We're Back! With Reviews!

DETROIT METAL CITY [Detoroito Metaru Shiti] (2008).
Directed by Toshio Lee.

You thought western Death Metal was absurd? Nothing beats the Japanese, and to illustrate just how weird it can get, cult favorite manga DMC is embraced by headbangers and non alike. While it is certainly a comic view of the hard rock world, it's also clearly a love letter to the world of popular music, good and bad (mainly bad), overall.

Toshio Lee's film adaptation of the manga is true to the source material, and because of that it is hammy, overblown and colorful -- in a good way. Kennichi Matsuyama (BRIGHT FUTURE, DEATH NOTE) stars as Negishi, a shy young man who longs to be a “trendy,” fashionable, Shibuya pop singer, but instead has found fame as his alter ego Johannes Krauser II, a KISS-style, clown-makeup heavy metal frontman of the band Detroit Metal City (DMC for short). Most of the story is caught up in his identity crisis. The girl he loves (but is too shy to ask out) detests Hard Rock and DMC in particular. As Negishi attempts to juggle both lives, he inadvertently humiliates love interest Yuri and nearly looses her to a jerky fashion designer. In the meantime, Negishi contemplates the incompatibility of his bandmates' personalities and is generally abused by the band's manager, a blond haired woman who puts cigarettes out on her own tongue and terrorizes everyone.

Broken by the realization that he will never achieve his dreams, Negishi gives up the Tokyo music scene and DMC to return to his family farm, only to find that Krauser has followed him. His mother more or less puts him on the right track and he returns for a satisfying wrap up.

L Change the World

L Change the World (2006) Hideo Nakata

I admit to having gone through an uncharacteristic (for me) love affair with all things Death Note. Mind you, the usual rule of thumb is that if I like a property it is doomed to be a failure, universally hated or leave people scratching their heads. Not so here! Death Note was a phenomenon in its native Japan, banned in China and controversial but hugely popular in the US.

I quite enjoyed Death Note I and II (see Shock Cinema Magazine #33) and was excited when one of my birthday gifts turned out to be the third film in the franchise. Some movie-savvy friends who attended a very early US screening of L reported back that it was "boring" and "confusing, and granted, if you haven't seen the other Death Note films or read the manga, no doubt that is an apt reaction to this complex, ongoing story line. The L novel, which was not written by either of the creators of the manga, is the only book in the series that I have not read, so I can't speak for the adaptation in this case. The first two films strayed from the manga but not to the detriment of the story telling, my guess is that the same methods were employed here. I'm not a hardcore fan who thinks an great adaptation is a pedantically accurate one.

The production values and cartoony CGI elements are the same high quality as the previous films, as is the acting. While I still feel the best performances of the series came in the form of Yagami Light and his police chief father (both rolls diminished here to video footage in the backgrounds), Quirky detective L is at top form, acting weird, being a jerk and eating enough sugar to make even a hard core junk-food addict swear off sweets for good. That Ken'ichi Matsuyama can actually carry a film without the benefit of more seasoned performers surrounding him (Tatsuya Fujiwara starred in Battle Royal before playing Light as well as a host of other projects for a fairly young guy, and Takeshi Kaga is a legend) makes me more interested to see him in the upcoming Detroit Metal City. Shunji Fujiura returns briefly as Watari, the Alfred to L's Bruce Wayne, before being dispatched much the way he was in Death Note II.

