Labyrinthine Tales

Arabian Nights (1974) - Pasolini

"Truth lies not in one dream but many". - Arabian Nights

Arabian Nights starts with a story of a confident, beautiful slave girl choosing her next owner, a young man she deems the handsomest. It's a story within a story within a story within.... The film is filled with plenty of nudity, frank sexual scenes involving both sexes, decapitation and dismemberment. It's like watching more down to earth and raunchier Fellini. There is no Sinbad or Ali Baba or Genie, but other stories Pasolini chooses for the film are just as colorful and fascinating. Men are often foolish and women often exude wisdom. Beauty and youth are worshipped. World weary wisdom only comes after hardships. Lovers perish, lovers reunite. It jumps from many majestic African settings to that of Middle East and India and back and forth. Ennio Morricone's score and Dante Ferretti's production design help bring out these fantastic tales too. Over all, Arabian Nights plays out like a film totally unencumbered by Western influence (eventhough some Italian actors playing the parts are a little distracting). A fascinating, strangely moving film.

The Zone

Stalker (1979) - Tarkovsky





Tarkovsky's usual theme of faith and sacrifice in the age of science is told metaphorically, making full use of the grimiest looking industrial wasteland ever as a backdrop. Stalker is not an insufferable borefest as I remembered. On the contrary, it's a pretty straightforward and simple road movie with clear destination and purpose. Writer and Professor are guided by Stalker to the zone where people's innermost wishes come true. These are earnest people: Professor tags along with an intention of blowing up the zone so it won't fall into the hands of bad people, Writer is a doubtful holy fool and Stalker is a true believer who is burdened with guiding non-faithful to happiness. They talk, move along and talk. The action here is always breathtaking cinematography- amazing slow tracking shots.

Ginger and Afro Beat

Beware of Mr. Baker (2012) - Bulger

Ginger Baker, a legendary 60s rock drummer for such influential mega bands as Cream and Blind Faith, is the subject of Jay Bulger’s revealing documentary. Known for his unparalleled virtuosic drumming and also his explosive temper, Baker is first seen assaulting Bulger with his cane, leaving the young director with a bloody nose.

Borne out of Bulger’s Rolling Stone interview, the film tracks Baker down living in Tulbagh, South Africa with his 4th wife and several horses in near seclusion. The subject is a very cranky old man. Bulger’s approach is just as aggressive- barking questions at the man whom everyone was afraid to work with some forty years ago. But the floodgate opens and a wild, colorful tale of a crazy eyed, puffy redhead spills out.

Just like Charlie Watts of Rolling Stones, Baker started as a jazz drummer. Heavily influenced by the African rhythm, his style revolutionized the rock sound and became the root of many genres of music that came after him. But it was his temper and heavy drug use that others found difficult to work with. Both admirers and detractors acknowledge his talent, from Eric Clapton to Johnny Rotten but are wary of his madness.

The highlight of the film is definitely what comes after the segment of his short-lived stint with Cream and Blind Faith. As his daughter aptly describes his condition: ability to constantly move or inability to stay in one place, Baker hopped on his Range Rover and drove across the Saharan desert. He ended up in politically tumultuous Nigeria in 1970, playing with legendary Fela Kuti and setting up a studio in Lagos. Using footages from Tony Palmer’s vibrant 1971 recording, Ginger Baker in Africa, it reveals Baker’s true love- Afro Beat and polo.

There are many juicy bits in the film- Jack Bruce recounting getting beaten up by Baker only to be asked by him again later to join Cream, Baker’s many ‘drum battles’ with his jazz heroes– Elvin Jones, Art Blakey, Phil Seaman, etc., him being resurfaced in the 90s only to be taunted by the metal fans on stage and being stupefied by a question if Nirvana was the new Cream, all the while keeping up his charming relationship with the director: “Do you see yourself as a tragic hero?” “Go on with the interview and don’t try to be an intellectual dighead!”

Well armed with interviews and stock footage and a certain cocky flare (not necessarily bad in this case), Beware of Mr. Baker paints an in-depth, entertaining picture of an artist who never apologizes for who he is.

Rudeness, Violence and Filth

The Exterminating Angel/El Angel Exterminador (1962) - Buñuel

Elegant guests arrive for a dinner party at an opulent mansion, while servants excuse themselves to be off for the night. As the dinner progresses, the guests gossip and boast about their bourgeois whatever. Uncharacteristically, as if under a spell, all of them rationalize themselves to stay the night at the study. They say they have places to be and businesses to attend but they lay themselves down on various furniture and floor even. The next day, they rationally talk about this phenomenon. But no one wants to take the first step out of the study and through the dinning room to the door, not even to the kitchen. Days become weeks become months. They soon run out of food and water. Ming vases in the closet become toilets. Tempers fly and fights break out. It's a total anarchy. They burn furniture and floorboard for heat and cooking. They break water pipes under the brick wall (with an ornamental mace, no less) to quench their thirst. Sick die and couples commit suicide. Many succumb to hallucinations and madness.

The outside world- including family members of the self-imposed prisoners and police, has a standoff with the mansion. No one's taking a first step into the house either. One of the kids whose parents are in the house tries to get in, only to scamper away at the doorstep. His balloon flies away. Someone say the stench from the house is unbearable.

Buñuel's absurd take on hypocrisy of bourgeoisie is a great fun to watch. He is a brilliant satirist with a great sense of humor. The film never feels ham-fisted the way José Saramago's Blindness does. Love the cyclical ending too.

Tokyo 1955 - 1970: New Avant Garde at MoMA

Two of the most striking things I've seen in Tokyo 1955 - 1970: New Avant Garde exhibit at MoMA:

Circular Train A by Hiroshi Nakamura


For the Damaged Right Eye (1968) -Toshio Matsumoto


Check out MoMA Website

MoMA Presents: Art Theater Guild and Japanese Underground Cinema, 1960 - 1986

Oh man, this is huge!! As a big fan of Japanese New Wave, I am very excited about this upcoming program at the Museum of Modern Art. There are 70+ rarely seen films present with many guest speakers. If you consider yourself a fan of cinema, you don't have any excuse to miss this once in a blue moon event. I'll see you up there!!

MoMA Press Release: Art Theater Guild and Japanese Underground Cinema, 1960 - 1986

Guest Presenters Include Filmmakers Nobuhiko Obayashi and Susumu Hani, and Author Ian Buruma. Retrospective Also Features Works By Other Celebrated Filmmakers Including Masao Adachi, Takahiko Iimura, Shohei Imamura, Toshio Matsumoto, Nagisa Oshima, Donald Richie, Kaneto Shindo, Hiroshi Teshigahara, Koji Wakamatsu, and others.

Art Theater Guild and Japanese Underground Cinema, 1960-1986
December 6, 2012–February 10, 2013
The Roy and Niuta Titus Theaters

NEW YORK, November 15, 2012—The Museum of Modern Art and The Japan Foundation present Art Theater Guild and Japanese Underground Cinema, 1960-1986, the most comprehensive U.S. retrospective ever devoted to the Art Theater Guild, the independent film company that radically transformed Japanese cinema by producing and distributing experimental, transgressive, and genre-shattering films from the early 1960s until the mid-1980s, running from December 6, 2012-February 10, 2013, in The Roy and Niuta Titus Theaters. This exhibition is curated by Go Hirasawa, Meiji-Gakuin University; Roland Domenig, University of Vienna; and Joshua Siegel, Associate Curator, Department of Film, The Museum of Modern Art; with curatorial assistance provided by Julian Ross, University of Leeds.

Free from the strictures and conventions of the mainstream Japanese studio system, the cinema of the Art Theater Guild was characterized by its provocative depictions of sex, violence, politics, and social upheaval. The ATG also provided a fresh testing ground for collaboration among filmmakers, composers, dancers, novelists, artists, performance artists, and avant-garde theater companies. This exhibition of approximately 70 titles features such seminal Japanese directors as Shohei Imamura, Toship Matsumuro, Nagisa Oshima, Kaneto Shindo, Hiroshi Teshigahara, and Koji Wakamatsu, and runs concurrently with the gallery exhibition Tokyo 1955-1970: A New Avant-Garde. Also presented are several non-ATG programs of Japanese underground cinema of the period, including experimental films and videos by Donald Richie, Masao Adachi, Takahiko Iimura, and others. Two of the leading filmmakers of the Art Theater Guild, Nobuhiko Obayashi and Susumu Hani, will make rare New York appearances to introduce their work, as will the artist Takahiko Iimura and the author Ian Buruma.

Screening Schedule
Art Theater Guild and Japanese Underground Cinema, 1960–1986
December 6, 2012–February 10, 2013
The Roy and Niuta Titus Theaters

Thursday, December 6
6:30 Tenkosei (Transfer Student/Exchange Students/I Am You, You Are
Me). 1982. Japan. Directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi. Screenplay by Wataru
Kenmotsu, Hisashi Yamanaka. With Toshinori Omi, Satomi Kobayashi, Makoto
Sato. Obayashi, the director of the 1977 cult classic House, makes a rare
appearance for the opening weekend of MoMA’s Art Theater Guild exhibition. His
1982 film Tenkosei is a kind of Japanese Freaky Friday: an astute exploration of
gender politics disguised as a tender coming-of-age comedy. A paranormal
incident causes an adolescent boy and girl to swap minds and bodies, leading
them to discover the blessings and foibles of becoming the opposite sex. In
Japanese; English subtitles. 112 min. Introduced by Obayashi.

Friday, December 7
6:30 Haishi (The Deserted City). 1984. Japan. Directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi.
Screenplay by Chiho Katsura, Makoto Naito, based on a novel by Takehiko
Fukunaga. With Satomi Kobayashi, Kisuke Yamashita, Toshie Negishi. Obayashi’s
second ATG production is a romantic, melancholy melodrama born of the elegiac
atmosphere of Yanagawa, a city famous for its canals. After reading a newspaper
article about a tragic fire that took place in Yanagawa, a man recalls the summer
he spent there as a student and the family who gave him room and board. Secrets
of a love triangle simmering between the daughter, her sister, and her sister’s
husband return to memory. In Japanese; English subtitles. Print lent by The Japan
Foundation; courtesy Toho Distribution. 105 min. Introduced by Obayashi.

