Lost In Translation

My Dinner With Herve

The older I get the more nostalgic I find myself getting, hence "part" of the appeal for HBO's My Dinner With Herve (2018). I suppose the other part is the fact that Peter Dinklage, of Game of Thrones fame-one of my favorite performers on that show, stars as the troubled dwarf, Herve Villechaize, who is the subject of a brief celebrity blur and becomes a more central figure in a troubled journalist's writing projects. As a child I remember watching The Love Boat followed by Fantasy Island-cementing Villechaize, as "Tattoo" calling out for - "The plane! The plane!" - in my childhood. I know I saw his breakout performance as "Nick Nack" in the James Bond offering The Man With The Golden Gun at some point, but I feel the need to re-watch it now. Overall, it was an entertaining nostalgic piece about a troubled man-not the first of any size to have suffered from fame and the lack of it later in life.

Elegant Beast

Yuzuo Kawashima will always be best known to me as a mentor to one of my favorite directors, Shohei Imamura. He died at age 45 before getting any recognition outside of Japan. It seems some of his film have been getting out like Elegant Beast (1962), which recently under went a 4K restoration. This film, that was scripted by noted director and screen writer Kaneto Shindo (Onibaba among others,) is a story about greed, hypocrisy, and conspicuous consumption in the postwar reconstruction and economic miracle. Kawashima takes an artistic risk by having all of the action take place in an apartment in a new modern high rise building that houses the corrupt Maeda family. This results in Kawashima resorting a number of interesting angles and classical framing to keep the film from being too static. The script is talky-much like a stage play and fast paced-but it all seem to work effectively. The parents, Tokizo Maeda (Yunosuke Ito), and wife, Yoshino Maeda (Hisano Yamaoka), are living off money embezzled by their son, Minoru (Manamitsu Kawabata), from his boss and favors and loans from their daughter, Tomoko's (Yuko Hamada) benefactor, a successful novelist named Yoshizawa (Kyu Sazanka). However, they are outdone by Minoru's coworker and secret lover, Yukie Matami (Ayako Wakao). Yukie has manipulated everyone and remained untouchable legally, so that she can quit her job to run a ryokan inn and raise her son. The only other Kawashima film I have seen is the equally impressive A Sun-Tribe Myth from the Bakumatsu Era, which makes me hope more of his films are restored and sent out into the world for viewer enjoyment.

Yebisu Beer x Ebisu Food 2018

I didn't get around to many places this year for the Yeibisu Grand Prix. My first outing was at Jing Hua Xiao Chi Singapore dumpling house. The dish was a selection of 5 different flavored shou ron pou (soup dumplings) — curry, yuzu, nori, ume and plain — served with a bottle of Ebisu. They were a bit hit and miss for me regarding the flavors-the yuzu was the best though.

Tenyawan was a winner with melt-in-the-mouth, fall-off-the-bone Miyazaki pork spare-ribs. I wish I had made a better effort-maybe next year.

The Trial

I recently saw a talk by Welsh director John Williams in Japan about his process for making his Japanese language version of Franz Kafka's seminal novel, The Trial. To start his talk he showed the opening of Orson Welles' 1962 version of The Trial. It was a good introduction to he film, because I read Kafka's novel in college a long time ago and do not really remember the the story so well, and completely forgot about the parable that Welles opens with, Williams mentioned that it is revealed later in the novel, but is effective in Welles' version. The film is certainly one of Welles' greatest triumphs for the visuals alone, however, Anthony Perkins is effective as Joseph K who has to live through the absurd nightmare. Welles imagines the story as a nightmare and adds his own distinctive ending to the film. This film was independently produced by European backers showing what Welles was capable of without studio interference like that he encountered with A Touch of Evil, after which he vowed never to direct with an American studio again. I suppose it is worth mentioning Edmond Richard was the director of Photography in this visual masterpiece. I suppose some of the recognition should also go to the art department for their work on the sets as well. It is undoubtedly one of Welles' greatest films for certain.

Kes

This is director Ken Loach's second feature and his first breakout film, Kes (1969), is an impressive depiction of the life of a working class boy growing up in Yorshire. In the film Billy (David Bradley) suffers humiliations from teachers and fellow students alike. Then he finds a kestrel falcon that he trains and finds escape, satisfaction, and a respite from his hard life that includes getting up early to do a paper route before school. However, this is a hardscrabble community and tragedy is always waiting to strike. That being, it is a moving story of discovery and passion in a child's life.