This story takes place just after film two ends. L, "the world's greatest detective" has twenty days left to live (it has to do with the way he solved the mystery of the first two films, I won't try to explain) and yet there is a weaponized virus on the loose and a group of eco-terrorists that must be stopped before his time is up! Worked into this mix is a small Thai boy-genius who is immune to the bio-weapon plague, a teenybopper who's father is a brilliant Virologist, and said virologist's sexy co-worker Dr Kujo (and ultimately the baddy of the story) played by Youki Kudoh -- the Karaoke belting kid of Sogo Ishi's 'Crazy Family' - all grown up and lovely (but still crazy!). Since this plot is not driven by the Death Note device, the weird-shit-factor in the form of the CGI Shinigami are kept to minimum, a cameo even, which is a shame because I really got a kick out of Ryuk's excellent voice actor, Shido Nakamura. Be warned that, as the rule in third sequels, the kids factory in pretty heavy -- not Mad Max Beyond Tunderdome heavy, but still... Also, it seems odd to tack such a happy, positive message to a series that is characteristic for projecting an ugly, cynical view of the human race and stars a character who you know perfectly well is doomed because you saw him die in the previous film. Hmmm. Director Nakata (Honogurai mizu no soko kara- Dark Water, Ringu), does what he can with the material and keeps it moving along - no small feat considering it clocks in over two hours long - but certainly not his most dynamic attempt either. One does get the feeling this veteran horror film director relished the flesh-eating-virus scenes. Nice cinematography by Tokusho Kimura (Ju-on, Kiyoshi Kurosawa's Cure) ties the visuals together. Certainly an entertaining addition, but really this is aimed at the Death Note fans, newcomers would do better to start elsewhere.

More adventures with Netflix

There was a time when renting wild import DVDs just didn't happen (unless you lived near Kim's Video or TLA rentals in NYC,and even then...) but now all sorts of neat releases pop up on Netflix, and while it takes me a while to work through them, some are worth pointing out. Here is one such example:

Wool 100% (Cinema Epoch)is a nice bit surrealist cinema, it's unorthodox approach is on display right from the opening credits. It tells the story of two elderly spinsters who live in a house covered by junk they have collected over the years. One day on a garpage picking outing they find a basket of rough, red wool and take it back to their Collier Brothers-esque lair. In the night it attracts a naked young woman who uses it to knit a really ugly sweater, she then collapses in despair screaming that she'll have to knit it all over again, leaving the sisters to cope with this unlikely chaos in their previously controlled and ordered world.

The junk especially is treated with great love and detail by the director. The sisters pour over garbage left on the street like jewelers over diamonds. They carefully catalogue all their finds in sketchbooks, complete with detailed drawings. The sisters themselves are artfully constructed. They dress in early Showa period fashion (1930's) one in western style the other in Japanese, their silver bob hair doos giving them the look of advertising art from the era. As a matter of fact, themselves, their house, their collections are so lovingly cultivated that it is almost heartbreaking to watch the knit obsessed little savage break it all up.

Gorgeously shot, edited and designed, Mai Tominga's fantasy is reminiscent of Jeunet and Caro's Delicatessen and City of Lost Children without being derivative. A good companion film to Nobuhiko Obayashi's (not released in the US) Hausu or underrated Higuchinsky's Uzumaki. Fantastic.

Tokyo Zombie, import disc paradise:

You can keep your Johnny Depps, Brad Pitts and other pretty-boys-gone-weird! Tadanobu Asano tops my short list of performers who could recite the phone book and somehow manage to make it an interesting experience. For such a good looking guy he has an uncanny way of making himself seem awkward and unsexy regardless of the situation, whether running from angry thugs through the woods in his tighty whities (Sharkskin Man and Peach Hip Girl), stomping his way clumsily through Dance Dance Revolution (Last Life in the Universe), or wandering naked in an unsettling, surreal landscape and burying his face in the stomach of a decaying corpse(Rampo Jugoku). He's played suicidal losers, homicidal sociopaths, and obsessed boyfriends for just about every notable maverick director in Japan -- Kiyoshi Kurawasa and Sogo Ishi just to name a few. In Tokyo Zombie he plays a Jujitsu-fixated, afro sporting moron who hangs out with his middle aged buddy, the awesome Sho Aikawa of Dead or Alive fame. Really all we're missing is Riki Takeushi and it would be Japanese cult-movie heaven. No surprise that director Sakichi Sato's most notable screen credits are as a script writer for Takeshi Miike's Gozu and Ichi The Killer. Fun fact: Sato has appeared in several films as well, including his performance as 'Charlie Brown Waiter' in Kill Bill Vol 1.

