jacqui-3 Reviews

Bach Cello Suite #5: Struggle for Hope (1997)

Art as Rorschach Test of an Artist

[9/10 · 4 August 2004]

I came to this after seeing Bando in Seijun Suzuki's YUMEJI (1991.) If the great filmmaker adores kabuki enough to get its biggest onnagata (male performer in female roles) star into a male role, what's Bando like in his natural habitat?

After the mutual admiration/love-fest in the beginning, Yo-yo ma and Bando get down to work. Ma has a personal agenda of reliving the tie he had with his deceased father through the Bach piece, with another prestigious artist. Bando wants to personalize the collaboration only as far as it frees him from the usual narrative constraints of his kabuki plays (this is apparent when Ma tries to link Bando's adoption by the prestigious kabuki community to loss of his own father, and Bando saw it -- like his collaboration with Ma -- as fulfilling his destiny of kabuki actor, not a family tragedy.)

Even though director Fichman sets it up as another divisive "East vs. West", "Male vs. Woman" piece of "art", soon we see the real show is in Bando translating Bach through his emotive movements that use gender as expression, not as a set biological fact. Meanwhile, Ma is suspended in his own intact world of cello-playing, ending his interaction with Bando (including eye contact!) at the development stage.

This is fascinating for anyone interested in the creative process: Ma seizes on a set idea and doesn't let go; he even interprets Bando's "performing for the heavens" not as the idea of human-universe unity, but as the Greco-Roman concept of Dionysian. At that point Bando "snaps" back "Don't think too much", and we see artists retreating back to their individual corners, out of their initial love affair-through-interpreter!

Bando truly is a fearless artist, unafraid to use what he already knows walking into unfamiliar territory of solo performance to someone else's emotional objectives. He comes up with a basic, technical pattern of movements for each piece in the 6-part suite, but goes above them to add the instinctive, emotional qualities of each theme. The most brilliant accomplishments of the 6 are the Bresson/Tarkovsky-like intensity of piece #4, "Prayer", and the amusing & lively #5 "Dream" -- which Dali & the Surrealists could learn from. Bando's "Dream" is neither a good one, nor a nightmare. It's just dreaming itself as rollicking, delicate motions like striking memories without control over the direction & speed of its consciousness. Brilliant stuff that pushes an art form beyond the usual level.

Gonza the Spearman (1986)

Interesting Period Piece, but...

[6/10 · 23 October 1999]

GONZA the SPEARMAN's true asset is the acting of Iwashita Shima, who has acted in many other films of director Shinoda (also her husband.) I actually sat down expecting to be blown away by the combination of cinematographer Miyagawa (Rashomon, Ugetsu), composer Takemitsu (Ran, Kwaidan) and Shinoda...but what a disappointment!

The picture is gorgeous to look at, and the sounds effectively disturbing when Iwashita bursts into her womanly rage and jealousy. Yet, GONZA does not hold well as a whole. The title character Gonza is a pretty boy-slash-expert-spearman, but his is a performance that is wooden at best. Much of his character is not demonstrated visually or by story, but rather we learn about his nature and personality through what others sing or speak of him.

Another bothersome aspect is the lack of relationship between people and space. You are likely to walk away from the picture feeling detached from the characters, because they just seem to float about on the streets, in this room and that, etc. I mean, static cutaway shots do not necessarily edit well together - to give a sense of Iwashita's opulence and isolation (although these were supposedly desired effects.)

This much said, GONZA is still quite an interesting adaptation of a puppet theatre play by Japan's "Shakespeare", Chikamatsu, an 18th century playwright. Shinoda wisely weaves together a parallel between the art of the tea ceremony and the stifling insitution and ideologies of marriage. The story is a tragic melodrama that ends in a bloody fare, which is really necessary to restore the sense of order both the play and film are suspect of criticism.

One especially haunting sequence of the film arrives just after the killing: that of a distraught woman by the sea, singing the song of her murdered lover - the spectre of whom gallops past her on a white horse (you may recall a similar sequence from Truffaut's Story of Adele H., where a maddened Adele hallucinates the lover who abandoned her.)

When a Woman Ascends the Stairs (1960)

The Will of a Woman

[9/10 · 23 October 1999]

This is my first Naruse film and, boy, what a treat it is! Hideko Takamine is simply brilliant in her evocation of a madame in the ginza bar district, where businessmen go in the after-hours for drinks, flattery, and anything else they can get their hands on.

