11/6/21 (Sat)
Frank Perry’s hallucinatory 1968 diary of a mad has-been. The main character’s precarious mental state is reflected in the odd structure of the film and some bizarre editing. While inevitably a product of its time – not sure if the white, Waspy, nouveau riche setting would be possible today, whether true to the era or not, not to mention a passing reference to “stylish fags” – its unconventional setup has evidently given it a cult following.
11/8/21 (Mon)
Frank Perry’s 1981 gothic portrait of the late Joan Crawford as the mother from hell is well deserving of its reputation as a camp classic. Continue reading
3/20/22 (Sun), Umewaka Noh Theater
The shows today were both cerebral Buddhist-inflected pieces appealing more to Noh lovers than general audiences. The theater was limited to 50% capacity and didn’t even manage to fill that, a sharp contrast with the packed house at the Kanze Noh Theater a week earlier even allowing for Kanze’s more audience-friendly program. I wonder if the undue precautions at some locations actually make audiences more fearful and deter them from coming.
3/16/22 (Wed)
Imamura Shohei’s directorial debut of 1958 is a rather silly comedy about a traveling theater group. Not much of the later provocative Imamura on view here, though he does concentrate on the lower classes in a struggling troupe that mixes popularized versions of classical pieces like Chushingura with titillating girlie shows to bring in unsophisticated rural audiences. In a sign of the future Imamura, it features numerous loud outbursts among the actors and crowds, leering audience members and peeping Toms, pilfering of money and geese, a reference to eating dogs, actors picking their noses, and an impressively vicious catfight between two actresses, among other delights. But this was all in a broadly comic mood.
3/5/22 (Sat)
Imamura Shohei’s hard-hitting 1979 film is based on the case of an actual serial killer in Japan active in 1964 just before the Olympics. The title is taken from Deuteronomy, where it is God who insists on that honor (“Vengeance is Mine; I will repay, says the Lord”). But it is not clear here what the main character is taking vengeance against. Continue reading
3/22/22 (Tues)
Spirited Away, the worldwide anime hit, has been retooled as a major stage show by British director John Caird of Les Mis fame. It’s always a thorny business bringing films to the stage since few producers have the creativity or guts to stray too far from familiar material, as way too many Broadway duds have proven in recent years. This one was particularly tricky since they’re dealing with an animated feature involving supernatural elements. Anime/manga has been a rich vein for producers here to mine, such as the hugely successful Kabuki version of the One Piece epic and a musical rendering of video game phenomenon Token Ranbu. It is now its own genre, known in local parlance as 2.5D shows. But Spirited Away is based not on a series but on a single highly popular film – it reigned for years as Japan’s biggest-selling movie by far of any genre (until eclipsed by another anime last year) – with iconic characters and scenes that its legions of fans will be eagerly awaiting. The trick for a long-running success is how to balance between lovers of the film and audiences less familiar with the material if at all.
That’s not necessarily a problem in Tokyo: the show is only being done here for four weeks (followed by a national tour) and boasts familiar stars. That ensures a full house for the brief run – tickets were quickly snatched up – and the high-for-Tokyo ticket price of ¥14,500 should guarantee a profit despite the elaborate staging (they were going for over 10 times that price on online resale sites). Given the familiarity of the movie and the family-friendly material, I’m at a loss why they didn’t book this for a longer run, especially with the money they’ve put into it. I have to assume they’re aiming for a future production in London or New York considering the creative staff – in addition to director/adaptor Caird, non-Japanese handled the music arrangement, orchestrations, art design and puppetry design (in the land of classic puppet theater). That would make this a trial run of sorts. The Japanese theater world works in strange and mysterious ways.
2/17/22 (Thurs)
The original French version of the big Sundance hit Coda. Continue reading
2/6/22 (Sun)
An entertaining if by-the-book feel-good story about the only hearing child of deaf adults (= CODA). Ruby (a superb Emilia Jones) is literally the ears and mouth of her parents and deaf elder brother, who run a fishing boat. Interpreting for them in their business dealings and accompanying them on the boat, she makes it possible for them to maintain their independence. But it also deprives her of a normal life. Their idea of family experiences includes farts and dating-site photos, which engage senses that they can share. She joins the choir at school on the spur of the moment when she notices a certain boy putting his name in. There she finds that she has talent, discovering her own voice in a way. She wants to break free and become a singer, especially when she gets an offer to audition for a major music university, but that would mean leaving the family without a voice of their own just as they are attempting to rally other fisherman to oppose the greedy fish brokers. The story is thus not only about her need to break free but theirs as well.
2/2/22 (Wed)
Lucy doesn’t come out looking too good in this portrait of a shaky marriage. Continue reading
8/27/21 (Fri)
George Cukor’s all-star 1933 comedy based on the Kaufman/Ferber stage play of the previous year. It seemed odd to see a play set among the rich and their swanky dinner party at the height of the Depression. But it turns out that there was more than meets the eye.
3/13/22 (Sun), Kanze Noh Theater (Ginza)
The pairing of these two lively crowd-pleasers was almost completely sold out despite the state of semi-emergency in Tokyo at present. The only reminder of the fading pandemic was the ubiquitous masks, though I noticed a lot of exposed noses, which I’m going to take as progress. Continue reading
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