Asano's Fujio is a brute with the mind of a child, Aikawa's Micchan is an aging hypochondriac who dreams of passing his Jujitsu skills to Fujio before he dies. They work at a factory in view of a giant trash heap in the middle of Tokyo dubbed "Black Fuji." When Fujio kills their abusive boss they decide to bury him in the trash heap (not an unusual idea as indicated by a young man burying his mother alive at the behest of his bitchy girlfriend, a school teacher disposing of a pantless student, oh and the numerous zombies now digging their way to the surface). It quickly becomes evident that the zombies are a growing problem, so our two heroes jump in their gaily painted delivery truck (complete with lace curtains) and hit the road for.... Russia?!? Why Russia? Because its Manly! Never mind that you can't drive to Russia from Japan... Micchan directs Fujio to drive North (because Russia is North) so of course he mistakenly goes South, requiring the pair to back track through Tokyo again where they rescue a the foul mouthed Yoko who is trying to escape zombies with a convenience store cash register in tow. And you know it will just get sillier as the story progresses. Jokes about homosexuality abound considering the two leads spend a good deal of screen time locked in Jujitsu holds, everyone they encounter is either violent, corrupt or perverted which works out well when they are, in turn, eaten by zombies. Horror Manga legend Kazuo Umezo (in his trademark striped shirt) makes an appearance as an expert on Paranormal phenomenon who seems rather excited that Zombies have "finally" made it to Japan, and demonstrates with gusto the removal of the head as the only solution. An animated segue fast forwards the story into a post apocalyptic Japan with blood sport for the bored Nuevo Riche... and a cliff hanger ending to top things off!

If you've been pinning for a successor to Wild Zero, Tokyo Zombie is just what you've been waiting for. Ok, so maybe Guitar Wolf doesn't pop up, but Japanese indie band The Homesicks rock the credits and obscure Toyko club scenesters Kamaboiler are already rumored to have rolls in the yet un-filmed sequel. A love letter to Eastern and Western Horror and B-films, this pop culture matsuri made my day.

I think they should have Saturday Morning Cartoons for Grownups...

I've come to the slow realization that comic books are about to become a much larger part of my life... so in that spirit, I thought I would go over some of my favorite animated projects that have been available State side at one time or another.

I'll start with Tekkon Kinkreet: Based on the manga of the same name by French influenced Japanese artist Taiyo Matsumoto, this is the first real project by Studio 4C to reach the US legitimately. Long time readers of Shock Cinema may recall Mind Game from the Film Flotsam section of the magazine a few issues back. Well, this is the same group of people with an American ex-pat at the helm (don't be put off, all you anime purists, he's worked for the company for years -- hello, Animatrix). The film captures both the style and esoteric story telling of the source material and will probably confound your average US viewer. Case in point: They are eating it up in France.

Speaking of France, I recently went looking for the English language release of Les Mondes Engloutis, or Spartikus and the Sun Beneath the Sea. This aired in the mid 80's in the US along with a package of Japanese-animated-for-French-TV Saturday morning fare. This French made, two season series was by far the most memorable. While the animation is stunted, it perfectly compliments the design and story. It would make a nice companion to Tekkon Kinkreet, but it is unavailable. Oh poo. If you do find yourself confronted with a musty old VHS copy, be forewarned that the US and Spanish release included the treacley pop stylings of Menudo over the end credits. UK and German viewers were spared this indignity.

Because of the sheer volume of animation that comes out of Japan, it may seem like that's where all the cool stuff is. Sure, I'll happily watch Paranoia Agent for the third time, or FLCL for the tenth, but I'm not an anime fan over all. I mean, good animation is just, well, good animation. That is why the Popeye The Sailor 1933-1938 is still at the top of my Netflix queue. A four disc set, arranged chronologically, re-mastered... a wet dream for Fleischer fans everywhere.

Oh, what I wouldn't do for a clean copy of the English dub of Felidae, a German animated feature from the mid 90's. Complete with swearing, sex and violence, a feline Sam Spade tries to solve the mystery of grisly cat murders in his new neighborhood. The Disney-eque style compliments the dark subject matter perfectly. Watch it with The Plague Dogs for a double bill of not so cute and fuzzy.


I still have a stack of animated oddities to make way through, so I'll end my commentary for now, but I'm sure I'll be back with more as I'm always on the look out for the next mind blowing feature in my favorite film category -- Animation!