The Asian Film Thread

I have gotten to the point where I pretty much only stock up on Japanese films now adays, surprise, surprise...

Anyway, some recent pictures for me include:

Kamikaze Girls: What a lovley, insane little comedy this turned out to be. Probably one of the more enjoyable films I have seen in quite some time.

Survive Style 5+: Like Kamikaze Girls in style, only much more off the wall. Not for everyone's tastes, but I enjoyed it.

Lupin the 3rd - Strange Psychokinetic Strategy: Live action Lupin done rather... poorly, I'm afraid. At least the assassin nun group was cool.

ESPY: Interesting little 1970's sci-fi picture, to say the least. Not what I would call a great film, but I'm a sucker for Japanese cinema from this decade so I enjoyed it quite a bit along with the contemporary score. Also always great to see Kaoru Yumi in her prime.

Originally Posted by The GreyFox

Nonetheless, when Godzilla is on the screen beating things up this movie is good, otherwise everything else is crap. Ryuhei Kitamura is one of the worst Japanese directors. I found Godzilla: Final Wars to be too The Matrix like in it's fight scenes. Bullet time, slow motion shots, etc. A complete rip off.

I fully agree with you. I got to attend the world premiere of the film in LA back in 2004, and left the theater extremely dissapointed by the whole thing (although the experience of attending the event was great). Even at the world premiere, people couldn't help but laugh at "the one" sequence where he stops the laser blasts/bullets mid-air. I don't know if I would say that all of Kitamura's movies are bad, though... I did enjoy his Azumi flick.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by seanne

As far as Japanese cinema goes I generally prefer the films made in the black & white days (particularly when compared to the often bleak films made today). There is a veritable goldmine of great stuff to be found from this era if you look deep enough. And few have contributed to it as much as Yasujiro Ozu.

The "Black and White" days ended in the mid 1950's in Japan, when there was a huge shift toward color outside of a few mavericks like Akira Kurosawa, and films like Double Suicide, which kept producing black and white movies into the late 1960's.

Anyway, the 1950's and the early 1960's are often referred to as the "Golden Age of Japanese Cinema", so you are hardly alone in that feeling. Personally, I just enjoy all of the movie made in the Showa era (up to the 1989) over the current crop of films out there, beyond some exceptions like Kamakize Girls and of course anything by Miyazaki.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by evergreen

New Hayao Miyazaki film to be announced May 5th I think.

O_o Really? Man, and he said he was going into retirement after Princess Mononoke, and now look where we are. I'm not complaining though, great news. Got a link for where it was mentioned?

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by evergreen

Twitch.

Awesome, thanks for the link!

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