long segments take place without anything really happening and no answers to the mysteries therein being provided, it becomes tiresome very quickly. I have now watched the first 10 episodes, and let's just say I'm uncertain how many more I can watch without some payoff.
Samurai Champloo, by contrast, is quick, witty, colorful, jaunty, funny...interesting in every way. Imagine Akira Kurasawa's Yojimbo and The Hidden Fortress crossed with Cowboy Bebop's lackadaisical attitude and trendy visuals, all tied neatly off with a hip-hop edge that seems fresh despite its bordering on anachronistic. The story follows two adversarial samurai (one calm and disciplined, the other a loose cannon) who travel with a young teahouse waitress as she searches for a man we know nothing about. Their quest repeatedly places them in the middle of local disputes, Yakuza wars and other skirmishes, and they rarely see closure to any event without at least three good sword fights. It's a really fun show, and thanks to Adult Swim we don't have to wait on each subsequently released DVD (though watching in the original Japanese with subtitles is more rewarding).
The only downside is that of the 7 or 8 episodes I've seen so far, I don't feel like I'm getting to know enough about the characters and their motivations, though I certainly don't mind the wait. The big difference between Gantz and Champloo is that the former seems to be driving itself very slowly into the ground, while the latter can - almost - walk on water.
- A Snake of June
[2002, Japanese, dir: Shinya Tsukamoto] A brief (77 minutes long) but deeply engaging drama about a married couple brought closer by creepy and erotic circumstance, A Snake of June is only for the adventurous filmgoer, and I'm not being lewd here when I say that. No innuendo intended: the film is one that if you have very mainstream sensibilities, you will not like or understand or complete or stand for it. A history of foreign film, pornography and marital crisis will lead you to a better appreciation of it, though those elements certainly are not required. Nor are they indicative of the film itself. It may seem creepy and lurid, but becomes erotic and freeing in an overtly sexual way. It may seem to supplant a steady (if staid) marriage with conflict, but ends on a happier and healthier note than most marriage dramas. Finally, it is artfully made without thumbing its nose at the viewer.
Considering it comes from the director of Tetsuo: The Iron Man, it's downright serene, cinematically-speaking. Of course, renting Tetsuo as a primer to the director's work would be challenge enough. This is one of the best films I've seen this year, and it's caught me by surprise in a big way. Sometimes those are the most rewarding ones.
- Gantz/Samurai Champloo
Two anime series with two distinct problems: one never delivers on the promise of something unique, and the other delivers almost too well.
Gantz is a tale of two teens who are killed in a freakish subway incident, but wake up to find themselves in a small apartment with several strangers and a black sphere. They are dead, it would seem, and yet the sphere gives them instructions to go into the city and destroy an alien being. Once done, they are given a score, and then sent back to their normal lives...until it's time to take part in another hunt. This sounds far more interesting than it appears, mainly because of the execution of the narrative. For a half-hour show in which long segments take place without anything really happening and no answers to the mysteries therein being provided, it becomes tiresome very quickly. I have now watched the first 10 episodes, and let's just say I'm uncertain how many more I can watch without some payoff.
Samurai Champloo, by contrast, is quick, witty, colorful, jaunty, funny...interesting in every way. Imagine Akira Kurasawa's Yojimbo and The Hidden Fortress crossed with Cowboy Bebop's lackadaisical attitude and trendy visuals, all tied neatly off with a hip-hop edge that seems fresh despite its bordering on anachronistic. The story follows two adversarial samurai (one calm and disciplined, the other a loose cannon) who travel with a young teahouse waitress as she searches for a man we know nothing about. Their quest repeatedly places them in the middle of local disputes, Yakuza wars and other skirmishes, and they rarely see closure to any event without at least three good sword fights. It's a really fun show, and thanks to Adult Swim we don't have to wait on each subsequently released DVD (though watching in the original Japanese with subtitles is more rewarding).
The only downside is that of the 7 or 8 episodes I've seen so far, I don't feel like I'm getting to know enough about the characters and their motivations, though I certainly don't mind the wait. The big difference between Gantz and Champloo is that the former seems to be driving itself very slowly into the ground, while the latter can - almost - walk on water.
posted by scn at 11:27 AM
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