there's a DVD newly available from Netflix, I'll be seeing it, eventually. Hell, I didn't even know a DVD could hold 4 hours of content.
speaking of weird, Japanesey-stuff, its hard to give an accurate discription of
Bunraku without it sounding pretty freaking awesome. Its a deliberately stage-y take on gangster noir with a visual style that one ups Dick Tracy in terms of live-action-comic-book and a weirdly diverse cast that features Josh Hartnett and Japanese rocker/very pretty man Gackt, as well as features Woody Harrelson, Ron Perelman, and Demi Moore in substantial supporting roles. Oh, and there's lots of well staged and non-shaky-cam afflicted fisticuffs.
If only the script were half as clever as the production design. Bunraku is the worst kind of bad movie, dissapointing and boring. This could have been the genre film of the year, but the script is freaking terrible, and Josh Hartnett is, well, lets be kind and say he's been very badly miscast as some sort of swaggering, unstoppable badass. Its a film that's frequently a wonder to behold, but its usually only mere moments before the film will burn through its very good ideas and get back to the business of being shitty again. There's moments of greatness here, but they frusterate all the more for the mediocrity that they rise out of.
2/5After the sorrowful crappiness of Bunraku, the more comforting but not quite excellence of
Burke and Hare was a relief. Its a black comedy that's not really that dark, but it is a comedy and is usually kind of funny. With such a great topic as the
cadavar making-and-selling story that powers the film, and the cast behind it, one could be excused for harboring very high expectations for this movie. Its John friggin Landis back at work, its Simon Pegg in a leading role, its from the reformed Ealing Studios. It should be awesome, but I'm willing to settle for amusing and not crappy.
3/5
