Review: Kidnapped

Posted on April 24, 2024 by philipbrasor

Given his prodigious output over a career that started in 1965, it should be surprising that director Marco Bellocchio doesn’t have more of an international following, but it may have something to do with the parochial nature of his work, which is not just thematically handcuffed to his native Italy but also appeals to a narrow sensibility that non-Italians may fail to appreciate. In recent years, however, he’s made attempts to explore Italian history more broadly, and while his storytelling tools still deliver overly large sentiments at the expense of narrative subtlety, for those of us who don’t know much about Italy as a national entity the films are quite educational.

With Kidnapped, Bellocchio explores an incident that marked a turning point in Italy’s development as a nation while also igniting the world’s scorn. In 1852, a son was born to a Jewish couple in Bologna, which at the time was under the direct rule of Pope Pius IX. The household maid, believing he was ill and might die, clandestinely baptized the boy, named Edgardo, so that his soul would not be banished to limbo. But the child did not die and the maid was subsequently fired for a different misdemeanor. When Edgardo was 6 a magistrate for the church arrived at the couple’s house and said that he was taking the boy to Rome to be raised as a Christian. His parents, Salomone (Fausto Russo Alesi) and Marianna (Barbara Ronchi), knew nothing about the maid’s subterfuge and, of course, objected mightily. The scene where Edgardo is taken away wailing while his parents put up a fight is the kind of thing Bellocchio was born to stage, with operatic music pounding away on the soundtrack and the camera following every outsized emotional gesture. Over the next hour or so, we see how Edgardo is indoctrinated into the Church while his parents try everything to secure his return, including writing letters to Israelite associations in foreign countries to help them gain public support. The matter becomes an international scandal, much to the chagrin of the Rome Jewish Council, since they have to deal with Pius (Paolo Pierobon) directly for their own needs, and the pressure from outside forces, including the global press, just makes the old megalomaniac more perverse in his determination to keep the boy at all costs. During this part of the movie Bellocchio plays the viewer’s emotions like a well-tuned violin, periodically suggesting the possibility of some kind of moral triumph before quashing it with another melodramatic set piece. Boo! Hiss!

Historically, much of the script sacrifices truth for dramatic convenience (at least according to Wikipedia), though the details—like, for instance, the Church’s sizable financial obligations to the Rothschilds, which constantly works to stir up the pope’s antisemitic rants—are endlessly fascinating. And I got lost at the end when the forces for Italian unity took over Bologna, since it wasn’t clear just what the Papal States lost except their regional political autonomy. Obviously, Italians already know about this, but Bellocchio doesn’t bother spelling it out for the rest of us. I guess I need to brush up on my 19th century European history.

In Italian, Latin and Hebrew. Opens April 26 in Tokyo at Human Trust Cinema Yurakucho (03-6259-8608), Shinjuku Cinema Qualite (03-3352-5645), Yebisu Garden Cinema (0570-783-715).

Kidnapped home page in Japanese

photo (c) IBC Movie/Kavac Film/AD Vitam Production/Match Factory Productions (2023)

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Media watch: Five years in, how does Naruhito stack up to his father?

Posted on April 22, 2024 by philipbrasor

On March 22, Emperor Naruhito and Empress Masako visited victims of the New Year’s Day earthquake that struck the Noto Peninsula on the Japan Sea coast. It was the couple’s second visit to a disaster area since Naruhito ascended to the throne in 2019, but this time there was chatter online about why the royal couple had waited so long. Officially, they said they had held off the visit due to fears that their presence could complicate matters for locals, and they did donate funds to help those affected, but even in the Emperor’s birthday message to the nation, he did not specifically mention the victims, which some people felt was unusual.

This feeling was likely prompted by how differently Naruhito had approached the matter compared to his father, Akihito, who retired so that his son could take over. Akihito would have likely been more proactive in his response to the Noto quake. In 1991, for instance, one month after the Unzen volcano erupted, he visited the disaster site. He was in Kobe two weeks after the Hanshin Earthquake of 1995. He sent a special video message to the victims of the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011 five days after it struck, and thereafter visited the affected area with his wife, MIchiko, 7 weeks in a row. Naruhito, on the other hand, didn’t even record a message to the Japanese people during the COVID pandemic. 