Saturday, December 8
2:00 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 1: Nobuhiko Obayashi and Yoichi
Takabayashi
Nakasendo (Nakasen Road). 1961. Japan. Directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi.
Digital projection. Courtesy the filmmaker. 17 min.
Emotion. 1966. Japan. Directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi. Screenplay by Obayashi,
Kyoko Hanyu. With Sari Akasaka, Kyōko Hanyū. Digital projection. Courtesy the
filmmaker. 39 min.
Hinanokage (The Shadow of Doll). 1963. Japan. Directed by Yoichi
Takabayashi. 20 min.
This program reunites two luminaries of Japanese underground cinema, Obayashi
and Takabayashi, who with Takahiko Iimura set up the collective “Group of Three”
and screened films together. Their innovative experimental 8mm movies were
harbingers of their subsequent feature work. Iimura is the subject of his own
program on January 12 and 13. Program 76 min. Introduced by Obayashi.
4:45 Otoshiana (The Pitfall). 1962. Japan. Directed by Hiroshi Teshigahara.
Screenplay by Kobo Abe. With Hisashi Igawa, Kazuo Miyahara, Sen Yano.
Together with The Woman in the Dunes and The Face of Another, The Pitfall marks
an astonishing and masterful collaboration among filmmaker Teshigahara, novelist
and playwright Kobo Abe, and composer Toru Takemitsu. Teshigahara described
The Pitfall as a “documentary-fantasy”: an existential murder mystery involving
3ghosts and doppelgangers that he infused with social realist depictions of
hardscrabble coal mining life. Courtesy Janus Films. In Japanese; English subtitles.
95 min.
7:30 Tobenai Chinmoku (Silence Has No Wings). 1966. Japan. Directed by Kazuo
Kuroki. Screenplay by Yasuo Matsukawa, Hisaya Iwasa, Kuroki. With Mariko Kaga,
Minoru Hiranaka, Rokko Toura. A strange and wondrously imaginative film:
Kuroki’s meditation on the history and politics of postwar Japan is told through the
fanciful and difficult journey of a caterpillar from the south of Japan to the north,
and through its metamorphosis into a butterfly and a beautiful, elusive young
woman. Silence Has No Wings has a breathtaking formal audacity, with soaring
cinematography by the great Tatsuo Suzuki and an ethereal soundscape that
interweaves voices both real and imagined. Print lent by The Japan Foundation;
courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 100 min.

Sunday, December 9
2:30 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 2: Nihon University Cinema
Club and Motoharu Jonouchi
PuPu. 1960. Japan. Directed by Nihon University Cinema Club.
22 min.
Tatsumi Hijikata. 1967. Japan. Directed by Motoharu Jonouchi. 1 min.
Gewaltopia Yokokuhen (Gewaltopia trailer). 1969. Japan. Directed by
Motoharu Jonouchi. 13 min.
Shinjuku Station. 1974. Japan. Directed by Motoharu Jonouchi. In Japanese;
English subtitles. 14 min.
Wan (Bowl). 1961. Japan. Directed by Nihon University New Cinema Club. 25
min.
Nihon University New Cinema Club holds a unique and significant role in the
history of Japanese experimental film, not only for its association with student
politics but also for its explicit stance against authorship. The Club, whose
members included Motoharu Jonouchi and Masao Adachi, would present films in
unconventional settings, and indeed, Jonouchi would often reedit his films and
insist on projecting them in different ways for each screening. Jonouchi works
courtesy Mineko Jonouchi; Nihon University Cinema Club works courtesy The FilmMakers’ Coop, New York. Program 76 min.
5:00 Seishun no Satsujinsha (The Youth Killer). 1976. Japan. Directed by Kazuhiko
Hasegawa. Screenplay by Tsutomu Tamura. With Yutaka Mizutani, Ryohei Uchida,
Etsuko Ichihara. Based on a true crime adapted into a short novel by Kenji
Nakagami, this debut film by Hasegawa is an operatic tragedy about the psychic
breakdown of a young man and the disintegration of his family. Hasegawa’s
mesmerizingly intense depictions of violence chart the criminal act and its
consequences. Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy Toho Distribution. In
Japanese; English subtitles. 116 min.

Monday, December 10
4:00 Shura (Pandemonium). 1971. Japan. Written and directed by Toshio
Matsumoto. With Katsuo Nakamura, Yasuko Sanjo, Masao Imafuku. “The most
important and beautiful film made in Japan since Kurosawa’s prime” (Noël Burch).
Matsumoto’s second ATG feature is a pitch-black adaptation of a play by Nanboku
Tsuruya. Relentlessly pessimistic, this tale of bitter betrayal and brutal revenge is
intensified by Matsumoto’s characteristic blurring of fantasy and reality and his
4aestheticization of violence. Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy the
filmmaker. In Japanese; English subtitles. 135 min.

Wednesday, December 12
4:30 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 3
Ryakusho Renzoku Shasatsuma (AKA Serial Killer). 1969. Japan. Directed by
Masao Adachi, Susumu Iwabuchi, Masayuki Nonomura, Yutaka Yamazaki, Mamoru
Sasaki, Masao Matsuda. A companion to Nagisa Oshima’s The Man Who Left His
Will on Film (also screening on December 12), AKA Serial Killer documented the
social upheaval and political oppression that roiled Japan in the 1960s. Director
Adachi, screenwriter Sasaki, and film critic Matsuda put fukeiron (landscape
theory) into practice in their profile of nineteen-year-old serial killer Norio
Nagayama. An indictment of media sensationalism, the film humanizes the young
man by situating his crimes in the larger context of his surroundings. Courtesy
Adachi Masao Screening Committee. In Japanese; English subtitles. 86 min.
7:00 Tokyo Senso Sengo Hiwa (The Man Who Left His Will on Film). 1970.
Japan. Directed by Nagisa Oshima. Screenplay by Masato Hara, Mamoru Sasaki.
With Kazuo Goto, Emiko Iwasaki, Sugio Fukuoka. Following activist
demonstrations, a student filmmaker discovers a last will and testament recorded
on film by a man who may or may not have existed. Much like Antonioni’s BlowUp (1966), the footage seems to be innocuous and visually uneventful, yet its very
banality suggests a tantalizing mystery that invites imaginative speculation. The
student concludes that the only way to understand the ghostly man’s last will is to
re-shoot the landscape locations himself. The tension between subjective
experience and historical fact lies at the heart of fukeiron, a landscape theory that
gained currency in Japan in the 1960s. Print lent by Harvard Film Archive;
courtesy Janus Films. In Japanese; English subtitles. 94 min.

Thursday, December 13
4:30 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 1: Nobuhiko Obayashi and Yoichi
Takabayashi
Nakasendo (Nakasen Road). 1961. Japan. Directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi.
Digital projection. Courtesy the filmmaker. 17 min.
Hinanokage (The Shadow of Doll). 1963. Japan. Directed by Yoichi
Takabayashi. 20 min.
Emotion. 1966. Japan. Directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi. Screenplay by Obayashi,
Kyoko Hanyu. With Sari Akasaka, Kyōko Hanyū. Digital projection. Courtesy the
filmmaker. 39 min.
Program 76 min. (See Saturday, December 8, 2:00)
6:45 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 2: Nihon University Cinema
Club and Motoharu Jonouchi
PuPu. 1960. Japan. Directed by Nihon University Cinema Club.
22 min.
Tatsumi Hijikata. 1967. Japan. Directed by Motoharu Jonouchi. 1 min.
Gewaltopia Yokokuhen (Gewaltopia trailer). 1969. Japan. Directed by
Motoharu Jonouchi. 13 min.
Shinjuku Station. 1974. Japan. Directed by Motoharu Jonouchi. In Japanese;
English subtitles. 14 min.
Wan (Bowl). 1961. Japan. Directed by Nihon University New Cinema Club. 25
min.
5Jonouchi works courtesy Mineko Jonouchi; Nihon University Cinema Club works
courtesy The Film-Makers’ Coop, New York. Program 76 min. (See Sunday,
December 9, 2:30)

Friday, December 14
4:15 Tobenai Chinmoku (Silence Has No Wings). 1966. Japan. Directed by Kazuo
Kuroki. Screenplay by Yasuo Matsukawa, Hisaya Iwasa, Kuroki. With Mariko Kaga,
Minoru Hiranaka, Rokko Toura. Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy Toho
Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 100 min. (See Saturday, December 8,
7:30)
7:00 Koshikei (Death by Hanging). 1968. Japan. Directed by Nagisa Oshima.
Screenplay by Tsutomu Tamura, Mamoru Sasaki, Michinori Fukao, Oshima. With
Yun Yun-Do, Fumio Watanabe, Masao Adachi. “The late 1960s marked a
remarkably productive and creatively intense period for Oshima as he began to
define a truly revolutionary approach to narrative. Death by Hanging marks a high
point of these fertile years as one of Oshima’s most potent, stylistically daring,
and intensely debated works. His first film to draw the attention of international
critics, Death by Hanging was inspired by the highly publicized death sentenced
received by a Korean youth for the strangling of two young female schoolmates.
The film opens with a gripping documentary-style reenactment of the execution
that is suddenly derailed by an uncanny and inexplicable mishap, plunging the film
into a dizzying mode of political theater where the authority of the executioners
and truth claims of cinema are brilliantly put on trial. An uncompromising ode to
Brechtian aesthetics, Death by Hanging is an awe-inspiring and urgent work of
political cinema” (Haden Guest, Harvard Film Archive.” In Japanese; English
subtitles. Print lent by Harvard Film Archive; courtesy Janus Films. 119 min.

Saturday, December 15
2:00 Tenkosei (Transfer Student/Exchange Students/I Am You, You Are
Me). 1982. Japan. Directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi. Screenplay by Wataru
Kenmotsu, Hisashi Yamanaka. In Japanese; English subtitles. 112 min. (See
Thursday, December 6, 6:30)
5:00 Haishi (The Deserted City). 1984. Japan. Directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi.
Screenplay by Chiho Katsura, Makoto Naito, based on a novel by Takehiko
Fukunaga. In Japanese; English subtitles. Print lent by The Japan Foundation;
courtesy Toho Distribution. 105 min. (See Friday, December 7, 6:30)
7:30 Seishun no Satsujinsha (The Youth Killer). 1976. Japan. Directed by Kazuhiko
Hasegawa. Screenplay by Tsutomu Tamura. With Yutaka Mizutani, Ryohei Uchida,
Etsuko Ichihara. Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy Toho Distribution.
In Japanese; English subtitles. 116 min. (See Sunday, December 9, 5:00)

Sunday, December 16
2:00 Ryoma Ansatsu (The Assassination of Ryoma). 1974. Japan. Directed by
Kazuo Kuroki. Screenplay by Kunio Shimizu, Yasushi Tanabe. With Yoshio Harada,
Renji Ishibashi, Rie Nakagawa. Using the perceived failure of student
demonstrations against the Japan-U.S. Security Treaty as a contemporary
backdrop, Kuroki recounts the legend of nineteenth-century revolutionary Ryoma
Sakamoto, the low-ranking samurai who engineered a bloodless revolution against
6Shogunate feudalism and paved the way toward Japan’s rapid modernization.
Kuroki’s dramatic retelling of a timeworn popular legend focuses on the three days
leading up to Ryoma’s assassination, and is given a strikingly modernist look by
cinematographer Masaki Tamura. Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy
Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 118 min.
5:00 Shura (Pandemonium). 1971. Japan. Written and directed by Toshio
Matsumoto. Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy the filmmaker. In
Japanese; English subtitles. 135 min. (See Monday, December 10, 4:00)

Monday, December 17
4:00 Otoshiana (The Pitfall). 1962. Japan. Directed by Hiroshi Teshigahara.
Screenplay by Kobo Abe. With Hisashi Igawa, Kazuo Miyahara, Sen Yano. Courtesy
Janus Films. In Japanese; English subtitles. 95 min. (See Saturday, December 8,
4:45)

