Miike and friend
About 2 months ago I saw my first Miike film. For those that don't know, Takeshi Miike is a Japanese director who, since directing his own movies about ten years ago has made over 30 movies. Like all the great film directors he's jumped around in generes -- from the ultra violent to musical comedy to (his next film, rumor has it) family adventure. But his bread and butter is in the crazy fucked-up violent genre. In all actuality he's invented his own genre.
The first Miike movie I saw was Ichi the Killer. Good god almighty, this movie bent me over, made me its bitch, and made me wonder how I ever lived without it. It is hands down the most violently bizarre, disturbingly hilarious, mind bendingly fun movie I have ever seen.
Ichi is this mentally unstable guy with a permanent hard-on who has gotten picked on all his life. He lives with these two guys (one of which aparently has the ability to painfully transform himself into a huge strongman twice his normal size--very cool scene) who can get Ichi to kill whomever they want dead by brainwashing him into thinkning that person was one of the bullies from his past. I suppose having a permanent boner will get you going into a frenzy, and that combined with knife size razors popping out of the shoes of your rubber superhero outfit will do some serious damage. And Miike's eye never flinches.
But the real star of this movie is Kakihara. He's the guy who's scarred up face you'll find on most covers/posters of the movie.
Ichi has killed his boss, and it's Kakihara's job to find out who did it (his interogation efforts resulting in one of the more gruesome torture scenes I've ever seen). Although Kakihara loves and misses his boss dearly because without him there's no one around to give him the beatings and punishment he longs for, once he finds out Ichi is the killer he is desperate to track down this guy who seemingly can dish out the brutality that Kakihara's been longing for his whole life.
The R-1 version that's you'll find at your local video store is supposed to be missing some of the more extreme moments of the original Japanese version--but really, it's pretty intense as it is. A great mind-fuck of I movie and I can't recommend it enough to anyone with a taste for a bit of the outlandish. It propells you with into it with utter exuberance from the first frame and all you can do is hold on, cringe and laugh. Right now it has a solid spot on my top 10 action movies.
Immediately after watching Ichi I had to bump up all my Miike movies on my Netflix queue. They couldn't get in the DVD player fast enough. Next up was Audition. A huge change in tone was immediately apparent. This one, for the most part, is much more subtle. It creeps up on you until the last 30 minutes or so when it does a 180 and punches you in the back of the head with one hell of a twisted suprise... Well, it is a Miike movie so it isn't that surprising.
It starts out with a mother dying in the hospital, leaving behind a father and son. We immediately jump foward and the kid is a teenager who's prodding his dad to live a little and maybe get a female companion before he gets too old. The guy agrees, and since he is a movie producer he decides, with the help of his friend, to hold auditions for the role of his wife under the false pretenses of casting a new movie. A good idea for a romantic comedy/drama, eh? That feeling quickly disintegrates into a lovely lingering trip to hell once we start getting the feeling that his choice of a new wife isn't quite Donna Reed.
By the time the credits roll you're left again with some of the most gruesome images and a Japanese female voice teasing "kitit-kitee". A great ride. As far as horror movies go I rank it right up there with the best of them. Very similar to the Exorcist in the way it build the feeling of dread right up to the climax that doesn't fail to deliver.
After those two the first Dead or Alive was abit of a let-down. And it wasn't just because the DVD crapped out on me right before the last chapter. It certainly does have it moments. The prolonged introduction is like the begining of Goodfellas transplated to Japan via Miike and edited by a schitzophrenic. It's a rush...
DOA 1
I'll comment on this one more later as I think I need to sit down with the complete DOA Trilogy to give it a fair appraisal. It's definately trying to make a Yakuza epic--in the same vein as Leone's western trilogy. Gangs and cops battling it out for supremacy while family and friends get caught up in it for the worse. There's some flashes of Miike having the kind of fun as with Ichi but I suppose the characters don't really allow for as much. Anyway--I'll get back to you on the subject. In the meantime--go get Ichi and Audition and give yourself some bad dreams.
The Cuddly Miike
1 comment:
...and people told me nothing would come of this...
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