According to Takeshi Hara, a political scientist who has written numerous books about the Emperor and the so-called Emperor System, the “Reiwa style” of Naruhito is shaping up to be very different from the “Heisei style” of his father. Hara sat for a lengthy interview with Asahi Shimbun that was published March 13—before Naruhito and Masako made their first visit to Noto—and he tried to summarize the contrast between the two emperors, but five years in Naruhito has not really established any kind of “style,” which is notable considering how hands-on his father was as a monarch.

Of course, activism is not part of the postwar Emperor’s job description. The Constitution defines his role as a “symbol” of the country, but doesn’t explain what that entails. Hara refers to Akihito’s 2016 message to the people where he implied his intention to step down. In the message, he mentioned the “challenges” of the two pillars of his symbolic role, which are “praying for the happiness of his subjects” and “standing beside them” as a figure of empathy. Hara interpreted this statement to mean that, in addition to the court rituals that the Emperor is required to carry out, Akihito felt it was his duty to comfort the people when troubles arose, as well as acknowledge the troubles of the past. This was something his father, Hirohito, the Showa Emperor, did not do, especially with regard to remembering the Pacific War for which many people hold him responsible. Akihito did remember the war, and made a point of visiting places closely associated with it. 

That empathy, says Hara, is the key to the Heisei style. In comparison, the Showa style after the war was vague and ambiguous. It’s why Akihito felt he had to step down. He was becoming too old to effectively carry out what he considered his duties as the Emperor, even though there is no provision in the law to allow him to leave the throne before he dies. Akihito, as well as Michiko, felt that “fortifying” the symbolism of the imperial household required “hard work.” By that standard, Naruhito’s status is as unclear as his grandfather’s was, and Hara finds it strange that the present Emperor’s “stance” has not been criticized, which would seem to indicate that “the Japanese people are just losing interest in the Emperor.” The former Emperor was always a vivid presence, and, in fact, remains a more engaging figure in retirement than his son is while actually occupying the throne. Even the crown prince, Akishinomiya, attracts more attention than Naruhito due to his son, the only younger male heir in the royal family.

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Review: Youth (Spring)

Posted on April 20, 2024 by philipbrasor

Wang Bing’s latest documentary may not, at 215 minutes, be one of his typically longer works, but it is probably his most vivid. He spent 6 years recording the lives of young textile workers in the city of Zhili and fashioned three films from the footage. Youth (Spring), itself the first of three movies about young Chinese workers, is reportedly the most narrative-attentive of the films that emerged from the footage, though it would be difficult to trace a continuing arc of a story. For the most part, Wang gathers together pieces of action that fit together thematically without necessarily relating to any other pieces of action. He will jump from concerted labor disputes to romantic intrigues to knock-down, drag-out fist fights, all filmed up-close and extremely personal. Though Wang’s epics can sometimes be a slog, this one rips right along thanks to the undeniable energy of the young people being studied. Though the labor is often punishing, these are not worker ants but fully expressive individuals with character and verve who dress well, love as heartily as they can, and make every attempt to enjoy themselves, even if it kills them. They occasionally enjoy their work, too, of which they are justifiably proud. 

What’s immediately notable about Youth (Spring) is Wang’s lack of authorial judgment, which means even the ironies on display—the almost insistently bleak Zhili consists of nothing but sweatshops lined up on a street called Happiness Road—are downplayed. Some observers seem to have a problem with this in that Wang isn’t being as critical about the system as he should be, especially compared to previous work like Til Madness Do Us Part (about the state’s poor treatment for the mentally ill) and Dead Souls (about the murderous anti-intellectual purges of the 60s and 70s), but here he is less interested in the political ramifications of the topic he’s filming than in how the objects of his gaze present themselves from minute to minute. Though many have lazily compared Wang to Frederic Wiseman, Youth (Spring) is the first documentary I’ve seen by him that feels as obsessed with getting to the heart of institutional behavior as Wiseman’s movies are. The little dramas that play out in real time almost have a scripted quality because of the way Wang frames them without reference to other dramas. The aforementioned fight scene between two young men competing for two things at once (a promotion and the affections of another worker) is so viscerally striking that you almost assume it had to be choreographed, as the two combatants tumble over work benches and sewing machines to get at each others’ throats. An earlier competition between two other men who want to prove which of them is the fastest stitcher in the factory has a joyous texture as they show off their skills with theatrical flair. And when one employee discovers she’s pregnant, the discussions with managers and parents become pure soap opera, except, of course, that you assume she’ll have the abortion her boss so casually suggests.