Wednesday, December 19
4:00 Ryoma Ansatsu (The Assassination of Ryoma). 1974. Japan. Directed by
Kazuo Kuroki. Screenplay by Kunio Shimizu, Yasushi Tanabe. With Yoshio Harada,
Renji Ishibashi, Rie Nakagawa. Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy Toho
Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 118 min. (See Sunday, December 16,
2:00)

Friday, January 4
4:00 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 4: Expanded Cinema
Tsuburekakatta Migime no Tame ni (For My Crushed Right Eye). 1968.
Japan. Directed by Toshio Matsumoto. Courtesy the filmmaker. Digital projection.
13 min.
Jidai Seishin no Genshogaku (Phenomenology of Zeitgeist). 1967. Japan.
Directed by Rikuro Miyai. Courtesy the filmmaker. Multiple projection. 37 min.
America America America. 1965. Japan. Directed by Kenji Kanesaka. Print lent
by Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography; courtesy Kumiko Shimamoto.
Digital projection. 13 min.
Great Society. 1967. USA. Directed by Masanori Oe, Marvin Fishman. Print lent
by Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography; courtesy the filmmaker. Digital
projection. 17 min.
Expanded cinema became a true phenomenon in late 1960s Japan. Artists began
exploring multiple projection, film as performance, and various Structuralist
investigations. This program features some of the best practitioners of the period,
including Matsumoto and Miyai, as well as early critiques of television and pop
culture by Kanesaka and Oe that offer a fascinating glimpse of Japanese expat
culture in downtown New York. Program 73 min.
6:45 Tenshi no Kokotsu (Ecstasy of the Angels). 1972. Japan. Directed by Koji
Wakamatsu. Screenplay by De Deguchi (Masao Adachi). With Ken Yoshizawa, Rie
Yokoyama, Yuki Aresa. Extreme leftist politics and candid sex collide in Art Theater
Guild’s most controversial feature, as the bad boys of “Pink Cinema,” Koji
Wakamatsu and Masao Adachi, depict Tokyo as a bombed-out city on the verge of
revolution, anticipating real-life bombings of police stations and internecine
warfare among various splinter activist groups. Courtesy Blaq Out. In Japanese;
English subtitles. 88 min.

7Saturday, January 5
2:30 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 5
Mujin Retto (The Deserted Archipelago). 1969. Japan. Directed by Katsu
Kanai. Screenplay by Kanai, Yuji Yamazaki, Yuki Miyata. With Kazumi Kushida,
Yoshihiro Kato, Shinichi Iwata, Jushin Sato. Kanai’s debut is a landmark in
experimental narrative cinema. Upon reaching adolescence, a young man escapes
the monastery where he suffered a tortured childhood. During his flight, he
encounters strange deities, including overgrown babies played by the performance
artists Zero-Jigen and his own doppelganger, spawned in an utterly creepy
manner. Courtesy the filmmaker. Digital projection. In Japanese; English subtitles.
56 min.
4:30 Ikiteiru Koheiji (The Living Koheiji). 1982. Japan. Directed by Nobuo
Nakagawa. Screenplay by Nakagawa, based on a play by Senzaburo Suzuki. With
Fumihiko Fujima, Junko Miyashita, Shoji Ishibashi. After a thirteen-year hiatus,
Nakagawa, a master of the immensely popular Japanese ghost genre, returned to
the studio one last time to make his most intense, and perhaps most beautiful,
film. Nakagawa stages his love triangle among a traveling Kabuki player, his wife,
and her lover—a drama about crimes of passion—as a theatrically stylized yet
intimate play between illusion and reality. Print lent by The Japan Foundation;
courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 78 min.
6:45 Shinju Ten no Amijima (Double Suicide). 1969. Japan. Directed by Masahiro
Shinoda. Screenplay by Taeko Tomioka, Toru Takemitsu, Shinoda, based on a play
by Monzaemon Chikamatsu. With Kichiemon Nakamura, Shima Iwashita, Hosei
Komatsu. In his radical updating of Chikamatsu’s classic bunraku play, Shinoda
explores the familiar tension between familial duty and individual longing through
a pair of desperately passionate young lovers sealed in a doomed fate. Shinoda’s
brilliant theatrical conceits include sets that collapse to reveal their artifice, and
the manipulations of hooded puppeteers who intervene in their characters’
destinies. Courtesy Janus Films. In Japanese; English subtitles. 104 min.

Sunday, January 6
2:30 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 4: Expanded Cinema
Tsuburekakatta Migime no Tame ni (For My Crushed Right Eye). 1968.
Japan. Directed by Toshio Matsumoto. Courtesy the filmmaker. Digital projection.
13 min.
Jidai Seishin no Genshogaku (Phenomenology of Zeitgeist). 1967. Japan.
Directed by Rikuro Miyai. Courtesy the filmmaker. Multiple projection. 37 min.
America America America. 1965. Japan. Directed by Kenji Kanesaka. Print lent
by Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography; courtesy Kumiko Shimamoto.
Digital projection. 13 min.
Great Society. 1967. USA. Directed by Masanori Oe, Marvin Fishman. Print lent
by Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography; courtesy the filmmaker. Digital
projection. 17 min.
Program 73 min. (See Friday, January 4, 4:00)
5:00 Shinjuku Dorobo Nikki (Diary of a Shinjuku Thief). 1969. Japan. Directed by
Nagisa Oshima. Screenplay by Masao Adachi, Mamoru Sasaki, Tsutomu Tamura,
Oshima. With Tadanori Yokoo, Rie Yokoyama, Kei Sato. Restlessly chaotic
storytelling prevails in Oshima’s brilliant homage to Tokyo’s city center of
Shinjuku—ground zero for cultural experimentation and social protest. Famed
graphic designer Tadanori Yokoo plays a young shoplifter who embarks on a
flirtatious roundelay of gender bending with the beautiful Umeko. Juro Kara’s
8Situation Theatre is one of several counterculture hotspots making a location
cameo. Courtesy Janus Films. In Japanese; English subtitles. 94 min. Introduced
by author Ian Buruma.

Monday, January 7
6:00 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 3
Ryakusho Renzoku Shasatsuma (AKA Serial Killer). 1969. Japan. Directed by
Masao Adachi, Susumu Iwabuchi, Masayuki Nonomura, Yutaka Yamazaki, Mamoru
Sasaki, Masao Matsuda. Courtesy Adachi Masao Screening Committee. In
Japanese; English subtitles. 86 min. (See Wednesday, December 12, 4:30)

Wednesday, January 9
4:45 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 6: Radical Experiments in
Japanese Animation
Ai (Love). 1963. Japan. Directed by Yoji Kuri. 12 min.
March. 1963. Japan. Directed by Hiroshi Manabe. Courtesy The Museum of
Modern Art, Ehime. Digital projection. 3 min.
Ikedaya Sodo (Battle at Ikedaya). 1961. Japan. Directed by Ryohei
Yanagihara. Courtesy the filmmaker. Digital projection. 8 min.
Kiss Kiss Kiss. 1964. Japan. Directed by Tadanori Yokoo. Courtesy the
filmmaker. 3 min.
Kamen no Marionetto-tachi (The Marionettes of Mask). 1965. Japan.
Directed by Keiichi Tanaami. Courtesy the filmmaker. 7 min.
Goho/Don (Time Gun). 1966. Japan. Directed by Akira Uno. Courtesy the
filmmaker. 11 min.
Kage (Shadow). 1967. Japan. Directed by Seiichi Hayashi. Courtesy the
filmmaker. Digital projection. 5 min.
WOLS. 1965. Japan. Directed by Motoharu Jonouchi. Courtesy Mineko Jonouchi.
18 min.
Before Japanese animation became big business, many legendary illustrators,
graphic designers, and manga artists (including the “Animation: Group of Three”
of Kuri, Manabe, and Yanagihara) experimented with the genre. Screened at
prestigious venues like the Sogetsu Art Centre, this program of independently
made animated shorts features some of their most stunning achievements.
Program 67 min.
6:45 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 5
Mujin Retto (The Deserted Archipelago). 1969. Japan. Directed by Katsu
Kanai. Screenplay by Kanai, Yuji Yamazaki, Yuki Miyata. With Kazumi Kushida,
Yoshihiro Kato, Shinichi Iwata, Jushin Sato. Courtesy the filmmaker. Digital
projection. In Japanese; English subtitles. 56 min. (See Saturday, January 5,
2:30)

Thursday, January 10
4:30 Nihon University New Cinema Club and Yukio Mishima
Sain (Closed Vagina). 1963. Japan. Directed by Nihon University New Cinema
Club. While depicting a love story between a man and a woman, this film uses
image of a closed vagina as a metaphor—by now considered sexist—for the failed
protest movement during the signing of the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty. This fifth
production of the Nihon University Cinema Club—the first late-night screening at
the Art Theatre Shinjuku Bunka—had a sensational reputation that extended to
9the larger world of experimental cinema, and had a major influence on the
development of the Art Theater Guild. Courtesy Nihon University Cinema Club. In
Japanese; English subtitles. 56 min.
Yukoku (Patriotism/The Rite of Love and Death). 1966. Japan. Written,
directed by, and starring Yukio Mishima. After receiving orders to take command
of a unit that will exterminate his rebel friends following their failed coup in the
“2.26 Incident” of 1936, a lieutenant and his wife commit double suicide.
Mishima’s chillingly nationalist adaptation of his own 1961 novel attracted
tremendous critical response and public favor, paving the way for Art Theater
Guild productions to follow. Courtesy Sakai Agency. In Japanese; English subtitles.
28 min.
6:45 Ikiteiru Koheiji (The Living Koheiji). 1982. Japan. Directed by Nobuo
Nakagawa. Screenplay by Nakagawa, based on a play by Senzaburo Suzuki. With
Fumihiko Fujima, Junko Miyashita, Shoji Ishibashi. Print lent by The Japan
Foundation; courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 78 min.
(See Saturday, January 5, 4:30)

Friday, January 11
4:30 Nihon University New Cinema Club and Yukio Mishima
Sain (Closed Vagina). 1963. Japan. Directed by Nihon University New Cinema
Club. Courtesy Nihon University Cinema Club. In Japanese; English subtitles. 56
min.
Yukoku (Patriotism/The Rite of Love and Death). 1966. Japan. Written,
directed by, and starring Yukio Mishima. Courtesy Sakai Agency. In Japanese;
English subtitles. 28 min. (See Thursday, January 10, 4:30)
7:00 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 7
Kurejii Rabu (Crazy Love). 1968. Japan. Written and directed by Michio Okabe.
With Okabe, Zero-Jigen, Kenji Kanesaka, Yasunao Tone. Capturing the exuberance
of 1960s Japanese counterculture, Crazy Love is an indelible record of
performance art, street happenings, futen hippie life, and wildly popular dance
halls. Performance artists Zero-Jigen, musician Tone and filmmaker/photographer
Kanesaka are among the many familiar faces of the Shinjuku underground who
appear in the film, which also features an infectious soundtrack of contemporary
pop songs. Print lent by Fukuoka City Public Library; courtesy the filmmaker. In
Japanese; English subtitles. 93 min.

