We're back!

After a much-needed time off, and some soul searching about whether to kill the blog altogether, we're back! A bit recharged, and definitely busy with lots of things to do.

For now, just a greeting but soon I hope to update with some actual content.

Before then, it's off to the Cannes Film Market, then Tokyo for some work on a new genre label debuting this summer from Nikkatsu: Sushi Typhoon.

See you then...

Bad girls come to NY's Japan Society!

New York's Japan Society brings some of the most iconic films from three legendary, dangerous beauties of Japanese cinema to their theatre next month, in the series with the $10 title: Mad, Bad... and Dangerous to Know - Three Untamed Beauties. More information is online here.

First up is Ayako Wakao, pictured above, a frequent muse for filmmaker Yasuzo Masumura. And in fact, four Masumura films will be screened in late March / early April featuring Wakao: Seisaku's Wife, A Wife Confesses, the astonishing Red Angel, and the most dangerous of them all, Irezumi (The Spider Tattoo).

Up next is one of our favorites: youth icon turned vengeance-fueled demon-from-hell Meiko Kaji, starring in five of her best films: Female Prisoner #701 - Scorpion, its (even-better) sequel Female Convict Scorpion - Jailhouse 41, Stray Cat Rock - Sex Hunter from her Nikkatsu days, and finally her pair of swordswoman films from Toho, a major inspiration on Tarantino's Kill Bill, Lady Snowblood and Lady Snowblood - Love Song of Vengeance. All are truly can't-miss.

And finally, things get a little more artsy with the frequent muse of Japanese New Wave filmmaker Kiji (Yoshishige) Yoshida, Mariko Okada. Films include Flame & Women (aka Impasse), The Affair, Woman of the Lake, and Two Wives.

Bring along your favorite dangerous lady. I know I will.

Off to Tokyo

En route for what promises to be a very busy, hopefully very productive trip. I've been asked to serve as a jury member at the Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival in Hokkaido, which is the start of the trip, and there are a lot of meetings and work scheduled for my Tokyo stay afterward. So much, in fact, that the trip will probably have to be extended.

More details in mid-March!

Sushi Typhoon!

A new genre label from Nikkatsu, and it looks like I'll be working with them on the North American exposure of it. Films are coming from Yoshihiro Nishimura, Noboru Iguchi and others.

Learn more at the Sushi Typhoon Twitter feed here. Website coming soon, and watch this space for more news!

HOUSE reviews from NYC

Nobuhiko Obayashi's HOUSE (Hausu) opened last Friday at New York's IFC Center, and reports are that audience turnout has been fantastic. Here are links to some of the more prominent reviews from its opening weekend.

NY Times
NY Post
Time Out NY
Paste Magazine
Slant Magazine
The L Magazine
New York magazine
Village Voice
And here's a great piece on the film from the IFC.com blog.

After New York, the new 35mm print travels to Nashville for a week's run at the Belcourt Theatre, then on to Portland and Cinema 21. The restored HD master screened at last year's New York Asian Film Festival will be simultaneously playing some dates during the same period, hitting some Florida cinemas between January 22nd and 28th, and heading off to Washington, D.C., for a run at the Turnage Theater on two successive weekends next month.

Full details of the tour can be found here, on the Janus Films HOUSE web sub-page. You can also get yourself a nifty HOUSE t-shirt there, like the one seen above, modeled by director Obayashi himself.

HOUSE review, Variety, 1977

In honor of the U.S. opening—after nearly 33 years!—of Nobuhiko Obayashi's brilliant horror hybrid HOUSE (aka HAUSU), here is the complete Variety review of the film from 1977. I think it betrays a still-ongoing prejudice against popular Asian cinema in its assumption that the mixed genres might be a mistake or fortuitous accident on the part of the filmmaker. Can you imagine a legitimate film critic asking the same thing about a film by Luis Buñuel or or Jean-Luc Godard? (For comparison, check out the great, recent reviews from The L Magazine and Time Out NY.)

HOUSE opens tomorrow, Friday January 15th, at Manhattan's IFC Center, and its newly-struck, English-subtitled 35mm print plays there for a week before moving to locations across the U.S. and Canada in the spring and early summer. Catch it while you can! Oh, and here's the trailer.

House (Japanese-Color)
Tokyo, Sept. 13 [1977]

A Toho release. Features entire cast. Directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi. Produced by Nobuhiko Obayashi and Norihiko Yamada. Screenplay, Chiho Katsura; camera, Yoshihisa Sakamoto; art director, Kazuo Satsuya; editor, Nobuo Oawa; music, Asei Kobayashi and Miki Yoshino; asst. director, Yasuhira Oguri. Reviewed at the Chiyoda Gekijo, Tokyo, Aug. 26, '77. Running time: 87 MINS.