The only theme that recurs is the demand for more pay and the lack of any real collective power on the part of labor, and in that regard the movie loses some of its own power by not tying the various tales of workers attempting to hold management to account into something cohesive. It’s more of a broken record, albeit one that gets louder with each revolution. There’s no resolution to the lives we see, and some of the more compelling individuals vanish from the movie without any explanation. What you end up with is a film that reveals with striking assurance how the men and women who know they are the future of China live their lives right now. 

In Mandarin. Now playing in Tokyo at Theater Image Forum Aoyama (03-5766-0114).

Youth (Spring) home page in Japanese

photo (c) 2023 Gladys Glover-House on Fire-CS Production-ARTE France Cinema-Les Films Fauves-Volya Films-Wang Bing

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Review: All of Us Strangers

Posted on April 19, 2024 by philipbrasor

I’ve only seen two of Andrew Haigh’s previous movies, but Lean on Pete and, especially, 45 Years gave me the impression he is a director who has little use for conventional sentimentality, no matter how much the material warrants it. His new one, however, exudes an emotional earnestness that relies on the viewer’s faith in its sticky fantasy premise, and by the end, though I found the love story affecting, it also struck me as corny. Perhaps the stickiness was already there in the source material, a 1987 novel I haven’t read by Taichi Yamada, but since Yamada’s tale took place in Japan and centered on a heterosexual affair, I would assume Haigh made significant changes when he moved it to London and adapted the love story for two men. I’m not the kind of person who thinks that queer love is substantially different from the straight kind once you remove the social elements (and I know many people will disagree), but I can’t help thinking that Haigh lightened the mood artificially. One of the main characters, after all, is presented as being depressed, maybe suicidal. 

What All of Us Strangers shares with the above-mentioned two films is a spare cast. Adam (Andrew Scott) is a writer living in a modern apartment tower that appears to be almost deserted. The only other person in the block is someone he spies one evening while looking out his window. This man, Harry (Paul Mescal), notices the attention and, drunk, shows up at Adam’s door suggesting they spend some time together. Adam politely refuses the entreaty but it’s obvious he’s both intrigued and perplexed by the attention. Though he has made peace with his homosexuality, it’s still something he dwells on obsessively, conditioned by a closeted adolescence. Before we know it, Adam is back in his suburban home town, lingering outside the house where he grew up. His parents (Jamie Bell, Claire Foy) see him out on the sidewalk and invite him in, happy for the unannounced visit, and as Adam passes a mirror in the living room we catch a glimpse of him as a pre-teen. His parents, we learn, died in a car crash when he was about that age, and he was never able to talk to them about his sexuality. Here is the chance, and while these imaginary conversations are clearly ripe with longing and self-actualization, their implied value as therapy for a soul that’s never had the chance to hash out its confusions and paradoxes feels forced.

When Adam applies the insights he gains from these fantasies to his new relationship with Harry—a relationship that Adam, like a good patient, pursues with a positive attitude—the results are also positive: the sex is honest and satisfying, the emotional payback enlightening and empowering. Eventually, the relationship itself goes dark and enters the realm of fantasy, though to what end is never really clear. As heartbreaking as All of Us Strangers is, the use of these diversions to make sense of unpleasant truths has the effect of sentimentalizing the story.

Now playing in Tokyo at Toho Cinemas Nihonbashi (050-6868-5060), Toho Cinemas Chanter Hibiya (050-6868-5001), Toho Cinemas Shinjuku (050-6868-5063), Shibuya Cine Quinto (03-3477-5905), Toho Cinemas Roppongi Hills (050-6868-5024).