Takamine's Keiko is a woman bound by social constraints: an aging mother who needs allowance from her daughter to get by, a brother who must be saved from prison because he forged legal documents, a nephew who needs money for operation, rich businessmen and corporate owners who want her body in exchange for petty patronage...

Despite all these attempts to stifle her, to drain her body, labor, and emotions for all their worth and resource, Keiko emerges from life's disappointements and heartbreaks the strong individual she tries to be. Her refusal to be defeated by family, men, the institution of the ginza bar and survival itself is reflected in many elements. The playful music, for example, discourages us from reducing the film to yet another tearjerking festival. Keiko herself is an intelligent and sophisticated commentator on her life as a particular kind of "fallen woman". Throughout the film, there are moments of narration and commentary on the ginza bar-mystique. Here we witness a resilence and self-respect so tremendous that the notion of "feminism" of Mizoguchi's women have to be reconsidered.

"Coming back was as bleak as a cold day in Winter. But certain trees bloom...no matter how cold the wind." WHEN A WOMAN ASCENDS THE STAIRS is a great testament to Takamine's acting wizardry and Naruse's sensitive treatment of the social construction of women - a particular way of brutalizing the individual.

Ah-chung (1996)

Fresh and Provocative

[9/10 · 22 October 1999]

Ah Chung may seem, on the surface, yet another Taiwanese film with characters that speak the Taiwanese dialect and dabbles in the lives of the lower stratum with a neorealistic flair. Tso-chi Chang, however, weaves together something that is so life-like that it captures the art and heart beyond the artifice of everyday life.

The story concerns a male youth named Ah Chung (or Diong-ah in the Taiwanese dialect) who graduates from high school and descends into a maelstrom of personal, familial, and communal conflicts. Ah Chung is going through the liminal stage of finding his place and aim in life. He is sent by his mother to a boot camp, training as one of the Eight Generals. This is a job in performing as a god in Taiwanese popular rituals and Ah Chung's mother believes it can bring spiritual and social goodwill to the much-troubled family: Financially strained mother who is a performer of "low-brow" entertainment, a kid brother who is somewhat retarded, a half-sister who is raped by his alcoholic father, and Ah Chung's listlessness which is easily sucked in by the local gang rivalry...

Chang's unobtrusive camera perfectly captures the tension, boredom, crisis, violence, and desire of a very particular way of Taiwanese life. The slow pace may put off viewers who are more used to the fast-paced action of super-suave elitism typical in Hollywood movies (as evidenced by one bored reviewer of Ah Chung at the Toronto Festival in '97/'98.) But Ah Chung will be a real treasure to those interested in unflinching, respectful, and honest portrayals of lives of resilience, courage, and will. Not to mention the gorgeous colors of the trance possession, melancholic lyricism of Ah Chung and grand-dad on the beach...

It is a testament that Taiwanese cinema should never put all its stakes on Hollywood imports. There is hope for all the stories and lives in need of being told.

A Chinese Ghost Story: The Tsui Hark Animation (1997)

enchanting tale & animation

[8/10 · 20 October 1999]

Reading all the reviews of "Don't expect to understand this one", I went in the theatre expecting another trashy eyecandy-piece...I came out loving it! The fact of the matter is, if you aren't already familiar with the Chinese folklore or myth of the love story between Xiao Qian and the tax collector Ning, you WILL find some ideas like the "ghost-busting" strange to comprehend. Actually the so-called ghostbusters have supernatural powers well-associated to Taoist masters, or elites of the popular rituals and religion in Chinese communities. (The other two "ghostbusters" recall wuxia/martial arts heroes in popular literature.)

This animated version is quite enjoyable as far as visualizing these stories well-known and dear to many Chinese. Having said that, there are also a lot of contemporary touches (e.g. the abusive boyfriend-ghost who seems a parody of the various Cantopop megastars giving another one of his "idolize me" concerts!)and musical numbers that are sometimes "Disney"-ish (having a song for the sake of the Disney-mation convention perhaps?) and at others really really gorgeous pop.

So, eyecandy it is but with very creative camera angles and enchanting colors. Very ambitious and hilarious! Recommended even if you don't want to mess with the subtitling (which reads rather strange anyway due to cultural relativism etc.) The luscious images and love story are "universal" enough to understand by anyone.

Streetwise (1984)

Powerful with some hesitations...