Saturday, January 12
2:30 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 8: Takahiko Iimura and Eikoh
Hosoe
Heso to Genbaku (Navel and A-Bomb). 1960. Japan. Directed by Eikoh Hosoe.
Courtesy the filmmaker. 10 min.
Anma (The Masseurs). 1963. Japan. Directed by Takahiko Iimura. 13 min.
Barairo Dansu (Rose Color Dance). 1965. Japan. Directed by Iimura. 13 min.
Kuzu (Junk). 1962. Japan. Directed by Iimura. 12 min.
Ai (Love). 1962. Japan. Directed by Iimura. 12 min.
Onan. 1963. Japan. Directed by Iimura. 7 min.
Made for the Experimental Jazz Film Laboratory, a group led by the great
filmmaker Shuji Terayama (a key figure in this exhibition), Navel and A-Bomb
anticipates photographer Eikoh Hosoe’s famous collaboration with Tatsumi
Hijikata, the co-founder of Ankoku Butoh dance, for the photo-book Kamaitachi
(1968). In the beautifully choreographed Anma and Rose Color Dance, Takahiko
10Iimura transforms his camera into an extension of his body. And in Junk, Love,
and Onan, Iimura improvises with vanguard musicians Takehisa Kosugi, Yoko Ono,
and Yasunao Tone with exhilarating results. All Iimura works courtesy The Filmmakers’ Co-op, New York. Program 67 min. Introduced by Iimura.
4:45 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 9
Gingakei (Galaxy). 1967. Japan. Written and directed by Masao Adachi. With
Akira Hanaue, Rui Takemura. Adachi’s surreal masterpiece Galaxy was the very
first film to premiere at the Theatre Scorpio, with crowds thronging to get in.
Mixing memory and dreams, the film centers on a man who becomes lost within
the Möbius strip of his own consciousness. Adachi uses all manner of cinematic
experimentation—including Yasunao Tone’s chilling soundtrack—to disorient and
unnerve both his protagonist and the audience. Courtesy Adachi Masao Screening
Committee. In Japanese; English subtitles. 75 min.
7:00 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 7
Kurejii Rabu (Crazy Love). 1968. Japan. Written and directed by Michio Okabe.
With Okabe, Zero-Jigen, Kenji Kanesaka, Yasunao Tone. Print lent by Fukuoka City
Public Library; courtesy the filmmaker. In Japanese; English subtitles. 93 min.
(See Friday, January 11, 7:00)

Sunday, January 13
2:45 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 6: Radical Experiments in
Japanese Animation
Ai (Love). 1963. Japan. Directed by Yoji Kuri. 12 min.
March. 1963. Japan. Directed by Hiroshi Manabe. Courtesy The Museum of
Modern Art, Ehime. Digital projection. 3 min.
Ikedaya Sodo (Battle at Ikedaya). 1961. Japan. Directed by Ryohei
Yanagihara. Courtesy the filmmaker. Digital projection. 8 min.
Kiss Kiss Kiss. 1964. Japan. Directed by Tadanori Yokoo. Courtesy the
filmmaker. 3 min.
Kamen no Marionetto-tachi (The Marionettes of Mask). 1965. Japan.
Directed by Keiichi Tanaami. Courtesy the filmmaker. 7 min.
Goho/Don (Time Gun). 1966. Japan. Directed by Akira Uno. Courtesy the
filmmaker. 11 min.
Kage (Shadow). 1967. Japan. Directed by Seiichi Hayashi. Courtesy the
filmmaker. Digital projection. 5 min.
WOLS. 1965. Japan. Directed by Motoharu Jonouchi. Courtesy Mineko Jonouchi.
18 min.
Program 67 min. (See Wednesday, January 9, 4:45)
5:00 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 8: Takahiko Iimura and Eikoh
Hosoe
Heso to Genbaku (Navel and A-Bomb). 1960. Japan. Directed by Eikoh Hosoe.
Courtesy the filmmaker. 10 min.
Anma (The Masseurs). 1963. Japan. Directed by Takahiko Iimura. 13 min.
Barairo Dansu (Rose Color Dance). 1965. Japan. Directed by Iimura. 13 min.
Kuzu (Junk). 1962. Japan. Directed by Iimura. 12 min.
Ai (Love). 1962. Japan. Directed by Iimura. 12 min.
Onan. 1963. Japan. Directed by Iimura. 7 min.
All Iimura works courtesy The Film-makers’ Co-op, New York. Program 67 min.
(See Saturday, January 12, 2:30)

11Monday, January 14
4:00 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 9
Gingakei (Galaxy). 1967. Japan. Written and directed by Masao Adachi. With
Akira Hanaue, Rui Takemura. Courtesy Adachi Masao Screening Committee. In
Japanese; English subtitles. 75 min. (See Saturday, January 12, 4:45)

Wednesday, January 16
4:00 Nikudan (The Human Bullet). 1968. Japan. Written and directed by Kihachi
Okamoto. With Minori Terada, Naoko Otani, Yunosuke Ito. Perhaps best known for
his samurai films for Toho studio, Okamoto also wrote and directed a number of
antiwar films based on his own experiences as a soldier. The Human Bullet is the
best of these, a satire centering on a nameless soldier who on the eve of a suicide
mission meets his first—and last—love. Mixing humor with melancholy, the film
offers a conflicted vision of national duty and sacrifice. Print lent by The Japan
Foundation; courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 117 min.
7:00 Gishiki (Ceremony). 1971. Japan. Directed by Nagisa Oshima. Screenplay by
Mamoru Sasaki, Tsutomu Tamura, Oshima. With Kenzo Kawarasaki, Atsuko Kaku,
Nobuko Otowa. Oshima’s magisterial epic, centering on the ambivalent surviving
heir of the Sakurada clan, uses ritual and the microcosm of the traditional family
to trace the rise and fall of militaristic Japan across several decades. The film was
made in celebration of the Art Theater Guild’s tenth anniversary. Print lent by The
Japan Foundation; courtesy Janus Films. In Japanese; English subtitles. 123 min.

Thursday, January 17
6:30 Shinjuku Dorobo Nikki (Diary of a Shinjuku Thief). 1969. Japan. Directed by
Nagisa Oshima. Screenplay by Masao Adachi, Mamoru Sasaki, Tsutomu Tamura,
Oshima. Courtesy Janus Films. In Japanese; English subtitles. 94 min. (See
Sunday, January 6, 5:00)

Friday, January 18
4:30 Tenshi no Kokotsu (Ecstasy of the Angels). 1972. Japan. Directed by Koji
Wakamatsu. Screenplay by De Deguchi (Masao Adachi). With Ken Yoshizawa, Rie
Yokoyama, Yuki Aresa. Courtesy Blaq Out. In Japanese; English subtitles. 88 min.
(See Friday, January 4, 6:45)
7:00 Bara no Soretsu (Funeral Parade of Roses). 1969. Japan. Written and
directed by Toshio Matsumoto. With Peter, Osamu Ogasawara, Toyosaburo
Uchiyama. “A carnivalesque melding of documentary vérité and avant-garde
psychedelia, Funeral Parade of Roses offers a shocking and ecstatic journey
through the nocturnal underworld of Tokyo’s Shinjuku neighborhood, following the
strange misadventures of a rebellious drag queen fending off his/her rivals. Often
cited as a major inspiration for Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange, Matsumoto’s
breakthrough film is a visually audacious and lyrically abstract testament to the
vertiginous daring of the postwar Japanese avant-garde art and film scenes.
Matsumoto orchestrates a series of quite astonishing visual set pieces, including
actual performances by the influential street theater group Zero-Jigen” (Haden
Guest, Harvard Film Archive). Print lent by Harvard Film Archve; courtesy the
filmmaker. In Japanese; English subtitles. 107 min.

Saturday, January 19
2:00 Nikudan (The Human Bullet). 1968. Japan. Written and directed by Kihachi
Okamoto. With Minori Terada, Naoko Otani, Yunosuke Ito. Print lent by The Japan
Foundation; courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 117 min.
(See Wednesday, January 16, 4:00)
4:45 Shinju Ten no Amijima (Double Suicide). 1969. Japan. Directed by Masahiro
Shinoda. Screenplay by Taeko Tomioka, Toru Takemitsu, Shinoda, based on a play
by Monzaemon Chikamatsu. With Kichiemon Nakamura, Shima Iwashita, Hosei
Komatsu. Courtesy Janus Films. In Japanese; English subtitles. 104 min. (See
Saturday, January 5, 6:45)
7:15 Mujo (This Transient Life). 1970. Japan. Directed by Akio Jissoji. Screenplay by
Toshiro Ishido. With Kotobuki Hananomoto, Akiji Kobayashi, Eiji Okada. Jissoji’s
feature debut was one of the Art Theater Guild’s biggest international hits, a
sensuous and daring exploration of Buddhist spirituality and eroticism that also
touched on the taboo of incest. The film’s controversial content, combined with the
breathtaking, nearly gravity-defying camerawork, captivated audiences worldwide.
In Japanese; English subtitles. 146 min.

Sunday, January 20
2:30 Gishiki (Ceremony). 1971. Japan. Directed by Nagisa Oshima. Screenplay by
Mamoru Sasaki, Tsutomu Tamura, Oshima. Print lent by The Japan Foundation;
courtesy Janus Films. In Japanese; English subtitles. 123 min. (See Wednesday,
January 16, 7:00)

Monday, January 21
6:15 Ninja Bugeicho (Band of Ninja/Manual of Ninja Martial Arts) [longer
Japanese theatrical version]. 1967. Japan. Directed by Nagisa Oshima.
Screenplay by Mamoru Sasaki, Oshima, based on the manga by Sanpei Shirato.
Voices of Shoichi Ozawa, Kei Yamamoto, Akiko Koyama. MoMA presents the longer
Japanese theatrical version of one of Oshima’s rarest and most groundbreaking
films. When budgetary constraints prevented him from making a live-action
version of Band of Ninja, an epic, 17-volume manga about the son of a defeated
warlord who joins a peasant rebellion to avenge his father’s death, Oshima
ingeniously used camera movements and voiceover dialogue to bring Shirato’s
original drawings to life. Courtesy Oshima Productions. In Japanese; English
subtitles. 117 min.

Wednesday, January 23
4:00 Ningen (Human). 1962. Japan. Directed by Kaneto Shindo. Screenplay by
Shindo, based on a novel by Yaeko Nogami. With Taiji Tonoyama, Nobuko Otowa,
Kei Sato. Four tempest-tossed fisherman, adrift and delirious with hunger, turn on
each other in their fight for survival. A pioneer of independent film since the early
1950s, Kaneto Shindo exploited the Art Theater Guild’s characteristically low
budget and skeletal crew to his advantage, deftly conjuring the desperate intensity
of a claustrophobic ship setting. Print lent by the National Film Center of The
National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo; courtesy Kindai Eiga Kyokai. In Japanese;
English subtitles. 117 min.