All of Us Strangers home page in Japanese

photo (c) 2023 20th Century Studios 

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Review: Manticore

Posted on April 18, 2024 by philipbrasor

At its most sensitive, Spanish director Carlos Vermut’s fourth film is about a burgeoning love affair between two lonely but very different people. Julian (Nacho Sanchez) is a modeler for a video game company who specializes in weird, terrible creatures. He is the most engaged when working alone in his Madrid apartment on his creations, using a VR headset to filter his vivid imagination into visual monstrosities. Otherwise, he keeps himself aloof from others. Diana (Zoe Stein), the friend of a work colleague he meets at a party, is more vibrant—talkative, intellectually stimulating, and outgoing—but hemmed in socially by her obligations to an invalid father, whom she cares for religiously. Their mutual attraction is casual at first, since whereas his nature is uptight, hers is carefree, and it takes a while for them to connect on an emotional level. We’ve already seen how Julian’s anxieties get the best of his impulses. He picks up a woman in a bar and can’t get it up in bed, so the gradual approach with Diana is obviously more his speed; but as the source of Julian’s anxieties becomes clearer, the sensitive aspect of Vermut’s approach turns sinister.

Because at its base, Manticore, a word that describes a creature which is half man, half beast, isn’t a love story at all. It’s a horror story, but one whose power to frighten comes from its ability to evince disgust rather than any intent to evoke terror. Early on in the film, Julian saves a neighbor, a young boy named Christian, from a house fire, and while the purport of this valiant act isn’t telegraphed as anything more than a character-establishing incident, it continues to reverberate in ever increasing waves throughout the film, first making itself felt in Julian’s digital creations, and then in his physical state, wherein certain thoughts make him actually ill. Though the viewer starts to understand what’s going on, the love story washes over the real meaning of Julian’s troubled mind, keeping it submerged beneath his desire to form a relationship with Diana; that is, until circumstances converge to make him realize what it is that he really desires, and then he can’t face the truth.

Vermut’s true talent as a filmmaker is the way he renders these various indicators organically. The repulsion he manifests in the end isn’t triggered. It’s brought about through an accumulation of subtle hints that, in hindsight, seem way too clever—everything from Julian’s seemingly innocent confession that as a child he wanted to be a tiger when he grew up, to Diana’s pixie hairstyle—but they have been so carefully curated that you don’t notice as they pop up just how penetrating they are. They linger in the imagination, because just like Julian’s creatures, they are visceral and unique. It’s only Julian himself, a sullen introvert with a secret he can’t acknowledge to himself, who is terrifying.

In Spanish. Opens April 19 in Tokyo at Cinemart Shinjuku (03-5369-2831), Cine Quinto Shibuya (0303477-5905).

Manticore home page in Japanese

photo (c) Aqui y Alli films, Bteam Prods, Magnetica Cine, 34T Cinema y Punto Nemo AIE

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Media watch: Mainstream press again decides Koike’s possibly fraudulent c.v. isn’t news

Posted on April 15, 2024 by philipbrasor
Toshiro Kojima (Tokyo Shimbun)

Back in 2020, shortly before Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike ran for a second term, a journalist named Taeko Ishii came out with a book about Koike called Jotei (Empress) that became an instant best-seller. Ishii included an interview with a woman who said she was Koike’s roommate when she was attending Cairo University in the 1970s and claimed that Koike never graduated from the university, which was significant since much of Koike’s brand as a public figure has been tied to not only graduating from Cairo University, but graduating at the top of her department, as she said. This achievement led to her reputation as being an expert on the Middle East and a fluent speaker of Arabic, which in turn helped get her a job as a TV news announcer and then boosted her prospects in politics. For a short time after Ishii’s book came out, Koike’s c.v. came under suspicion, since lying about one’s educational history violates election laws (and, in fact, seems to be a common practice), but eventually a statement appeared on the Facebook page of the Egyptian Embassy in Japan stating that Koike had indeed graduated from Cairo University and the matter was forgotten; or, at least, it was forgotten by the mainstream media.

