Viewing Gum

FILM 2012: #21. Sleep

A dark, but brutally honest, tale of an outcast family - a woman raped as a teenager now forced to live hand-to-mouth as a masseuse/sex worker, her invalid father, and the daughter, the result of the rape attack, now trying to track down her father. It’s provocative micro-budget film-making at heart, asking more questions than it can possibly answer, focused more on raising issues than necessarily delivering a compelling narrative. But its realism and matter-of-fact delivery make it a hypnotic and involving watch. It’s lo-fi miserablism (plus endless lengthy shots of the bridge under which the family now reside) gets a little wearying, though it is ultimately justified in its determination to be upfront about its difficult subject matter.

Oh, Flower, Sun and Rain. You so meta.

Source: chevreau

FILM 2012: #20. Gozu

One of Japanese cinema’s most prolific directors, Takashi Miike must also have one of the most varied back catalogues in film history, flitting easily from flashy franchise adaptations to soapy rom-coms to family comedies to low-budget yakuza schlock to skin-crawling shockers. Gozu falls somewhat in the last two categories, though trying to fully pin it down is quite a task. Why I’ve waited so long to see Gozu I’m not exactly sure. But really pleased I finally did. As weird, baffling and disturbing as it gets, it’s never impenetrable, with a very clear, if simple, story and purpose to it all, and it’s peculiar sense of humour ensures even the most horrifying moments are pitched just on the right side of jet black comedy. If you think you have the bottle for it, Gozu is a compelling, fantastic oddity, and a highly recommended watch.

notablegamebox:

Some lovely promo art for Jet Set Radio on Dreamcast.

(via hotshothamish)

Tokyo Soundscape Episode 16!

Tracklist:

Base Ball Bear – Yoakemae (Hontou no Yoakemae ver.)
Avengers in Sci-Fi – Save Our Rock
8otto – You Just Not Only One
80kidz – Mind the Gap
Sexy-Synthesizer – Space Music
Anchorsong – Daybreak
The Polka Dot Fire Brigade – The Moon Which Lies
Elen Never Sleeps – My Aquamarine
Jappers – Settle Down
Andymori – Beautiful Celebrity
Chihei Hatakeyama – Waves

David Bowie, charting at #11 on Top of the Pops, on 21st April 1977 (with “Sound and Vision”, I presume).

cliptip:

Night And Day by Hot Chip

Directed by Peter Serafinowicz

FILM 2012: #19. The Sun

Putting all the historical and political aspects aside, this look at Emperor Hirohito in the last few days of World War II and subsequent meetings with General MacArthur wants to be an interesting study of someone once treated as a god being brought suddenly down to earth, but utterly squanders a fascinating prospect. Not only that, but few films have raised my ire quite so much in recent memory.

It’s dull, tedious, stagey and cheap. Issei Ogata’s central performance is marred with an unbelievably irritating tic, smacking his lips over and over from start to finish. Robert Dawson as MacArthur sports a ludicrous headpiece that makes him resemble the aliens from This Island Earth. And the American extras spout the most inane dialogue. It relies more on the set-up and situation to derive anything interesting or dramatic from the film instead of actively trying to engage the viewer on its own accord. You get far better reconstructions of these kind of events in History Channel docudramas, and even they seem to have better resources than this shoddy excuse. Why it received heaps of praise from all and sundry I’ll never know. The Emperor’s New Clothes indeed.