13Thursday, January 24
4:30 Nagisa Oshima and Akio Jissoji
Yunbogi no Nikki (Yunbogi’s Diary/Diary of Yunbogi). 1965. Japan. Directed
by Nagisa Oshima. This ethereal montage of still images with darkly somber
undertones, Yunbogi’s Diary is based on photographs that Oshima took during his
two-month research trip to South Korea in 1965, during which he was haunted by
his encounters with impoverished street children in Seoul. The voiceover
comprises diary entries from a six-year-old Korean boy, and Oshima’s own
reflections on Japanese-Korean relations, a controversial subject that he revisited
in his later films Sing a Song of Sex and Death by Hanging (shown in December).
Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy Oshima Productions. In Japanese;
English subtitles. 24 min.
Yoiyami Semareba (When Twilight Draws Near/Twilight Falls). 1968.
Japan. Directed by Akio Jissoji. Bored by the emptiness of everyday life, four
students gather to play dangerous games in an apartment. Oshima was
approached by noted television director Jissoji to adapt his script on reckless
youth, and Jissoji delivered with dramatically experimental filmmaking conceits
that influenced such later films as This Transient Life (1970) (also in this
retrospective) and Mandala (1971). Twilight had a successful theatrical run on a
bill with Oshima’s Diary of a Shinjuku Thief (1969). Print lent by the National Film
Center of The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo; courtesy Kodai. In
Japanese; English subtitles. 44 min.
6:45 Ninja Bugeicho (Band of Ninja/Manual of Ninja Martial Arts) [longer
Japanese theatrical version]. 1967. Japan. Directed by Nagisa Oshima.
Screenplay by Mamoru Sasaki, Oshima, based on the manga by Sanpei Shirato.
Voices of Shoichi Ozawa, Kei Yamamoto, Akiko Koyama. Courtesy Oshima
Productions. In Japanese; English subtitles. 117 min. (See Monday, January 21,
6:15)

Friday, January 25
4:30 Nagisa Oshima and Akio Jissoji
Yunbogi no Nikki (Yunbogi’s Diary/Diary of Yunbogi). 1965. Japan. Directed
by Nagisa Oshima. Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy Oshima
Productions. In Japanese; English subtitles. 24 min.
Yoiyami Semareba (When Twilight Draws Near/Twilight Falls). 1968.
Japan. Directed by Akio Jissoji. Print lent by the National Film Center of The
National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo; courtesy Kodai. In Japanese; English
subtitles. 44 min. (See Thursday, January 24, 4:30)
7:00 Mujo (This Transient Life). 1970. Japan. Directed by Akio Jissoji. Screenplay by
Toshiro Ishido. In Japanese; English subtitles. 146 min. (See Saturday, January
19, 7:15)

Saturday, January 26
2:00 Ningen (Human). 1962. Japan. Directed by Kaneto Shindo. Screenplay by
Shindo, based on a novel by Yaeko Nogami. With Taiji Tonoyama, Nobuko Otowa,
Kei Sato. Print lent by the National Film Center of The National Museum of Modern
Art, Tokyo; courtesy Kindai Eiga Kyokai. In Japanese; English subtitles. 117 min.
(Wednesday, January 23, 4:00)
145:00 Den’en ni Shisu (Pastoral: Hide and Seek). 1974. Japan. Written and directed
by Shuji Terayama. With Kantaro Suga, Hiroyuki Takano, Yoshio Harada. A
virtuoso in a great many artistic disciplines, counterculture icon Terayama drew
upon his poetry collection, also titled Pastoral, for this clever and humorous
exploration of memory and memoir. His alter ego is a filmmaker who is suddenly
confronted with his childhood self. Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy
Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 102 min.
7:30 Sho o Suteyo, Machi e Deyo (Throw Away Your Books Get Out onto the
Streets/Throw Away Your Books, Let’s Go Into the Street). 1971. Japan.
Written and directed by Shuji Terayama. With Eimei Sasaki, Masahiro Saito,
Yukiko Kobayashi. Terayama’s Art Theater Guild debut is a breathtaking collage of
words transformed into street actions and art happenings—a devilishly disjointed
urban narrative loosely held together by a coming-of-age drama. Print lent by the
National Film Center of The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo; courtesy Toho
Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 119 min.

Sunday, January 27
2:30 Sho o Suteyo, Machi e Deyo (Throw Away Your Books Get Out onto the
Streets/Throw Away Your Books, Let’s Go Into the Street). 1971. Japan.
Written and directed by Shuji Terayama. With Eimei Sasaki, Masahiro Saito,
Yukiko Kobayashi. Print lent by the National Film Center of The National Museum
of Modern Art, Tokyo; courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles.
119 min. (Saturday, January 26, 7:30)
5:15 Ningen Johatsu (A Man Vanishes). 1967. Japan. Directed by Shohei Imamura.
With Yoshie Hayakawa, Shigeru Tsuyuguchi, Imamura. In this genre-shattering
investigative (and investigation of) documentary, Imamura and his crew follow
one of Japan’s thousands of missing-persons cases. They find their journalistic
integrity suddenly called into question when the missing man’s fiancée begins to
fall in love with the filmmaker. “In a coup de cinéma that has been equaled only
by Abbas Kiarostami’s Close-Up, Imamura transforms fact into artifice, being into
acting, personal identity into tenuous fabrication” (James Quandt, Cinematheque
Ontario). Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy Icarus Films. In Japanese;
English subtitles. 130 min.

Monday, January 28
4:30 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 10: Donald Richie and Shuji
Terayama
Senso Gokko (War Games). 1962. Japan. Directed by Donald Richie. 22 min.
Cybele (Cybele: A Pastoral Ritual in Five Scenes). 1968. Japan. Directed by
Donald Richie. 20 min.
Ori (Cage). 1962. Japan. Directed by Shuji Terayama. Courtesy Henrikku
Morisaki. 11 min.
Tomato Ketchappu Kotei (Emperor Tomato Ketchup). 1971. Japan. Directed
by Shuji Terayama. Courtesy Henrikku Morisaki. 27 min.
Donald Richie, a former MoMA curator and internationally renowned historian and
critic of Japanese culture, was also an avid participant in underground cinema in
Japan. Two of his personal and affecting films are presented in this program: War
Games depicts a sacrificial ritual enacted by children, with the participation of
butoh dancer Tatsumi Hijikata; Cybele is an outrageous naked ceremony
performed by Zero-Jigen. The theme of ritual continues with Terayama’s Cage and
15culminates in the anarchistic revolt of his Emperor Tomato Ketchup, which
scandalized the nation both as a radio play and a film. Program 80 min.

Wednesday, January 30
4:00 Noyuki Yamayuki Umibeyuki (Bound for the Fields, the Mountains, and
the Seacoast). 1986. Japan. Directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi. Screenplay by
Haruo Sato, Shinobu Yamada. With Saburo Boya, Sen Hara, Yasufumi Hayashi.
During the fervently nationalist months leading up to World War II, a rebellious
teenager is transferred to a new primary school in a small Inland Sea town. He
vies with the school’s reigning bully, who takes a romantic interest in his older
stepsister. When they learn she’s going to be sold to a brothel to pay off her
father’s debts, they form an uneasy alliance to free her. With surprising moments
of caricature and slapstick, Obayashi celebrates the anarchic world of adolescence
while also satirizing adult hypocrisy and conformism. This is the color version of a
film that was also released in black and white. Print lent by The Japan Foundation;
courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 135 min.
7:00 Enrai (Distant Thunder). 1981. Japan. Directed by Kichitaro Negishi. Screenplay
by Haruhiko Arai, based on the novel by Wahei Tatematsu. With Toshiyuki
Nagashima, Johnny Okura, Eri Ishida. Distant Thunder charts the urban sprawl
and corrupt materialism of Tokyo in the 1970s, as well as its devastating effect on
farming families in the outlying areas of the city. Negishi’s film, whose protagonist
is a young tomato grower, was made in the characteristically realist style that his
uncle established in the 1930s as the leading producer of the famed Nikkatsu
Tamagawa studios. Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy Toho
Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 135 min.

Thursday, January 31
4:00 Den’en ni Shisu (Pastoral: Hide and Seek). 1974. Japan. Written and directed
by Shuji Terayama. With Kantaro Suga, Hiroyuki Takano, Yoshio Harada. Print lent
by The Japan Foundation; courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English
subtitles. 102 min. (See Saturday, January 26, 5:00)
6:30 Japanese Underground Cinema Program 10: Donald Richie and Shuji
Terayama
Senso Gokko (War Games). 1962. Japan. Directed by Donald Richie. 22 min.
Cybele (Cybele: A Pastoral Ritual in Five Scenes). 1968. Japan. Directed by
Donald Richie. 20 min.
Ori (Cage). 1962. Japan. Directed by Shuji Terayama. Courtesy Henrikku
Morisaki. 11 min.
Tomato Ketchappu Kotei (Emperor Tomato Ketchup). 1971. Japan. Directed
by Shuji Terayama. Courtesy Henrikku Morisaki. 27 min.
Program 80 min. (See Monday, January 28, 4:30)

Friday, February 1
4:00 Furyo Shonen (Bad Boys). 1961. Japan. Written and directed by Susumu Hani.
With Yukio Yamada, Hirokazu Yoshitake, Koichiro Yamazaki. One of the great
postwar Japanese filmmakers, Hani was a seminal figure of the Art Theater Guild
and presents several of his key works at MoMA. His debut feature, Bad Boys, was
voted best film of the year by prominent critics and launched the Japanese New
Wave. A classic of the genre, it’s a tough, poignant story about teenage
16delinquency that gained its street cred through vérité camerawork, on-location
photography, improvisation, and the use of non-professional actors. Hani’s
reputation as a brilliant and vital new voice in Japanese cinema was cemented by
such films as She and He, The Inferno of First Love, and The Morning Schedule, all
screening in a special weekend with Hani. Print lent by The Japan Foundation;
courtesy Iwanami Audio-Visual Media Ltd. In Japanese; English subtitles. 89 min.
Introduced by Hani.
6:30 Kanojo to Kare (She and He). 1963. Japan. Directed by Susumu Hani.
Screenplay by Kunio Shimizu, Hani. With Sachiko Hidari, Kikuji Yamashita, Eiji
Okada. Although incontestably one of postwar Japanese cinema’s most innovative
and influential filmmakers, Hani today is unjustly neglected. His second feature
film is a finely etched, feminist study of a young modern woman (Hidari) who is
restless in her marriage to a salaryman. The couple live in a shining new
apartment building on a hill overlooking a slum. The wife finds herself strangely
drawn to a rag-picker who lives down below in a tin shack with a blind child and a
dog, and the sheltering comforts of her middle-class existence inexorably fall
away. Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy Iwanami Audio-Visual Media
Ltd. In Japanese; English subtitles. 114 min. Introduced by Hani.