Earlier this month the matter came up again when an article appeared in the May issue of the monthly magazine Bungeishunju by Toshiro Kojima, a former Koike aide who wrote that he inadvertently assisted in the coverup of Koike’s allegedly fraudulent c.v. in 2020. There was also an essay by the former roommate, Momoyo Kitahara, who had been referred to pseudonymously in the initial editions of Jotei, but who allowed Ishii to use her real name in the subsequent paperback editions. Kojima says in his piece that Koike summoned him to her office in the Tokyo Metropolitan Government building in June of 2020 after the book came out and asked him to help her get on top of the bad publicity it had stirred up. Kojima, who believed that she had graduated from Cairo University, said it was simple: Just call the university and get them to issue an official statement confirming that she had graduated. He assumed they would have to go through the Egyptian Embassy, which meant it might take time, so he was surprised when the desired statement appeared on the embassy’s FB page only three days later.

Kojima went into more detail in a video interview with Bungeishunju that was posted on the magazine’s website. He begins by explaining that he became acquainted with Koike when he was working for the Environment Ministry as the chief of the Global Environment Bureau. At the time, Koike was a Diet member in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and had been appointed environment minister. They worked together on several ideas and came up with the Cool Biz policy wherein men were encouraged to eschew jackets and neckties in the summer to reduce energy consumption in offices. Later, she decided to run for governor of Tokyo in order to “destroy” the LDP’s dominance of the prefectural assembly, and she asked Kojima to join her team. His main task was moving the wholesale fish market from Tsukiji to Toyosu. When Koike left the LDP to form the Tomin First party, she selected Kojima to head it. 

After Jotei was published and Koike summoned Kojima to talk about the c.v. problem, she showed him an invitation to a “Science Day” event being held by Cairo University. The invitation was for alumni, and Koike seemed to be showing it to him as proof she had graduated, which he didn’t need because he believed her. However, he thought it strange that the invitation included “unnecessary” information about the date she entered the university and the date she graduated. First, he told her just to get out her diploma and send copies to the media, but she seemed to think it wouldn’t be enough to convince people, and that’s when he suggested she contact the university to get proof from the source. The next day she called Kojima and asked what kind of information the statement from the university should include. 

Kojima recalls that time was of the essence, since the LDP was planning to use the c.v. controversy against Koike in the assembly as a means of getting back at her. Also, she was planning to announce that she would run for a second term as governor of Tokyo and wanted to get the matter out of the way before the press conference. So while Kojima was surprised at the speed with which Koike was able to produce the statement, it was just as well she did. 

In the posted statement, Cairo University affirms that Koike graduated from the Sociology Department in October 1976 and was issued a diploma. The statement also criticized the Japanese media for doubting Koike on the matter, since such doubt tacitly defamed the university and its alumni. The university said it would take legal action if it deemed such action was appropriate. Kojima told the Bungeishunju interviewer that the LDP immediately put a halt to their investigation of Koike and the media dropped the subject. Koike went on to win reelection easily. 

However, after the election was over, Kojima was visited by another Koike advisor, a journalist he refers to as “A.” The journalist told him that it was he who wrote the Japanese language version of the Cairo University statement that appeared on FB, and he showed Kojima the email correspondence between him and Koike related to the matter. He added that Koike herself wrote the English language version of the statement, which also appeared on the FB page.

When the interviewer asks Kojima why he wrote the article for Bungeishunju, Kojima replied that he felt responsible for the coverup, especially after Kitahara had the courage to allow her real name to be used in subsequent editions of Jotei. He mentions that when he was in the Environment Ministry he was involved in the Minamata pollution matter, and was dismayed that those responsible for the widespread poisoning tried so hard to cover it up. It was one man, a doctor for Chisso, the company that caused the pollution, who made a difference by coming forward, just as Kitahara did. “So I felt that I had to come forward too,” says Kojima. Moreover, he had admired Koike because of her stated determination to break up the hidebound nature of Tokyo government, where all decisions were made by a handful of leaders in the LDP and some top bureaucrats. But during her second term she seemed to abandon this stance, since the same group of men are still running the show without any regard for the needs and desires of Tokyo residents. He now sees Koike as being the kind of politician who seeks office only for their own personal gain. 

