So it seems Kitamura Ryuhei (director of zombie flick Versus) made another weirdo movie I hadn’t seen with a bunch of his favourite people. It has a lot of nice camera shots, gorgeous surreal stuffs, and smokey weird sets, and for a while its all about the psychotic minds of murderers being experimented on in some crazy secret prisonish human-experimentation lab thing.
It feels kinda familiarly stylized – especially when the witch enters the story and the crazed fighting starts. It is pretty messed up, but is so shiny and Kitmuralised (cant think of a better way to put it) it doesn’t feel as gritty as its plot synop would suggest.
Sakaki Hideo and Sakaguchi Taku are both also in Versus though this time swapping their good guy /villain roles around – actually there are like 10 actors from Versus in this movie. A swirly grey fight scene between the two is aptly entitled “Versus” for the nice homage to his own movie.
And yes, his cell mate is such a f*ckin d*ck. Right from the get go. All I want to do I punch him in the face, like, every time he speaks. Just ignore him, he f*cks off after a while. Just in case you were wondering.
So, a bit about the plot would probably help right? Well i will start from the middle and work to the begining - it actually makes more sense that way.
In order to save her sister, a witch with some weird bug inside her, Saehusa Asuka (Koyuki – yay! We all know how much I love her) and Matsuda (Sugata Shun) are conducting some weird ass experiments on psychotic prisoners who escaped the electric chair’s doomy deathness by being the perfect specimens for the cause.
In order to save her sister, a witch with some weird bug inside her, Saehusa Asuka (Koyuki – yay! We all know how much I love her) and Matsuda (Sugata Shun) are conducting some weird ass experiments on psychotic prisoners who escaped the electric chair’s doomy deathness by being the perfect specimens for the cause.
The sister, Yurika, played by the wonderful Ryo (Zeni Geba, Casshern, JOKER Yurusarezaru Sosakan, Ryusei no Kizuna, Suppli, Azumi, code blue, Iryuu, Welcome to the quiet room, should I go on?) is some waaaaay crazy cool mental weirdo with this thing that the military want as a weapon – this bug thing called isomer. She plays with everyone’s minds and in the hope that their prisoner-specimens will lose the plot and try to kill her.
The bug will leave its host for another with a stronger anger or savage will, but as of yet it has never left little miss crazy witch. She will be saved if only they can find someone who is more messed up than her.
Enter stage right: Tenshu (Sakaki), messed up by the memories of killing his girlfriend and her attackers after she had been horrifically assaulted. The transfer of the bug thing from Yurika to Tenshu is the plan behind the experiment. At least, it is to her, Asuka, and Matsuda, but there are others with ulterior motives they had not expected.
Enter stage right: Tenshu (Sakaki), messed up by the memories of killing his girlfriend and her attackers after she had been horrifically assaulted. The transfer of the bug thing from Yurika to Tenshu is the plan behind the experiment. At least, it is to her, Asuka, and Matsuda, but there are others with ulterior motives they had not expected.
I wasn’t expecting to like it – for some reason I always do this with Kitamura films, even though I tend to really enjoy them, I never expect to. I really don’t know why.
His direction is really recognisable and seeing actors I know well from other things (Koyuki for example) I can fully see it in action. Don’t mistake the stylised nature for over acting or anything like that, it is a specific feel explored by a few really interesting Japanese directors and it has become a technique in itself. It isn't over the top enough to be really manga style, but it is just enough to make it feel sci-fi and arty..
His direction is really recognisable and seeing actors I know well from other things (Koyuki for example) I can fully see it in action. Don’t mistake the stylised nature for over acting or anything like that, it is a specific feel explored by a few really interesting Japanese directors and it has become a technique in itself. It isn't over the top enough to be really manga style, but it is just enough to make it feel sci-fi and arty..
We have no unnecessary constant flashbacks to his girlfriend’s assault, a blessing for sure, and the story does lovingly twist up and go all crazy fighty nut bar with Sakaguchi, which was more interesting than all the arguing with the crazy cell mate dude at the start.
I do think they should have painted Sakaguchi’s skin rather than it being material (because I think it is meant to be his skin but it clearly creases like fabric) but it is no great mortal destruction of the movie. No great loss, just something i noticed. Sakaguchi, as usuall, was all hardcore-fighty man - this time some sort of weird isomer bug / human clone hybrid thing, looking like a cyber punk who would have felt at home in the goth club i used to go to as a teenager. But, y'know, actually cool.
F*ck sake, if you could see all the bugs I’m getting attacked by right now, I’ve got moths and crane flies flying at me from everywhere while I’m trying to f*cking write this. I just want to watch this film for god’s sake! Snoop totally just ate one that made the mistake of landing on the floor next to him. Hahaha good one my little puppy. Eat him. Eat him up.
*Sigh* back to the film.
So anyway, it is all dark and grey, so don’t get a sh*t copy, you’ll never know what the hell is going on. But it is very shiny and swirly ooo trippy fighty type stuff, and is what you could expect from typical Kitamura’s direction and of course his cheesy chums.
Check out Versus if you haven’t seen it, and Azumi (just the first one though), and also I liked Sky High – I really liked that one actually. He also directed the series of Sky High which I quite desperately want to see but haven’t gotten around to tracking it down yet.
I don’t know if this review has made any sense at all, but I can’t compete with the feckin’ bugs I have to contend with tonight. September sucks when you live outside.
movie poster:
~
No comments:
Post a Comment