Saturday, February 2
1:30 Noyuki Yamayuki Umibeyuki (Bound for the Fields, the Mountains, and
the Seacoast). 1986. Japan. Directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi. Screenplay by
Haruo Sato, Shinobu Yamada. With Saburo Boya, Sen Hara, Yasufumi Hayashi..
Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese;
English subtitles. 135 min. (See Wednesday, January 30, 4:00)
4:30 Gozenchu no Jikanwari (The Morning Schedule). 1972. Japan. Directed by
Susumu Hani. Screenplay by Hani, Kanji Nakao, Ichiro Araki, Yutaka Hamada.
With Aya Kunikida, Sumei Shau, Takuji Hatano. Continuing his favorite theme of
lost childhood, Hani invented faux home movies—some shot by his own actors—
for this affecting, and somehow jarringly modern, work of nostalgia. Reiko returns
from vacation to inform Shitamura of the suicide of their friend Kusako; together
they watch 8mm holiday films that reveal the melancholic passing of friendships
that once seemed eternal. Courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English
subtitles. 101 min. Introduced by Hani.
7:00 Hatsukoi Jigokuhen (The Inferno of First Love/Nanami). 1968. Japan.
Directed by Susumu Hani. Screenplay by Shuji Terayama, Hani. With Haruo
Asano, Kuniko Ishii, Misako Miyato. One of the most powerful themes of this ATG
retrospective is that of incest and childhood abuse. The Inferno of First Love is a
particularly haunting example of this, made all the more disturbing for the erotic
atmosphere that pervades it. The film centers on an adolescent boy whose love for
a beautiful young model is corrupted by memories of sexual molestation. It
remains an unforgettable collaboration between two dramatically distinct voices of
independent Japanese cinema and art, Hani and Terayama (the latter also
represented in the MoMA exhibition with Emperor Tomato Ketchup, Cage, and
Throw Away Your Books, Let’s Go Into the Streets). Print lent by The Japan
Foundation; courtesy the filmmaker. In Japanese; English subtitles. 104 min.
Introduced by Hani.

Sunday, February 3
2:00 Kanojo to Kare (She and He). 1963. Japan. Directed by Susumu Hani.
Screenplay by Kunio Shimizu, Hani. With Sachiko Hidari, Kikuji Yamashita, Eiji
Okada. Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy Iwanami Audio-Visual Media
Ltd. In Japanese; English subtitles. 114 min. (See Friday, February 1, 6:30)
5:00 Arakajime Uchinawareta Koibito-tachi yo (Lost Lovers). 1971. Japan.
Directed by Soichiro Tahara, Kunio Shimizu. Screenplay by Shimizu. With Renji
Ishibashi, Kaori Momoi, Tenmei Kano. In their feature debut Lost Lovers,
television documentarian Tahara and avant-garde playwright Shimizu offer an
energetic portrait of Japanese youth after the failed student protests of the 1960s.
While on a trip to northern Japan, a former pole vault champion befriends a young
deaf couple and learns a way of communicating beyond words. Actress Kaori
Momoi makes her impressive debut as a liberated female character that at the
time seemed refreshingly new for Japanese cinema. Print lent by The Japan
Foundation; courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 122 min.

Monday, February 4
4:30 Hatsukoi Jigokuhen (The Inferno of First Love/Nanami). 1968. Japan.
Directed by Susumu Hani. Screenplay by Shuji Terayama, Hani. With Haruo
Asano, Kuniko Ishii, Misako Miyato. Print lent by The Japan Foundation; courtesy
the filmmaker. In Japanese; English subtitles. 104 min. (See Saturday, February
2, 7:00)

Wednesday, February 6
4:00 Ningyo Densetsu (Mermaid Legend). 1984. Japan. Directed by Toshiharu
Ikeda. Screenplay by Takuya Nishioka. With Mari Shirato, Kentaro Shimizu, Jun
Eto. A cult favorite that deserves to be better known in the United States,
Mermaid Legend was the first feature film of the Director’s Company, established
in 1982 by nine directors, and the first of several co-productions with ATG. In this
wicked and wrathful tale of revenge, a fisherman becomes the unwitting witness
to a murder. He discovers that the victim had been mixed up in a corrupt
businessman’s scheme to construct a nuclear power plant. When the fisherman
himself is then murdered, his wife, a pearl diver, unleashes a torrent of merciless
revenge, quite literally becoming a force of nature. Courtesy Toho Distribution. In
Japanese; English subtitles. 110 min.
7:00 Tattoo Ari (Tattoo). 1982. Japan. Directed by Banmei Takahashi. Screenplay by
Takuya Nishioka. With Ryudo Uzaki, Keiko Takahashi, Misako Watanabe. A heist
drama based on a true story, Tattoo marked Takahashi’s switch from a successful
career making sexploitation films to more mainstream fare. A bank robber’s life
story is told in flashback, tracing his frustrated efforts to find his place in society
and culminating in a last-ditch, violent attempt to prove himself. In Japanese;
English subtitles. 107 min.

Thursday, February 7
4:00 Ningen Johatsu (A Man Vanishes). 1967. Japan. Directed by Shohei Imamura.
With Yoshie Hayakawa, Shigeru Tsuyuguchi, Imamura. Print lent by The Japan
Foundation; courtesy Icarus Films. In Japanese; English subtitles. 130 min. (See
Sunday, January 27, 5:15)
187:00 Furyo Shonen (Bad Boys). 1961. Japan. Written and directed by Susumu Hani.
With Yukio Yamada, Hirokazu Yoshitake, Koichiro Yamazaki. Print lent by The
Japan Foundation; courtesy Iwanami Audio-Visual Media Ltd. In Japanese; English
subtitles. 89 min. (See Friday, February 1, 4:00)

Friday, February 8
4:30 Kazoku Gemu (Family Game). 1983. Japan. Written and directed by Yoshimitsu
Morita. With Juzo Itami, Yusaku Matsuda, Saori Yuki. The illusion of familial
harmony, an undercurrent to so many ATG films, culminates in this wildly
successful and absurdist adaptation of a popular novel by Yohei Honma. Presented
in New Directors/New Films and the winner of 5 prestigious Kinema Junpo
awards—including Best Film, Best Director, and Best Supporting Actor for the
brilliant director Juzo Itami’s performance as the patriarch—Family Game was
described by Vincent Canby in The New York Times as “wickedly funny…a stylish
deadpan comedy about Japan’s comparatively affluent, utterly directionless, new
middle class…. [F]rom the opening shots until the last, it's a visual adventure. The
succession of brilliantly colored, often geometric compositions satirize the worst
aspects of what might be called Japan's economic modernism.” Print lent by The
Japan Foundation; courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 107
min.
7:00 Gozenchu no Jikanwari (The Morning Schedule). 1972. Japan. Directed by
Susumu Hani. Screenplay by Hani, Kanji Nakao, Ichiro Araki, Yutaka Hamada.
With Aya Kunikida, Sumei Shau, Takuji Hatano. Courtesy Toho Distribution. In
Japanese; English subtitles. 101 min. (See Saturday, February 2, 4:30)

Saturday, February 9
1:30 Tattoo Ari (Tattoo). 1982. Japan. Directed by Banmei Takahashi. Screenplay by
Takuya Nishioka. With Ryudo Uzaki, Keiko Takahashi, Misako Watanabe. In
Japanese; English subtitles. 107 min. (See Wednesday, February 6, 7:00)
4:15 Enrai (Distant Thunder). 1981. Japan. Directed by Kichitaro Negishi. Screenplay
by Haruhiko Arai, based on the novel by Wahei Tatematsu. With Toshiyuki
Nagashima, Johnny Okura, Eri Ishida. Print lent by The Japan Foundation;
courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 135 min. (See
Wednesday, January 30, 7:00)
7:30 Kazoku Gemu (Family Game). 1983. Japan. Written and directed by Yoshimitsu
Morita. With Juzo Itami, Yusaku Matsuda, Saori Yuki. Print lent by The Japan
Foundation; courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 107 min.
(See Friday, February 8, 4:30)

Sunday, February 10
2:00 Arakajime Uchinawareta Koibito-tachi yo (Lost Lovers). 1971. Japan.
Directed by Soichiro Tahara, Kunio Shimizu. Screenplay by Shimizu. With Renji
Ishibashi, Kaori Momoi, Tenmei Kano. Print lent by The Japan Foundation;
courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 122 min. (See Sunday,
February 3, 5:00)
5:00 Ningyo Densetsu (Mermaid Legend). 1984. Japan. Directed by Toshiharu
Ikeda. Screenplay by Takuya Nishioka. With Mari Shirato, Kentaro Shimizu, Jun
1920
Eto. Courtesy Toho Distribution. In Japanese; English subtitles. 110 min. (See
Wednesday, February 6, 4:00)
Visit MoMa website here

Informal Processing

The Master (2012) - Anderson

A sprawling, ambitious work. I enjoyed it just as I enjoyed There Will be Blood and both of them happen to rely heavily upon the tremendous lead performances. Id vs super ego, embodied by Joachim Phoenix and Philip Seymour Hoffman, is still very much a PT Anderson acting workshop but more subdued (still hurt my ears with all that shouting though). They still talk plainly what's exactly on their minds like lovelorn teenagers. There is no character arc, no change of minds in Anderson's protagonists. At first, they want to be sympathized with (Hard Eight, Boogie Nights, Magnolia). But after There Will be Blood, the writer/director seems less concerned with them being understood. They have always been arrogant, self-assured pricks. It's all about them pitted against one another for a dogmatic battle. There Will be Blood could have easily been called The Master.

Still, Phoenix is really amazing, slumped like an injured ape, slurring his words from one side of his mouth, so as Hoffman, red faced most of the time. Amy Adams and others are negligible, barely registering on the radar. PT Anderson movies usually annoy me. The Master didn't. I see it as a departure of sort for him. It's not a character study, doesn't have the strong narrative nor flash camera movement or innovative photography, even though it was shot on crisp 70mm (I do like close ups and constant shot from a low angle). Don't read this as a backhanded compliment. I really do like the Master. There are some great individual scenes in that film. I let out a short laugh and almost cheered Freddie on when he drove off with his bike near the end. I even liked the clunky ending. It might be my new favorite Anderson so far.

Truth on Film

A Man Vanishes (1967) - Imamura

Imamura's search for the truth goes beyond a representation of reality on film. A plastic salesman has gone missing. The strong willed, pretty wife of the missing man with a film crew in tow sets out on a journey to find him. Interviews after interviews with various people in the man's life reveal no clear picture regarding the disappearance. The film is also a reflection of a society in a specific time and place. People got married for their financial stability without really knowing each other. "How can a man be missing in such a small place?" the voice over in the beginning asks.

Even though Imamura announces in the middle of the film that what we are seeing is a fiction, even after he takes away the studio walls to reveal the sound stage, there is no trace of irony. The wife falls in love with the interviewer/crew member. The film winds down to a sibling rivalry- the case of she said/she said. The shoot ends, director calls cut. People disperse. And we are left with many heady questions: Where is Oshima the plastic salesman? Who is telling the truth? What makes a man? What is reality? A great precursor to current crop of shape-shifting, postmodern cinema, A Man Vanishes is an invigorating experience.

Faith, Memories and Sacrifice

Nostalghia (1983) - Tarkovsky






I'm in awe of this film...and speechless...

Tarkovsky fashions a breathtaking meditation on his usual themes: faith, memories and sacrifice. It's filled with unforgettable images. We follow a Russian poet Andrei (Oleg Yankovsky) accompanied by his translator, a Rafaelite beauty (Domiziana Giodano) in an ancient hot springs hotel in Italy. There he meets Domenico (Bergman regular Erland Josephson), a local kook who had locked himself and his family up in his house for 7 years, believing the end of the world is imminent. The poet feels a kinship with the madman. The film slowly progresses to an unforgettable speech by Domenico in Rome. He calls for human unity and urges us to go back to our origins. Then he douses himself with gasoline and sets himself on fire. The ending with Andrei carrying a candle through the drained outdoor hot springs really made me very emotional.

