Lost In Translation

The Cockfighter

The Cockfighter (1974) is a filme based on the novel by Charles Willeford about cockfighting in the South. I can't imagine this film being made today and the film like the book captured a subculture that was alive but underground. Director Monte Hellman was famous for making a film about another subculture, the hot rodding culture of the late 60s and early 70s in Two-Lane Blacktop in 1971. That film also starred the excellent Warren Oates, who is also well known for Sam Peckinpah films like Bring Me The Head Of Alfredo Garcia (1974). It also has turns from Harry Dean Stanton, Ed Begley Jr., and James Earl Jones. It's not as good as the novel, but a competent and entertaining cinematic version for sure.

State Of Fear: The Truth About Terrorism

State Of Fear: The Truth About Terrorism (2005) is a documentary film directed by Pamela Yates about the violence had engulfed Peru for twenty years through the 1980s and 1990s. It is based on the findings of the Peruvian Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Yates uses use personal testimony, history and archival footage to tell the story of the escalating violence of the Shining Path Maoist rebel group that wanted to overthrow the government by violent means. During the reign of Alberto Fujimori democratic institutions were relaxed in the name of fighting terrorism and personal rights suffered as people thought to be sympathizers or members of Shining Path were killed or disappeared in the name of peacemaking. The context in which this film was made warns about the potential dangers of eroding personal rights during the Bush administration following 9/11. A chilling and important film.

Aguirre, The Wrath of God

Aguire, The Wrath of God (1972) begins with an astounding image of a Spanish exploring party descending from the Andes into the jungle that will be their undoing. This party includes Indian slaves, lamas, conquistadors, palanquins, pigs, cannons, and more. It is shocking to me that Werner Herzog was only 28 at the time, had a budget well under $500,000, and used only one camera for the shoot. Klaus Kinski, in his first collaboration with Herzog, is magnificent as Aguirre the megalomaniacal leader of the party’s demise deep in the Amazonian jungle in search of the illusive city of gold, El Dorado. There are many stunning shot throughout the film, which Herzog had filmed on location in Peru. It’s hard not to see that Coppola and Malick borrowed from Herzog in their respective films Apocalypse Now and The New World. Interestingly, I learned from the commentary with the director that the black slave played by Edward Roland named Okello, is named after John Okello a leader of a rebel group that took Zanzibar in 1964 killing between 5,000-20,000 Arabs in the process. It seems that Herzog was in contact with Okello, who wanted him to translate a book that he had written. Aguirre is partly modeled on him. Herzog said, “I chose the name Okello because I owe his craze, his hysteria, his atrocious fantasies quite a bit for this film." It is a fascinating film with many beautiful sequences, perhaps Herzog's masterpiece.

Ley Lines

Ley Lines (1999) is part of the Black Society Trilogy directed by Takashi Miike, that also includes the impressive Rainy Dog and, the yet ot be viewed by me, Shinjuku Triad Society. So far the first two installments focus on outsiders, (A Japanese in Taiwan in Rainy Dog) and Chinese in Japan in this film. Also, both films focus on unlikely families is that are formed in the underworld fringes of society. In Rainy Dog, a boy, a hit man, and prostitute form the unlikely family, while in this film it is a pair of brothers, their school friend and a Chinese prostitute that form the unlikely family. So far, these are two of Miike's best films in my opinion. They both have creative uses of camera angles, film filters, acting, and dramatic story lines in which the lead characters try to escape their shady environments which end in tragedy or ambiguously.

Utamaro And His Five Women

Utamaro And His Five Women (1946) is a film directed by celebrated Japanese director Kenji Mizoguchi. This is a Portuguese DVD version that has English subtitles, and admittedly it is considered a "minor" work from one of Japan's cinematic masters, but you would think Criterion would bring out a new transfer. The opening sequence has a great scene in which the camera tracks down a long procession of people at a 45 degree angle, so each person is seen in a rounded, profile view. Joan Mellen in her book, Waves At Genji's Door, suggests that this image of slowly walking women slowed by their dress and "geta" (traditional wood shoes) implies the subjugation of women. She may have a point since most of the women are prostitutes in the film--the ukiyo-e artist Umataro's most famous subject. Umataro in the film is presented as a anti-feudal, anti-traditionalist obsessed with art and happily living among the "common people." It is the story of an artist whose passion inhabits his art instead of his life, while the opposite is seen with one of his disciples who absconds with one of the beloved models, Oran, and stops painting. Umataro's anit-feudal and traditional aspects are seen when he refuses a duel and challenges the man to an art contest to show that he lives a code that is unlike that of the oppressor the shogunate, who considers banishing him before deciding on a 50 day house arrest where his hands are bound so that he cannot create. It is almost too much for him and once freed there is a collage of Umataro's greatest prints at the closing. It seems that Mizoguchi had less funding that prevented him from using a crane to do his trademark aerial tracking shots and it was made under scrutiny by the Occupational censor who didn't want films espousing the glories of the past in post war Japan.