[15 October 1999]

Several times during this wrenching documentary, I found myself asking if these kids of the streets were paid well enough so they don't have to wait around for another documentarian to come along and probe their lives like this. Yes, it indeed is quite manipulative if Dewayne (or Duane? surname Pomeroy who committed suicide) and his Dad's tearjerking moment on the phone was scripted. But any considerations of manipulation aside, Streetwise is a well-made and nicely weaved together narrative for a subject that deserves all the attention it can get. However, I did find the shower scenes and the shot of the dead boy a little too much. Staged or not, these kids deserve more respect I think. Things like taking a shower and sleeping in your own coffin could be graphically hinted at or rendered less obnoxiously loud...these kids do not purport to be Bob Flanagan, whose dead body was captured on film for Sick and arguably justififed by his self-professed exhibitionistic impulses.

Vengeance Is Mine (1979)

Vintage Imamura

[9/10 · 28 September 1999]

Far from a film that explores the "whydunit?" of a ruthless but charming murderer, Vengeance of Mine bristles with all the energies Imamura believes the real Japanese possess. These people are in lower social positions and just trying to survive the brutality of day-to-day struggles. In their energy, courage, and perseverance to survive, Vengeance of Mine becomes beautiful and captivating to watch.

Admittedly, it is quite difficult to understand such stereotypes as murderer, tempted Catholic, prostitute, pimp/hotel owners, and delivery men as eccentric individuals in the space of two hours. But oddly enough, I feel a strange sense of familiarity in the hustle and bustle of these characters in the story. They may live their lives teetering on what is considered socially acceptable or healthful, but Imamura presents them with such respect and curiosity (of an anthropologist?!) - that I cannot resist feeling their robust lives leaping off the screen. In this way their seemingly bizzare and extreme behavior are very convincing, very real, and very touching.

Highly recommended for the challenging story (flashbacks, vignettes, illogical twists and turns of story and visual), quirky pace, idyllic country scenes, and the wonderful performance of Ken Ogata.

Darkman (1990)

See the Original = "Face of Another" (Teshigahara, 1966)

[25 September 1999]

For years I had no idea Darkman was just another Hollywood-approved remake of a foreign classic, Hiroshi Teshigahara's Face of Another (1966.)

Now that I've seen both: Please, if you ever get the chance, SEE THE ORIGINAL!!

It is gazillion times better than Rami's work. Don't dismiss the original based on its date, black and white, subtitles, or whatever...it is an incredible artistic and philosophical inquiry about the nature of identity and facial appearance. A much, much more elegant and experimental (read:daring, cliche-free, & thought-provoking)piece than Rami's remake.

The marriage of Takemitsu's music, Teshigaraha's direction, and Abe's novel/script is seamless. It will certainly wet your appetite for more wonderful offerings from the Japanese new wave (circa 60s-70s.)

See FACE OF ANOTHER (Tanin no Kao) if you want truly original cinema that surprises, challenges, and rewards the proactive film-goer.

Practical Magic (1998)

Watch it for Nic and Sandra

[6/10 · 28 July 1999]

The two ladies are simply amazing! If sexy legs and cleavage and up-all-night sisterly cuddles are your idea of good-natured fun (not without a bit of funky twist of the supernatural), then this movie will do you justice. Mmm.

Personally, I've never felt such intensely contradicting emotions during the course of one movie. Most of the times I'm grimacing for better plot development. That is, can the story dump the cliches with more confidence and truly explore real-life issues of women such as abuse --- instead of using it as a stepping-stone for sexy actresses to get wicked and 'bewitched'?!) The stock characters of the female townies, always adversary to the sister-witches, are truly embarrassing.

The film remains superficial precisely because it touches on, rather than develops, very complex phenomena like fear of witches (read: powerful women), competition among women, abusive relationships, women's cinderella dreams, fitting in, female ambitions (examplary housewife or wild slut - your pick), etc etc etc!!!! Instead these issues are *exploited* for a *greatly* uneven film: a hodge-podge of romance, black/family comedy-drama, suspense, crime story, science fiction...We CAN still have a fun and exciting movie with a story that focuses on, respects, and gives its all to one or two of these topics without using them for their surface/shock values (really!)

It's highly possible that the film started out with a solid good script based on the book and gets tampered with by the studio for maximum appeal later on. The most horrifying aspects for me? The flying witches at the end (oh GAWD!) The strange cut from the sexual passions of the main romance to a weird-and-weak confrontation with the supernatural undead boyfriend (as if the effects people are itching to drop a load of Hollywood eye candy - even at expense of awkward development!) And the overall stereotypical typecasting of women.