Afraid To Die

Yasuo Masumura already had more than 10 films under his belt when he made Afraid To Die (1960) with author and media sensation Yukio Mishima as the lead actor and who also sang the film's theme song. I guess it was the studio's idea to cash in on Mishima's notoriety, but he is adequate at best as, Asahina, a yakuza released from prison with a price on his head. 60s starlet Ayako Wakao stars as the love interest. The film also boasts veteran actor Takashi Shimura (mostly known for collaborations with Kurosawa like Seven Samurai and Stray Dog among others)and the sinister-looking Shigeru Kôyama delivers a good performances as do Asahina's tattooed yakuza uncle Gohei and an asthmatic hit-man Masa. Visually the movie is up to Masumura's standards, but it feels somewhat generic and static overall.

Carl's Jr. (Japan)

I've finally had a chance to visit a Carl's Jr., which is more upscale in Japan than back home-much like the Taco Bell franchises in Japan. This one had outdoor seating, a drink bar, and a burger that is better than Shake Shack in my opinion-too bad none of the locations are near me.

An Innocent Witch

An Innocent Witch (1965) is a late career masterpiece from prolific director Heinosuke Gosho. Until recently it was quite difficult to find English subtitled versions of Gosho, who mostly made melodramas and was a contemporary of Naruse, Ozu, and Mizoguchi-like them he started in the silent period and went on to make film s until the the 60s. So far, from the few films I have seen, I have been most impressed by his late period films. This one feels much more modern and less of a melodramatic film than his earlier efforts. In fact, I find much in common with New Wave wunderkind of the 60s-Shohei Immaura. This film has much in common with Imamura's masterpiece, The Insect Woman: the story of a poor Tohoku girl who becomes a prostitution to support her family in the late 30s as Japan mounts its military campaign in China-which is revealed parallel to the action back in Aomori. The beginning of the film and the end are almost documentary-like in their introduction, expositions, and treatment of Ozoresan (one of the three sacred sites in Japan also known as "Home of the Dead") and the depiction of the itako (mediums who converse with the dead). In this story Ayako (Jitsuko Yoshimura from Imamaura's Pigs and Battle Ships Kaneto Shinto's Onibaba) stars as the innocent girl from Oma, the northern most point of Honshu, who is sold in to prostitution to support her ailing parents. Complications arise as she takes a shine to a young local boy, which ends up having dire consequences. Her bad luck is seen as result of being possessed by evil spirits, so they entreat the itako to help exorcise the spirits to restore Ayako to her original innocent state. It is a much more complex psychodrama than the previous Gosho films I had seen and has a contemporary "1960s-New Wave" feel to the production. It also boasts some great cinematography of the rugged Aomori location settings and an inspired soundtrack by Sei Ikeno, who seems to have done many of the Zatoichi film soundtracks as well. An Innocent Witch was an unexpected gem from a veteran of Japanese cinema in his late career.

First Reformed

First Reformed (2017) has been heralded as a return to form by director Paul Schrader and a career best acting performance from Ethan Hawke. Hawke does put in a memorable performance, as for Schrader I haven't seen his most recent full-length features, but I suspect this is probably more along the art film line of film making, than the most recent films-calling to mind his treatise on transcendental film making. I think Diary of a Country Priest by Robert Bresson is the film that clearly has inspired Schrader the most here. To be honest, the film came across as dour and portentous, but not without some interesting ideas and themes being considered.

Dispersed Clouds

Dispersed Clouds (1951) is another well-made Heinosuke Gosho postwar melodrama. This films concerns a selfish young woman, Masako (Keiko Sawamura), who catches pneumonia while traveling in Yamanashi with her college girlfriends and is forced to recuperate in a mountain village inn and learns some lessons about life. These are provided by the widowed inn worker, who acts as a surrogate mother, and the young but worldly doctor Minami,, who freely gives her advice when she suggests becoming his assistant. Gosho again is shooting on location in Yamanshi and has lots of great outdoor shots of the local villages and the surrounding forests and mountains. The tragedies of the war are embedded in the personal stories of the characters as well as the slow postwar development is underscored as on many rural villages have not yet gotten electricity.