Cast: Kimiko Ikegami, Kumiko Oba, Ai Matsubara, Miki Jinbo, Mieko Sato, Miyako Masayo, Eriko Tanaka, Kiyohiko Ozaki, Saho Sasagawa, Haruko Wanibuchi [Note: they forgot Yoko Minamida, who plays the villainous Auntie!]

This is the first feature length film directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi and a very puzzling debut it is, too. Formerly a director of tv commercials, Obayashi is either a brilliant conscious satirist or a brilliant unconscious satirist; his "House" either an unintentionally funny compendium of the stylistic conventions of Japanese tube sell or an intentional send-up of those conventions.

The plot is a variation on Agatha Christie's "Ten Little Indians." Seven young ladies spending their summer holidays in a spooky old house owned by a spooky old lady begin disappearing one by one.

Too often it appears Obayashi's only purpose in mounting this tale was self-promotion: seldom has a director used so many scenes to draw attention to his "cleverness." Still, beneath this superficial bravura, there are comic bits and snippets which almost, but do not quite, add up to an indictment of Japan's over-commercialization (i.e. its flood of sell copy.)

Whenever actress Haruko Wanibuchi appears on screen, she walks with the slow, exaggerated stride of a featured player in a 60-second spot for cosmetics, her hair and the scarf around her neck blown by a private breeze which touches no one near her. Among the unlucky seven young ladies are those who take as their nicknames the names of mass-produced food and drink. [Note: So that's where this error began! Only a couple of the girls have names that could conceivably be taken from food or drink names; in reality, the names just reflect their personalities.] The clothes of the main characters are often color coordinated with their patently unnatural pastel-shaded surroundings.

Still, questions nag. Was the director kidding? The dialog, as is the case with most air sell, is banal, but is it purposely banal? Background music, as is the case with most commercials, is insistent, but is its intrusiveness calculated or accidental?

Most cast members are either talented or pleasant to look at, or both. Top-billed Kimiko Ikegami has a marvelously changeable fashion model face and is capable of looking winsomely innocent or frighteningly mature for her age.

"House," a good indication of what this country's new generation of filmmakers is up to, will probably not do too well abroad. Too much of the film's humor is dependent upon a familiarity with Japanese media personalities, tv shows and movie series. --Bail.

Noboru Iguchi's ROBO-GEISHA comes to America!

Good news from home video company Funimation, who today announced their acquisition of director Noboru Iguchi's hilarious comedy-action film ROBO-GEISHA.

No word yet on whether the film will get a limited theatrical release, like their earlier title ICHI did, or whether it will go straight to DVD. Here's hoping they do some festival screenings in the U.S. and Canada before releasing it to a more general audience, to build up some audience awareness and press exposure.

The film originally had its secret World Premiere at Austin's Fantastic Fest back in late September, with Iguchi, f/x designer Yoshihiro Nishimura, and actresses Asami and Cay Izumi in attendance, then opened in Tokyo in early October and rolled out across Japan through the fall and early winter. It also screened in Spain as the Closing Film of the San Sebastian Week of Fantastic and Horror Cinema, where Iguchi was a guest.

Congratulations to Iguchi and the rest of the cast and crew!

Things we did in Japan

Had a terrific two-and-a-half week visit to Japan, mostly in Tokyo but also some vacation time elsewhere and one "work" trip outside the city. Will be posting specific updates on a few things later, but for now, here's an overview which includes some film-related news.

DEATH KAPPA set visit
We were invited to the set of Tomoo Haraguchi's DEATH KAPPA, which is the latest Tokyo Shock / Media Blasters production, and an old-school giant monster movie! I didn't see any of the miniatures in person, but got to participate in a "running from the giant monster" crowd scene, out at Nikkatsu Studios. Fun, and hopefully we'll end up in the final movie, which is due out next spring. You can watch a promo for the film from director Haraguchi, which we premiered at the New York Asian Film Festival last summer, here.

HUNTERS preview
I got to watch a rough cut of an upcoming Japanese genre film, a kind of Pinky Violence modern-day hybrid / tribute, called HUNTERS. It's directed by noted packaging and poster designer Kazushi Nakadaira, who co-directed a short film (with Shinichi Okuda) called YAKUZA HUNTER back in 200. It was originally included as an extra in the DVD box set of the short film collection 893239, but has since been made available separately (trailer is here). HUNTERS is the second follow-up to the short, with part two (called HUNTER'S, I think - ?) directed by Okuda and part three directed by Nakadaira. Part two is a Spaghetti Western riff, and part three is all 1970s Toei and Nikkatsu action film. Both star action-gal Asami (also in MACHINE GIRL and ROBO-GEISHA) as a vengeance-fueled killer who seeks to rid the world of the gangster scum who killed her boyfriend, employing weapons like a shotgun that fires the severed fingers of other yakuza victims. What I saw was a rough version without finished audio, CG or final music, but it was a lot of fun. A bit long-feeling, but it's still being edited; it perfectly captures the feel of 70s Japanese action films, though, and Asami is great in the leading role. Expect to see this one on the usual festival circuit—along with its predecessor and maybe the short, as well—next year.