*No Country for Old Bond

Skyfall (2012) - Mendes

Ever since 007 franchise decided to 'go back to its roots' with Daniel Craig as a no-nonsense, cold blooded MI6 killing machine, the makers were left with fewer and fewer options. The world is changing: the machismo, sexism and patriotism all sound as unattractive and outdated as the word 'computer'. It's been harder and harder to differentiate this blunt instrument from any other Bourne action hero types. So it has to be and only can be a character study even if it means sacrificing sex appeal and glitz. Because its breakneck speed though, to keep up with other actioners, the character arc and whatnot can't be stretched out long enough for them to keep Craig as Bond. And as much as I'm excited about the rumor that Idris Elba as the next Secret Agent, I am very sad to see Craig go. In my humble opinion, Craig has been the best Bond ever.

Mendes and the team sets out what maybe the last Craig 007 the same way as Rocky 4. Hardly any older than his counterparts in their primes (I remember one 80s Sean Connery Bond movie where they make incessant jokes about his age), Skyfall starts with picturesque Istanbul setting where he gets shot off of the moving train. Hard to believe Daniel Craig as an aging, failing Bond, considering Roger Moore's never athletic flabby Brit-twit JB. It's all about honor and code and stuff. Monstrous Silva (scene chewing Javier Badem), an ex-secret serviceman, has it out for M (Judi Dench, playing mother of all mothers). In order to protect her, 007 first has to go off the grid and do Driving Miss Daisy routine to Scotland, then do an OK Corral style shotgun battle. I was half expecting either Eye of the Tiger or Hank Williams to kick in.

But it's no less fun than the previous two. OK maybe a little less. It's also the first time anyone notices the cinematography (shot by Roger Deakins) in a Bond movie. Shanghai and Macao never looked better. The final showdown in misty Scotland, backlit by burning mansion is perhaps second best this year, losing only to another Scottish movie, Wuthering Heights.

*the title courtesy of Robbie Bruens.

Colors and Shadows

Tren de Sombras (1997) - Guerin





Gerard Fleury, a Parisian attorney and amateur filmmaker, disappeared while vacationing in Normandy with his extended family in 1930. He left countless disintegrating home movie reels. José Luis Guerin, using some of Fleury footages and reenacting scenes with actors, makes an utterly captivating film. The film starts with a prolonged b&w home movie- the family on vacation in their big country estate. Sound of projector running is audible. Then it's the present- rustling of the wind, fallen leaves, the empty, decaying opulent estate, shadow play on decorative walls, rain. The long sequence is just as beautiful as any later JLG films. Tren de Sombras doesn't catch fire 'til half way in, when it becomes a reconstruction of the Fleury family through the home movie reels. Guerin playfully edits- using jump cuts, juxtapositions and split screen, suggesting the scenario of illicit affair between a maid and the elder son. This voyeuristic process is not unlike Antonioni's Blow Up or Zapruder reenactment. But the film is much more than that. It is obvious that Guerin is playing with the genre and form. The films works on many levels. With elegant and poetic images, the film never feels sordid or trivial. There is no dialog- as in In the City of Sylvia, he utilizes sound of the street and nature. And there is a glorious, Brakhage-like experimental element to the whole thing. Tren de Sombras hits all the right notes in what I'm looking for in movies right now.

Occupy Sandy

Just saw a news clip of Red Hook relief activities. Red Hook is an area in Brooklyn right near the water where my friend Sean lives. The water overran everywhere and the damage has been enormous. While FEMA and Housing authorities scrambling to provide hot food and water for Red Hookians who don't have power and running water, with their twitter and smartphone, Occupy Wallstreet stepped up their game by providing food, supplies and transportation. They are becoming more and more like Hamas sans blowing stuff up.

Now I wish I had a car and a twitter account. All I could do was donate some money:

http://interoccupy.net/occupysandy/

Their website is slow but after a minute or two it will come up. Donate if you can. I might trek down to one of the gathering sites and volunteer this weekend if the power doesn't come back on in those areas.

Immersion

Colossal Youth (2006) - Costa





For two and a half hours, we follow Ventura, an eldery resident of Lisbon's slum known as Fontainhas, as he visits his various 'children' and have lengthy conversations with them. Costa concludes his trilogy with this tall, erect man in a dark suit and white shirt in almost every frame. This DV shot film is remarkably beautiful. As with his other two in the trilogy, the film is an immersive experience: with its quiet protagonists and deliverately slow, leasurely pacing, you get to 'live in' with these souls in their darkness, listening to their stories. Costa's docufilms are nothing like I've experienced before and Colossal Youth, with its poetry, is the most beautiful of them all.

In Vanda's Room Review

Ossos Review

Obsession

La Captive (2000) - Akerman

Akerman's parable about jealousy, possessiveness is that of simplicity- an obsessive love story devoid of pettiness and emotional outbursts. Instead, she prefers carefully composed shots and operatic narrative to illustrate a tragedy born out of controlling jealousy in man-woman relationship. Simon (Stanislas Merhar) first seen perving over the images of Ariane (Sylvie Testud) having a good time at the beach with her friends. Then we find out that he already has her living in his grand mansion where he and his grandma reside. Ariane is passive and defenseless- "If you like," or "As you wish." are her most common answers to Simon's incessant demands. He trails Ariane's whereabouts whenever she leaves the house and imagines wild lesbian escapades she may or may not be up to. There is a funny scene- convinced that Ariane is having a lesbo relationship, Simon visits a lesbian couple and thoroughly asks them about the nature of their relationship. After accusing her of lying, he declares the end of the relationship and of course it is for her benefit. She obliges, saying even though it would hurt her, "as you wish". For her in relationship, there should be some mysteries remain in your partner. For him, it's the opposite. Rachmaninov's Isle of the Dead is a perfect fit to the stormy finale to this moody, intriguing piece of filmmaking.

Trumping Masculinity

The Loneliest Planet (2011) - Loktev

Julia Loktev's breakdown of masculinity is very interesting. A young, engaged American couple, played by non-Americans (Gael Garcia Bernal and Israeli actress Hani Furstenberg) are trekking breathtaking Georgian outdoors with a enigmatic local guide Dato (Bidzina Gujabidze). The couple are playful, and very much in love until one act of cowardice changes the foundation of their relationship. Loktev slowly builds up to a turning point mid-way. Everything is stripped down. Nothing is stereotypical. There is no emotional breakdown, just a lot of brooding and self reevaluating. Bernal underplays his usual hunky masculinity and internalizes his thought process silently and it's a site to see. Deeply uncomfortable yet fascinating, The Loneliest Planet is an Antonioni-esque film where dissection of masculinity is at its sharpest.

Aftermath: Julia Loktev Interview

It's been six years since we heard from Julia Loktev after her minimalist, downright Bressonian suicide bomber film, Day Night Day Night. Her new film The Loneliest Planet, shot in the Caucasus mountains in Georgia, is just as enigmatic and elliptical as her first one, if not more. In person, Loktev appears to be fiercely intelligent and thoughtful. But just like her films, I had a very hard time pinning her down on what the film is all about.

It's been a while since your last film Day Night Day Night, why the gap?

What a rude question to ask a filmmaker?! (laughs)

Oh I didn't mean to be rude...

I was just talking to someone about how we were supposed to shoot the film one year earlier. We had to delay it for a year because it took a while to get the money together. It's amazing how long it takes to get everything done. I wish I could make a film a year. In this day and age, I think that's very hard to accomplish. In this case we had most of the budget, we needed about twenty five percent of it. And the story takes place in the mountains, so there is a very short window to shoot from the month of May through September. After that, it's all snow and they are closed for business. We were going to shoot the previous summer and had an investor who came in and said, "We will give you the last 25 percent of the money, if you could move the location to China. So we were going to move to China even though the script was originally set in Georgia. Then they pulled the plug two weeks before the shoot, and we had to wait another year. Luckily, by that time I had Gael (Gael Garcia Bernal) and Hani (Israeli actress Hani Furstenberg) cast and they both stuck with the project and came back after a year to do it.

That's pretty awesome. How long did it take you to write the script?

That's a hard thing to measure because you know, it takes a while to come up with the initial idea and there is a germination period before you flesh out what you want to say. I never understand people asking "what version of the script are you on?" because I keep on writing everyday even on the set. And I'm constantly editing while I am writing it, it's much more of a fluid process for me.

You said it was conceived with Georgia in mind and the film is stunning to look at. Why Georgia?

I was born in Russia (technically in Soviet Union) when Georgia was part of the USSR. It's where I can still get around speaking Russian even though it is a different country with their culture and language. That's where my mother used to go for hikes when she was a university student. So there was this kind of family connection to the mountains even though I went to Georgia for the first time for a film festival a few years back.

Was it very hard to shoot in the mountains?

It was the hardest thing I've ever done. Yes, it was incredibly difficult. Not because we were shooting in Georgia. Georgians are actually amazingly easy to work with and made everything very easy for us, we really couldn't have done it without them. We had a small international crew and some of them were made up of Georgian mountaineers. It was run like an expedition, so in terms of organization, it was fantastic. But what made difficult was the sun because I had a very specific visual in mind. Most of the time the sun was too harsh to shoot. We had very short windows to shoot with a particular direction in mind and it really, completely limited how we shot. Perhaps limited is not the right word. The sun was definitely an obstruction and a challenge.

There was a rainy scene in the film though.

We did manage to get one rainy day scene. We planned it and waited for it and got it done. Most of the time we couldn't find a cloud in the sky. We wanted to get a nice overcast look but no luck. There was a heat wave and we had to wait for the sun to go behind the mountain so we could get some relief.

How big of a crew did you have?

About a dozen on set. It had to be very small and mobile because we had to hike into a lot of our locations. We came back all thinner and healthier. (laugh)

I find it interesting to see non-American actors (Bernal and Furstenberg) playing an American couple. Same with Day Night Day night, where young suicide bomber (Louisa Williams) is of unknown ethnicity. Do they share the theme of anonymity?

I wouldn't say it's anonymous. But they are not caricatures. They are not a blonde haired, blue eyed couple from Wisconsin and I wanted to make a point of that. Look at us here sitting and talking. Where are you from?

Korea.
You are from Korea and I'm from Russia. To me that's the world that surrounds me- many people I know are from somewhere else and to me that's very natural.

What happens in the middle of the film, I have to say, I never have seen such a subtle and sharp criticism of masculinity anywhere.

I don't know if it's a criticism of masculinity or desire for masculinity.

I've seen some other films that deal with the same theme, Bruno Dumont's "29 Palms" and possibly Claire Denis' "White Material" in which emasculating circumstances bring about the violence and destruction. Alex (Gael Garcia Bernal)'s action in the film baffles himself.

That's a very... reductive way to look at it. But it's incredibly hard to be a man now for sure. (laughs) Yes. In our culture it is incredibly difficult. As a woman I have a lot of flexibility: I can be strong, I can be vulnerable. I can kind of choose how I want to play that. And we are telling guys to be sensitive. I do like sensitive men. But there are times part of me wants a man to be a man with a capital M. That's always kind of confusing to me, about myself.