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Review: No. 10

Posted on April 12, 2024 by philipbrasor

The title of Alex van Warmerdam’s latest feature is meaningless in terms of describing the film. It is called No. 10 because it is van Warmerdam’s tenth film, nothing more and nothing less; and, in fact, given the slippery nature of the plot, it sort of makes sense to give it a numeric marker rather than a title. Because van Warmerdam knows how to make quality films on a technical level, the pacing and atmosphere are assured, and the first half exudes a potent sense of intrigue with its story about a minor theater actor, Günter (Tom Dewispelaere), having an affair with his leading lady, Isabel (Anniek Pheifer), who is also the wife of Karl (Hans Kesting), the writer/director of the play he is presently rehearsing. The pair’s clandestine assignations are eventually noticed by Günter’s rival, Marius (Pierre Bokma), a sullen, incompetent amateur with an ailing wife. Moreover, Günter’s grown daughter, Lizzy (Frieda Barnhard), is also suspicious, and once Karl is hipped to the affair he starts tormenting Günter within the framework of the play they’re putting on.

Van Warmerdam uses the vacant, industrial-tinged setting of the Dutch city where this story is set to great advantage, and the grayish cast of the various interiors makes the movie feel cold and claustrophobic. Above it all hovers Günter’s provenance, which is mentioned in passing in the beginning, suggesting that he was raised by foster parents after being found wandering in a forest when he was five years old. Eventually, this part of the story takes over, with a whole additional group of characters, including two Catholic priests and a bunch of men who skulk around like secret agents. By the time Günter’s story is revealed, the entire love affair/stage play plot line has been abandoned. 

It’s difficult to know what to make of No. 10, which feels experimental in that it doesn’t really have much reason to exist as a narrative work of art, because the two storylines are so alien to each other that the film could have been divided at the midpoint without any attendant loss of meaning. Joined together, however, they’re just baffling, especially since neither reaches any sort of conclusion. This is the first film I’ve seen by van Warmerdam, though I’ve heard of him—he seems like a major figure in Dutch cinema—and most of what I’ve heard is that he’s an acquired taste. I can now see why. I really don’t know what kind of viewer this would appeal to. 

In Dutch, English and German. Now playing in Tokyo at Shinjuku Cinema Qualite (03-3352-5645).

No. 10 home page in Japanese

photo (c) 2021 Graniet Film Czar Film BNNVARA

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Review: Priscilla

Posted on April 11, 2024 by philipbrasor

In terms of verisimilitude, Sophia Coppola’s dramatization of the relationship between Elvis Presley and Priscilla Presley (nee Beaulieu) is much more convincing than Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis biopic, which was an obvious fantasia. Based on Priscilla’s own 1985 memoir, the new film necessarily centers on her experience, so what we get of Elvis is limited in scope: very little recreation of his music or performances, absolutely no Colonel Parker, and no inkling of what his life was like before he met Priscilla. Coppola is thus free to fix her attention on the kinds of things she’s famous for, like American kitsch (acres of shag carpet), the foibles of youthful desire, and a rather dreamy take on sexual attraction. At first, I thought the total absence of Presley’s own music in the film was a function of rights acquistion—though Priscilla is one of the film’s producers, she hasn’t controlled the estate for decades—but Coppola isn’t interested in Elvis as an icon or an artist, so she fills the soundtrack with anachronistic but familiar pop songs that have scant connection to the action they accompany. In the context of the movie, Elvis is simply a privileged male who lacks the maturity to understand his appetites, and thus is doomed to failure as a husband and, in the long run, a functioning organism.

For all that, the movie lacks any real drama. The opening sequence, which takes place in Germany during Elvis’s army stint, is the most effective. Fourteen-year-old Priscilla (Cailee Spaeny) is wasting away on the base where her officer step-father has been assigned. She hates being out of the U.S., and, as it happens, so does Elvis (Jacob Elordi), who makes up for it on the weekends by throwing elaborate parties for fellow G.I.s and other American expats. A soldier spies Priscilla sitting at a base soda fountain and invites her to one of these get-togethers. Of course, her parents object and a great deal of diplomatic discourse is expended to gain their permission, but once Elvis locks eyes on her he’s hooked, and for the rest of his stint won’t take no for an answer, despite the Beaulieus’ understandable reservations. When his obligation to the army is up and he returns to Memphis and his show biz career, Priscilla is heartbroken, and both Spaeny and Coppola elegantly capture the sense of utter despair that accompanies a foreshortened adolescent love affair. Eventually, Elvis moves Priscilla, still a minor, to Graceland, with her parents’ permission, where she finishes school (just barely) under the gaze of his stern father and big-hearted grandmother, and while during this time it’s clear that there’s no sex (much to Priscilla’s frustration—though Elvis obviously has other women for “that kind of thing”), Elvis’s gallant but domineering behavior toward his teenage bride-to-be is undeniably creepy. Even the storied Memphis Mafia, those good ol’ boys who were constantly at Elvis’s beck-and-call, realize this relationship is kind of sick, but no one has the courage or wherewithal to call it as they see it.