The only enjoyable elements left of the film are the two female leads. I have to admire their courage and creativity in some of the absolutely ludicrous moments (midnight magarita, flying as witches, one nibbling on the other's ear...) And that atmospheric opener with grandma-witch who got knocked up by an unfaithful member of the male species and is crying up a storm toward an open sea?....just fastforward to Nic and Sandra. Or pop in Witches of Eastwick for a more acceptable film of a similar theme [just don't expect it to be as sexy;) ]

Samurai III: Duel at Ganryu Island (1956)

Best cinematography of the trilogy

[28 July 1999]

Samurai III boasts far superior color and composition to the first installment. The opener includes a beautiful scene of Kojiro and Akemi by a magnificent waterfall. This sets the stylistically polished tone of the film, a nice attempt to revive our interest in the sometimes-stalling narrative (Will Kojiro fight the indestructible Musashi? Is Otsu going to get her man after spurning his inviting advances?)

In terms of eye candy, this finale gives the most exotic colors (some may complain as "un-Japanese"), the best lighting, and the most skin of Mifune's Musashi! The story continues with the intellectual and spiritual education of Musashi. Even though the final duel is set up to be his moment of self-realisation, it is preceded by a tad-curious sequence of Musashi's farmlife. Very reminiscent of the samurai-villager relationship in Seven Samurai, Musashi becomes their protector against bandits. The result is formulaic but does what the story intends: return Musashi to a life of the earth - a humanist existence preached by his Buddhist education - and to his humble origin.

P.S. Although Miyamoto Musashi/Samurai I is crucial to understanding the rise of our hero, it probably got Best Foreign film for 1955 Academy Awards during the sudden "discovery" of Japanese films starting with Rashomon.

And if you're looking for a female figure with as much spunk as Musashi himself, note the courtesan in Samurai II. Her chastisement of Musashi, that he lacks humanly affection and thinks of women as weaklings, almost makes up for the overall iffy portrayal of "romantic heroines" in the trilogy!

Annie Hall (1977)

Neurotic New Yawkers I couldn't relate to...but the point is taken and appreciated............

[8/10 · 23 July 1999]

Annie Hall thrives on Allen's comic bantering and developing characters as richly as their own narrowness and shortcomings would allow (the only non-cardboard characters are really Annie and Alvie themselves...but Marshall McLuhan has a cameo!) I particularly enjoyed the way the characters' childhood trauma, relationship sore-spots, and personal psyche are played out, while they are on-screen watching themselves and talking to us about themselves. Very theatre-like. One favorite moment is the montage sequence of Alvie's frustration at his stalling romance with Annie, reinforced by shots of a young Alvie going bananas at the bumper cars. Freud would probably have loved breaking apart Annie Hall ;-)

The film tells Alvie and Annie's relationship in multiple flashbacks and vignette-episodes. This drives home the point of their personalities. It's also VERY effective in giving you a migraine from its neurotic structure and characters. This being Woody Allen, I expected a lot of laughs and was not disappointed. The ending is quite bittersweet and the best way, not over-sentimental or romanticized, to conclude a humorous look at relationships.

The Sword of Doom (1966)

Chambara with C double-dipped in Cheese!

[19 June 1999]

Oh boy, how can i even begin to describe my simultaneous horror *and* admiration for this strange creature that is Sword of Doom? The film opens with a bloody murder of an old pilgrim (played by the always dependable Kamatari Fujiwara) on the Daibosatsu Pass, which in itself tells you how evil Tatsuya Nakadai's Ryunosuke character is. Sadly, the rest of the film suffers from much meandering subplots and leaves Ryunosuke's Evilness (the core interest of the film) to much verbalization. What we know of his evilness - as exemplified in his merciless killing of both innocent and "bad" - is confined to word-of-mouth. Ryunosuke's father wants him dead because he's danger to society, other people want him dead because of oldtime grudges. What does Ryunosuke think of himself? Nakadai does his stoic self one better in this role, lending his pretty-boy visage to eerie-fy and contrast the supposedly sickening murderer. Yet, all of these are mostly suggested instead of demonstrated - or should have been given more demonstration ("show us how evil he is! don't tell us!")