AVN preview
I also caught a peek at the upcoming Nikkatsu / Sushi Typhoon production ALIEN VS. NINJA, specifically the final fight scene. Also missing final music and full CG, it was about what you would expect: crazy action, lots of blood and creatures effects, and terrific martial arts. Looking forward to seeing the final version of this one fairly soon.

HELL DRIVER casting
One of the things TOKYO GORE POLICE director Yoshihiro Nishimura was happy to talk about during his visit to this summer's New York Asian Film Festival was an upcoming project of his about a high school girl who's also a zombie fighter. Set in a post-apocalyptic Japan, this is another Nikkatsu / Sushi Typhoon film, due to shoot in the spring for a summer release worldwide (again, expect a lot of festival play). I was lucky enough to sit in on auditions for the leading role of Kika, the girl whose own heart is ripped out by her mother before becoming a world-class zombie-killer (and apparently an undead or cyborg one?).

THE ANCIENT DOGOO GIRL
Noboru Iguchi (MACHINE GIRL) created this 12-episode television series (also known as "Kodai shojo Dogu-Chan") that been airing since October in the western Kansai region of Japan only. Its final episode shows next week and the same day, a first half-season DVD box set streets in Japan, giving Tokyo viewers their initial taste of the madcap adventures of a Jomon-era yokai hunter who is resurrected in modern times with the help of an archaeologist and his high school student son. For foreign fans, the entire series has been uploaded (non-subtitled) at various streaming sites, which should tide people over until there's a legitimate overseas release. Alternatively, Iguchi and Nishimura (a collaborator on the series) also just completed a theatrical version of the series that runs two hours and will be released in Japan next February, probably around the time the second half of the TV series comes out on DVD. The theatrical version will include excerpts from various episodes of the show, including ones directed by Takashi (THE GRUDGE) Shimizu and others, in addition to Iguchi. Best of all, the theatrical version will include the full premiere of a 30-some minute "splatter version" of the concept directed by Nishimura and starring Asami, who with her performance makes the strongest break yet from her idol girl / AV star past. We've seen a rough cut of this and believe me, it delivers comedic gore and insanity in a way that lives up to the work Nishimura did on TOKYO GORE POLICE.

ROBO-GEISHA in Nagoya & Tokyo
Speaking of ROBO-GEISHA, one of the things that director Iguchi (as well as Nishimura) always do for their films is to support them with stage greetings and other personal appearances in Tokyo and other cities. These usually involve onstage fundoshi (sumo diaper) shows, Q&As, giveaways, you name it—anything to please the audience, particularly repeat viewers, and keep them coming back. We've participated in such stage greetings at foreign film film festivals, and also a few times for VAMPIRE GIRL VS. FRANKENSTEIN GIRL, and got to visit Iguchi and actress Cay Izumi when they did one at Shibuya's Theater N, which is where most of these films wind up screening in Tokyo. Then a week later, we saw Iguchi, actor Demo Tanaka, Cay, Asami and several of the Geisha Army actresses, do another stage greeting at the same cinema. But best of all, we were lucky enough to travel to the city of Nagoya, in central Japan, to watch—and participate in—a stage greeting at the great Cinema Skole, a tiny theater (owned by radical 60s filmmaker Koji Wakamatsu) which has showcased all of Iguchi and Nishimura's works in the past. A very drunken (and cold) night of fundoshi play, horse-meat sashimi, autograph-signing, needles-in-butts, and other craziness ensued. It was unforgettable.

New Films from Japan
Each year during Tokyo Filmex (an Office Kitano-sponsored film festival held in Yurakucho, showcasing mainly foreign—non-Japanese—films), government film promotion office Unijapan allows overseas festival programmers and press access to a huge stockpile of English-subtitled DVD screeners of major and minor films from the past year and beyond. We spend three to four days sitting at TV-DVD setups, running through as many of these possible. I got to check out a couple dozen new titles, since we are beginning to think about NYAFF 2010 about now. Nothing incredibly surprising, but some standouts included the Shunji Iwai-produced BANDAGE, one-take musical performance film LIVE TAPE, indies LOOP_0152 and LOST PARADISE IN TOKYO, Akira Ogata's NORIBEN, and a few others. Expect to see many of these on the festival circuit next year.

There were many, many other fun activities on this trip, most of the rest too complicated (or too private) to detail here. I had my head cast for a future project involving mayhem perpetrated to my skull (see photo at the top), chatted with directors Taku Sakaguchi, Takenori Tsujimoto, Sion Sono, Daisuke Goto, Kengo Kaji and others about upcoming films, met an old yakuza movie star, went to an amusement park with Iguchi and crew, scouted films and met with distributors about next year's festival, and most importantly saw lots and lots of good friends, ate great food, and soaked up the atmosphere of my favorite city. Can't wait to go back next year!