There is something vulnerable and boyishness about his behavior, like hiding behind his mom...

I don't really equate vulnerability and boyishness.

Cowardice?

No, cowardice will fall in any case. I mean we all have a case when we feel vulnerable. All the way from our childhood to old age, there are moments that challenge who you are and catch you off guard, that aren't planned for and wherein you fail. And then what do you do? It's always the aftermath, that's the question. I wouldn't call it cowardice. It's quite natural. Then, would it be more forgivable if it was a woman in his shoes? Most people would say that I wouldn't have a movie if it was like that. That's so screwy now, I mean, all this talk about challenging gender roles, we always come back to that fact. It could've been man and man or woman and woman. But we are veering off from the subject...

Well, the character's played by Gael, who obviously brings in certain masculinity and that's why that scene is so surprising.

Yeah, I think it's very important but it's not someone big. You would expect this to be built into their character but what he does something that is very out of character. That was the reason I cast Gael. Because he always seems like he knows what he's doing.

How did it come about casting Gael and Hani?

Obviously they were committed to the project even though it was delayed. I think they were both attracted to the central question in the script. They tried to find a way into those characters and tried to unpack all those very complicated yet very simple and primal emotions. The way they worked together was incredibly important to me. How they clicked from the very first day they met. They had a very good chemistry together. On the first day, they looked like a believable couple and they brought things out from each other. And also how they fit with the guide (Bidzina Gujabidze). I think the chemistry among them is what made the film work.

There is something very Antonioni about this film. How does the location factor into the couple's relationship?

I think it is like music. It colors the tone and feel of the film. The landscape completely affects the emotions and I don't mean in a straightforward way necessarily. I didn't want to have an emotionally difficult story in a difficult landscape. Like a desert for example. I actually like the idea that it is set in a soft and lush landscape. It becomes more and more beautiful as their relationships get more and more strained. It's a beautiful place. I've traveled a lot and went up a lot of mountains. But it really is an astonishing looking place and I've never been any place like that before.

Are there any contemporary filmmakers you find affinity with?

I don't know if I can say I find affinity with any particular directors. There are certainly directors I like. And I like a lot of different directors- from Claire Denis to Park Chan-wook. But I tend to be attracted to the movies that deal with image and sound more strongly than just talking.

The last half of the film is pretty much dialog-less, except for Bidzina's long monologue at the end. How did you approach that with the actors?

It's all about their inability to talk about this thing- it should be talked about but it can't be talked about. What on earth can they possibly say afterward? How do they negotiate the space between them and try to find the way toward each other? They have no idea what to say and don't have any space to talk either because they are not alone. There is the guide present the whole time. So they try to show it with their body language and so on. I think they did a tremendous job.

Is there anything you are working on right now?

Not enough I want to talk about. (laughs) It's always easier to talk about it afterward. And I don't want to jinx it.

Both of your films are really fascinating. And I'm hoping you come out with more films, because I'm really interested in what you are after.

Well thank you. I hope so too.

The Loneliest Planet opens Oct. 26 in New York and Los Angeles and will be available on VOD Oct. 30.

I Live on an Island Called Cinema: Leos Carax Interview

Leos Carax, once the wunderkind of French cinema, the heir apparent to the French New Wave, has made only five feature films in his almost 30 year career. He is roaring back to the scene with his fantastical new film Holy Motors. His third feature, Les Amants du Pont-Neuf, made some 20 years ago, happens to be my favorite film of all time, so my anticipation for the interview was extremely high, to say the least. I knew the interview wouldn't be easy, considering his bad boy status and reclusive persona. I had to prepare for it: no easy questions such as, the casting of Kylie Minogue and Eva Mendes, and nothing too gossipy about his tumultuous love affair with Juliette Binoche and Yekaterina (Katya) Golubeva (with whom he had a daughter and to whom the film is dedicated). It would've been ideal to have Carax all to myself and be a total fanboy. But I had to share the honor of interviewing this elusive director with three other journalists.

Deeply reflective of his rocky career, Carax turns out to be an ethereal sage of some sort. He almost inaudibly, almost incoherently, rambled on. It was all kinds of wonderful. As he often paused for a long time, searching for the right words and connections to describe his thoughts, I could see the glimpse of a gifted artist who's been fighting against his own demons rather than against the world. I just hope this new found artistic freedom and (hopefully) flexibility in funding with the success of Holy Motors will help his future endeavors.

[The interview was originally set up for Carax and one of the stars from the film, the Brit pop icon Kylie Minogue, but because of scheduling conflict, Miss Minogue couldn't make it. Many thanks to my journalist compatriots: Steve Erickson and Hillary Weston.]
 
You've directed Denis Lavant over the course of three decades now, how has your process of working with him evolved over the years?

We don't talk much. I didn't know Denis in real life and we lived about 500 meters apart in Paris, we had mutual friends and went out to dinners together, and so on. But I was lucky. It was almost miraculous that I found him for my first feature (Boy Meets Girl). I was looking for this boy (Carax's alter ego Alex) for a long time. We had to postpone the project looking for him. But I haven't used him in his full physical capacity. The film was quite static. So in my second feature (Mauvais Sang), I finally got to use his physical talent. Then the third film (Les Amants du Pont-Neuf) came along ... then, we didn't work together for 16 years until we made Tokyo!

A few years ago. I discovered that he became a much better actor since then. Because at the time (of my Alex trilogy), he was great, but limited. Even ten years ago we couldn't have made Holy Motors together. He could have played parts of it, I think, like the motion capture scene. But I don't think he could've pulled off a scene with a father and daughter or of him in a deathbed. I knew this much going in -- that the film would be shot in Paris with little money and it will be shot on digital and it would be with Denis and I would not watch dailies. Then I thought the two or three scenes I mentioned wouldn't be good. Still, I thought, "OK, let's try it." So I was very surprised with the results. I don't think now there is any role that he can't play.

Was there any initial scene that sparked to make this film?

....

I'd rather you said you had sort of an image of a theater full of people and you didn't know if they were sleeping or dead ...

I'm not a writer so I don't write script from A to Z. With every film, I have two, three images and feelings, then I try to edit this feelings and images together. There was obviously the limousine, which has been attracting me that I saw first in America and since then .... My neighborhood I live in Paris is a Chinese neighborhood and they use limousines for their wedding .... This I find strange because I find them morbid, more like coffins. But I was very intrigued by them. I thought they were great vehicles for today's fiction. They are like a virtual world. They want to be seen but you can't see inside them. People feel very protected inside. They play a role -- you don't buy them, you rent them, like a rented life. They are like avatars themselves. They are also very cinematic.

And I had this image of an old beggar, which is in the second scene of the film. I pass these gypsy beggars all the time. They are out there every day. They dress the same and their back completely bent. I thought, "how can anyone [be] more alone then them," "what life is left of them?" And so on. Then I was thinking about making a documentary about one of those women and me. We build this bridge between us and I'll try to relate to her and probably have to go to her home country to understand her story.... Then my fear was, if I start making this documentary, there will be no end and I might have to devote myself to this documentary forever. Even in fiction I have a hard time with the ending, how do you end a documentary? So I went completely opposite way. This woman would be played by an actor and I would play my words into his mouth. I guess I associated this role-playing limousine idea with this and put them together.

The last time I saw you was at the Q&A session of the TOKYO! screening here in New York. And you mentioned not getting any funding for any of your projects. You mentioned making HOLY MOTORS cheap and fast. And it's very different from the films you've done. It seems much more energetic and freer than anything you've done. Did the lack of funding play a big role in it being so different?

This movie was born out of rage, rage of not being able to make other projects, so it was imagined very fast. I think the whole idea came about in two weeks. If it seems stronger and freer, it's because it was put together very quickly I think. It was only in a few weeks the idea was conceived. It took us about a year to find the money. But it was shot very fast right after that.

Watching HOLY MOTORS, I couldn't help noticing your ambivalence toward cinema. If someone would've walked up to you and asked, "Should I devote my life to the movies?" what would you tell them?

Devotion is such a strong word. It's really a miracle that cinema exists. It has to be invented. No other art is an invention. In cinema, it needs machines. In French, it's "motor! (equivalent of camera roll!)" before director calls it. "Action!" I was around 16 years old when I discovered this island called cinema where I can see life and death from another perspective, from many different angles. I think every young person should be interested in that island. It's a beautiful place. I haven't made that many films so I don't really consider myself a filmmaker. It's really arrogant for me to say this but I do believe that I live on that island. It's worth living there.

Do you feel any kinship with other directors of your generation?

No. But I'm not looking for any. I started very young. I was a shy young man of 17 when I first came to Paris. I didn't know anyone. I was kind of a bluff -- I didn't study film, I've never been on a film set before, so when I was asking money for film, I was bluffing. I was proud of being alone. So I paid the price for this pride. It gave me strength but also it made me very isolated in the industry. I can't say it's good or bad but that's my story. I happened to be a director (sometimes) and happened to be born in France. But I don't really see myself as part of a certain generation in French cinema.

We are living in a virtual world. There are people living their lives without any real human connections. With the main character going in and out of the situations without any consequences, is that something you wanted to address in Holy Motors?

Yeah.... Actions, the notion of experience is what I was after.... I am interested in virtual reality. But it's something I don't want to impose upon someone, neither I want it being imposed upon me. The film is not against anything. It's about just a fighting for survival. I think we lack in courage. Not only as filmmakers but us as human beings. I think courage should be taught in school. [Everyone laughs.] Whether it's civics, politics, poetry, even physical... if we lose courage nothing is possible.

Did it take you a lot of courage to do this film? It's very personal, like your other films. It's always about Alex, your alter ego played by Denis Lavant. I saw your daughter's name in the credit. And that father and daughter scene, which was very poignant (and mean too). How close was that scene to the relationship with your daughter?

I wouldn't say there is any courage in my filmmaking business. I do what I can. It happens that Denis and I are about the same age. Although I don't know him well but I know he has three daughters. I have one, who appears in the beginning of the film. She's 8 years old. So, you use your fears and all the questions marks in to your film. You know the father and daughter relationship can be one of the most beautiful relationships, but at the same time it's also the basis for many horror stories. I mean a father can be a monster, very easily. That's my fear, being a monster. But it's got nothing do do with my actual relationship with my daughter, I hope.

What I admire about this film is that you have a rich understanding of the cinema's past. All the different genres that are considered dead -- musical, monster films, etc. -- are used and made in a such a new way. I was wondering what your relationship is like with the classic cinema?

What's strange is that I discovered the film at the same time as I started making films. It doesn't really happened that way for most of the people. Usually one comes first and the other later. It just happened to me that way. I watched a lot of films from 16-24. A lot of silent films, Hollywood films of course and the New Wave. But I stopped watching films after my second film. I thought I paid my dues for my love of the cinema and I needed to go my own way. People see lots of references in the film but I don't. I just live on this island called cinema. I just want it to be seen as it was imagined, not with some cinephile's hat on. Hopefully, this film is a success showing the experience of human life today and not come across as some new cinematic language invented. Cinema permits you to see things, like ghosts. And so, I don't care much about cinema's history.

Holy Motors garnered accolades in various film festivals this year and opens on Wednesday, Oct. 17 in New York City.