After Priscilla and Elvis marry in 1967, all bets are off, and once she’s given birth to Lisa Marie, she realizes she must resolutely contend with Elvis’s weaknesses, especially when it comes to pills and cheap, quick thrills that he believes have no consequences. Coppola’s characteristic directorial m.o. of mostly standing back from the interpersonal dynamic in her films and concentrating on the atmosphere and trimmings works while the dynamic is in development, but after Priscilla finally gains a measure of adult self-awareness, the movie sprints to its tragic finish with little regard for the emotional stakes. When Priscilla files for divorce, the feeling I got was: What took you so long?, even though they’d been married less than six years. Verisimilitude has its limits, too. 

Opens April 12 in Tokyo at Toho Cinemas Chanter Hibiya (050-6868-5001), Kino Cinema Shinjuku (03-5315-0978), 109 Cinemas Premium Shinjuku (0570-060-109), White Cine Quinto Shibuya (03-6712-7225), Toho Cinemas Nihonbashi (050-6868-5060), Toho Cinemas Roppongi Hills (050-6868-5024), Yebisu Garden Cinema (0570-783-715).

Priscilla home page in Japanese

photo (c) The Apartment S.r.L. 2023

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Review: Infinity Pool

Posted on April 6, 2024 by philipbrasor

As a chip off the old block, Brandon Cronenberg lacks his father’s ability to connect a viewer emotionally to the outrageous images he conjures up, unless you consider disgust an emotion. Whereas David Cronenberg’s patented body horror has something to do with the imagination, Brandon’s is wholly visceral in that he shows in almost loving detail how violence affects flesh and bone. In his first film, Possessor, various remotely controlled assassins find creative ways of killing that seem extreme compared to the usual cinematic hitman m.o., but I hesitate to call it gratuitous because the nature of a remotely controlled assassin, by definition, can’t be clearly understood. However, in Cronenberg fils’ new movie the violence, the sex, and particularly the cruelty are clearly gratuitous, because the story is so catastrophically ridiculous, even on an allegorical level. The movie doesn’t generate enough confidence in its premise to render the gross-out elements as anything but pointless provocations.

Since the subjects of the movie are rich white folk, the cruelty, wherever positioned and pointed, is taken for granted. The setting is a fictional tropical country where the resorts are separated from the poor inhabitants by barbed wire fences. James (Alexander Skarsgård), a blocked novelist, and his wealthy publishing heir wife, Em (Cleopatra Coleman), are vacationing here when they meet CM actress Gabi (Mia Goth) and her French architect husband Alban (Jalil Lespert). Gabi attaches herself to James because she loved his one novel, attention that flatters the monumentally insecure writer to no end. After the two couples borrow a car—a vintage Cadillac, no less—and take a forbidden drive off the resort compound to frolic on a deserted beach, James hits a local while driving drunk and kills the man. Though they try to sneak back into the compound the police catch up to them and the head detective (Thomas Kretschmann) informs them that the law of the country dictates that the son of someone killed by another person has the right to kill that person himself. But this country also has a loophole for those who can afford it: The authorities will produce a clone of the condemned and have that clone killed in the condemned’s place—while the condemned watches. Though stupid, this high concept is exactly the kind of thing that brings out the creative in Cronenberg, and the gory sequence that shows how it works reveals an original, if downright sick, imagination.