So what DOES Ryunosuke think of himself? Apparently not very much, until he is illuminated by the swordsman-sensei played by Toshiro Mifune (the Great,etc...Really!!) Admist quite a lot of hacking and slashing, Mifune utters that an evil mind will be reflected in an evil sword. This sends Ryunosuke into a downward spiral (or *further* down...), culminating in a conclusion that is very beautifully choreographed and photographed.

Overall, a film with good intentions (of studying a psychotic master swordsman) but weak results in making these come alive. A fun thing to do with this film is to spot the many typecasted pairing of the actors. For example, the girl Omatsu and Mifune's pupil (Yuzo Kayama) played a couple in Kurosawa's Akahige (1965.) Nakadai's "wife" in this film was also the unlucky first wife in Kwaidan (1964.) It goes without saying that Sword of Doom features one of the countless master-disciple pairings of Mifune and Kayama.

Rashomon (1950)

Above All the Acclaims, a Work of Philosophic Contemplation & Cinematic Beauty

[19 June 1999]

RASHOMON is the film that got me hooked onto Kurosawa, and you simply would have no idea what amazingly transformative powers films can have until you've seen what Kurosan does with RASHOMON. Everything in the film speaks of the director and his crews' brilliance at their peak, right down to the didactic conclusion that leaves you rather warm and fuzzy inside.

[If the ending seems unbelievably abrupt and a cop-out, perhaps it's time to view it as a Kurosawan tendency and plea - at least in his younger years of the 50's - that "Willpower can indeed cure all human ailings." Indeed, it is this willpower to transform the self and social, to presevere in such humanistic ideals that characterize what is widely considered Kurosawa's peak period (50s-60s.)]

The sin of EGOISM of the INDIVIDUAL at the cost of SELF and SOCIAL, that is what RASHOMON aims at and achieves masterfully -in a style that emulates the subtle beauty of silent films: the dance of light and shadow in a naturalistic (forest) setting.

And yes, the acting cannot be any better (100%+++ for Shimura, Mifune, Mori, Kyo, Ueda.... everybody!!!) If I've made this film sound like serious and heavy-handed stuff, that's because it IS! Equally important is RASHOMON's ability to ENTERTAIN. The film's desire to be visually pleasing as well as intellectually challenging make this a simply unique artwork of AK's genius. Rest in peace, Kurosan.

The Quiet Duel (1949)

Glimpses of things to come in early Kurosawa

[18 June 1999]

The Quiet Duel features Mifune's second role for Kurosawa, as a young doctor who contracts syphilis from operating on a patient in WWII South Pacific. This alone constitutes the opening and perhaps most riveting sequence of the film. In the little shack where the operation take place, effects of irritation and discomfort hit a high note with the leaking roof, pestering flies, and assaulting humidity. This shabby condition breaks Mifune's concentration and leads him to cut himself in the patient's infected blood. There is much beautiful play of light and shadow across the virginal white uniforms of the doctors.

When Mifune goes back to his father's (Takashi Shimura) medical practice in Japan after the war, the film staggers in cajoling our empathy for the hero's incredulous dilemma: How to protect his fiancee - whom he has kept waiting for six years during the war - from the syphilis he contracted abroad, yet to be honest with himself and his own physical desires. The movie strives to be the tragic love story of a sexually unfulfilled man, an Unjustifiably Tainted Virgin who pains in silence. He is so saintly that his self-denial (abstinence) inspires a single mother (Noriko Sengoku) to become a certified nurse. Despite relatively good performance from the actors, the story of a saintly individual done wrong by a disease that is symbolically social restricts itself to melodramatic proportions.

Thankfully, there is a subplot involving the patient, aka the agent of Doctor Mifune's syphilis. As irresponsible (and promiscuous) as he is, he gives syphilis to his own wife and this ends ups killing their first born. The wife is a victim in the sense that Mifune contracted his disease, and much of Kurosawa's famed humanism involves the wife's recovery from her stillborn and the promise of her eventually ridding syphilis.

This film was made just after several labor strikes broke out at Toho, Kurosawa's home studio. The strikes had devastating effects on the unity and creative synergy of film talents in Japan then, and Kurosawa made this '49 film under Daiei-- with a relatively inexperienced production unit and using a contemporary stageplay that would not alienate moviegoers. The result is vastly uneven, aside from the fantastic opening that is classic Kurosawa. Further, this film continues the cultivation of a Kurosawa-obsession: that of a saintly doctor who, despite his own faults, tries to be his most honest with the world. This can be first seen in Drunken Angel's Dr. Sanada, and later - most memorably - in Red Beard's Akahige/Dr.Niide.