Love Exposure

I have been hearing good things about Japanese director Sion Sone, so I though I'd check out some of his films. The first I watched was Love Exposure (2008) and I wasn't very impressed. Poor acting, of the variety you find on Japanese dramas. It is an overblown story that seems to have been ripped from the pages of manga its cartoonish intensity. It is a pretentious grab bag of sex, violence, religion, and drama. I haven't completely written him off yet, since I ordered Cold Fish (2010), which garnered a small amount of fanfare.

Three Outlaw Samurai

Three Samurai Outlaw (1964) is a film by under rated chambara director Hideo Gosha. After directing a TV series based on this concept, Gosha got his first chance to direct this film. Gosha would go onto direct several classics in the genre. This film is somewhat critical of the shogunate system, but is essentially an action film. There are some great fight scenes and some inspired cinematography, but there isn't much subtext in the film as three ronin band together to support peasants that are being exploited by local government. It come sin at around 90 minutes, which seems short for the period (think three hours for Seven Samurai). It was an entertaining first forray into film.

United Red Army

United Red Army (2007) is a fascinating look at the radical politics of Japan's fringe left groups in the 60s and 70s represented by the United Red Army. In Oliver Assayas' excellent Carlos, some of the Japanese URA members make an appearance. I was somewhat unaware of the radical violence by the Japanese radicals. It seems that some of the escapees began making news as they were captured or returned to Japan in the 2000s. Several of the students were from universities I work or have worked at (Meiji University, Chuo University, etc.) and not to mention, areas I know well, like Ochanomizu and Shinjuku. It is a harrowing look at radicals eating their own--how many countless deaths in the name of self-criticism--it's hard to believe that so many went along with the petty brutalities, but that is often the case with true believers. The length and amount of time spent on the self-criticism overload in the mountains is almost fatiguing. However, a fascinating look at the radical politics of the turbulent late 60s and early 70s.

Dr. Akagi

Dr. Akagi (1998) aka "Dr. Liver" is a Shohei Imamaura film adapted from a novel. This is clear in some of the themes and characters. Nature and animals often play symbolic roles in Imamaura films and this is no exception. Imamaura is also fascinated with earthy, sexual women who act as natural beings rather than constructs of society--and the comic prostitute Sonoko fills this role in the film. Dr. Akagi is a rural doctor on a island in the Seto Sea near the close of the war who is battling against an outbreak of hepatitis, which is a metaphor for the mindless patriotism that drives people to sustain an unwinable war. Imamura also shows tolerance for the weakness of his characters: Sonoko's prostitution, the priests drinking, the escaped Dutch prisoner, and the other doctor's morphine addicition. The film is subtly critical in making allusions wartime atrocities like "The Nanking Incident" and the doctors who did cruel experiments on POWs, Unit 731 (going as far to suggest that Akagi's son may have been complicit in the group since he was stationed in Manchuria). The ending shows the fruits of this patriotic disease as the Japanese experienced it in Hiroshima nd Nagasaki.

Bullitt

Bullitt (1968) directed by Peter Yates is a quintessential Steve McQueen film. He is the ultimate cool guy who can drive like a maniac, a sharp dresser, who scores babes like the young Jacquline Bisset. I'm pretty sure I've seen it before but dozens of years ago, but was interested in revisiting it after seeing that Yates also directed the Robert Mitchum vehicle, The Friends Of Eddie Coyle, which I saw last year. Great muscle cars: a Mustang and a Pontiac Charger race through the streets of San Francisco. There's an early Robert Duvall performance in the film as well. Entertaining with plenty of style, if not a little over long.