But that’s not the end of the silliness. James, forced to watch his own mutilation, gets turned on by it, and he is soon welcomed into a secret society of privileged seasonal regulars who’ve been through the same thing and now get their rocks off by throwing off all social and moral constraints and doing whatever they like, including killing and raping, because they can always pay for clones to receive the punishment. Though I can understand the message Cronenberg is pushing, the means of delivery make me wonder if he also doesn’t get off on it. The characters just fall deeper and deeper into depravity with no ethical or rational reckoning. Meanwhile, the director gooses the repellant images with odd camera angles and a slick electronic score from Tim Hecker in an attempt to turn it all into entertainment. It felt more like punishment.

Now playing in Tokyo at Shinjuku Piccadilly (050-6861-3011), Human Trust Cinema Shibuya (03-5468-5551).

Infinity Pool home page in Japanese

photo (c) 2022 Infinity (FFP) Movie Canada Inc., Infinity Squared KFT. Cetiri Film d.o.o.

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Review: The Iron Claw

Posted on April 5, 2024 by philipbrasor

To those of us who do not follow professional wrestling, it’s often difficult to separate the athletics from the theatrics, and one of the strengths of Sean Durkin’s feature about the real-life Von Erich family, who were stars of the sport from the late 70s to the early 90s, is how it brings these two components together without making a big deal of it. Much of the movie’s drama is derived from one or another of the four Von Erich brothers striving for a championship title, and while my own understanding of what that entails has never been complete—If it’s mostly theater, who and what determines a champion?—the dedication and passion these brothers demonstrate in their quest for glory is impressive, though not necessarily inspiring. For one thing, they are constantly under the pummeling tutelage of their father, Fritz (Holt McCallany), a former wrestler whose own ambitions for the title were cut short. As in all great family sagas, the father channels his hopes and dreams into his sons, who not only honor those wishes but sacrifice themselves to a discipline they may not fully believe in. The reason has less to do with filial piety and more to do with fraternal love. These brawny men will do anything for each other.

The story’s parade of tragedy is truly cinematic in scope. The oldest brother, Kevin (Zach Efron), is the one who most eagerly pursues greatness as a wrestler. He truly loves being in the ring, but he’s willing to sacrifice his legacy if it means his brothers can have their shot. Kerry (Jeremy Allen White) is also into the sport, but he’s less sure of himself and clinically self-destructive. David (Harris Dickinson) is the family’s brain and clown, a born performer who gets off on the attention while not necessarily taking the sport seriously as a sport. And Mike (Stanley Simons) is the sensitive artist who isn’t interested in wrestling at all, but participates in order to prop up the family business—Fritz has his own company, which trains wrestlers and stages matches. (In reality, there was a fifth brother whom Durkin decided to elide from the family portrait.) Over the years, the four brothers are plagued by injury—some horrific—and psychological turmoil, mostly at the hands of their father, but they always have one another. At times, Durkin has trouble developing his story. It’s mostly one triumph or tragedy after another, though as a family saga it has depth thanks to the synergizing energy of the sport. Durkin attempts to do with wrestling what Scorsese did with boxing in Raging Bull—make the visceral aspect of the battles seem fantastical. The fact that the theatrical component is fantastical to begin with only heightens the spectacle on screen.

The real message of the film is that family ties, no matter how strong, can rarely remedy individual flaws. In that regard, the two principal female characters, Von Erich matron Doris (Maura Tierney) and Kevin’s wife, Pam (Lily James), have to shoulder the burden of that hoariest of family saga cliches, the sensible, practical, feminine counterbalance to the overriding male ego, but since the hyper-masculine temperament required by pro wrestlers is here extended by the peculiar macho aesthetic of Texas, the two women really have their work cut out for them. Durkin often gets carried away with the sweep of the saga, but along the way he supplies not only valuable instruction on how pro wrestling works, including the business side, but why so many people just can’t get enough of it. 

Now playing in Tokyo at Toho Cinemas Nihonbashi (050-6868-5060), Toho Cinemas Hibiya (050-6868-5068), Kino Cinema Shinjuku (03-5315-0978), Toho Cinemas Shibuya (050-6868-5002), Toho Cinemas Roppongi Hills (050-6868-5024).

The Iron Claw home page in Japanese

photo (c) 2023 House Claw Rights LLC; Claw Film LLC; British Broadcasting Corporation

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