Shin Godzilla co-directed by H.Anno : Liked it a lot, it brings it up to date, the SFX are good, Godzilla is intriguing (both scary and goofy with those silly eyes), there's a good balance for his presence on screen, it's never repetitive. I was pleasantly surprised to see how much of the camera work was lifted straight from Evangelion (alongside one of the most famous bits of the OST, the one which is basically a John Barry ripoff) and most of it works well in live action. There's a couple of parts where it doesn't : a weird quick succession of cuts on the female lead's hands at a briefing, later a dialogue with her father where his face is out of the frame for all of the sequence without any real reason. It's not too surprising given Evangelion paid homage to kaiju eiga but it helps a lot modernizing some of the obligatory set pieces (the failed army operation, filled to the brim with the expected otaku / grognard obsession for details) and give a very distinctive feel to all of the urban landscape shots, not unlike Tokyo-3.
Of course the other big deal from this Godzilla is that the film actually has something interesting to say for the usually weak parts featuring humans : it's all presented from a pseudo realistic / serious depiction of the political and administrative response to a monster attack. It makes for some excellent dry deadpan comedy (the beginning is hysterical with the cabinet blowing hot air but changing conference rooms to repeat again and again that they don't know what is going on, but I'm easily amused...) and overall it is much better at giving some depth to what is usually filler though I think the film would have been better with maybe 15-20mn less.
Two thumbs attached to cute tiny Godzilla arms up. Also your best chance for an Eva fix since Anno is obviously never gonna bother finishing Rebuild.
Danchi / The Projects by Junji Sakamoto : An elderly couple move into an old Osaka projects. After a few months, the husband seems to disappear and the gossip machine goes into overdrive... It's a touching film from a director I'm not familiar with (but very eclectic, I was told) which navigates the line well between drama, melancholy, levity and the plain absurd (the plot escalates suddenly into an unexpected direction) to offer the portrait of a mostly aging Japan and the intimacy of this couple's hidden tragedy. It's always light and well paced enough to keep your attention and it's the most subdued Japanese film of all those I saw recently. It's hard to discuss it deeper without going into the plot, so I'll just recommend you see it if you can.
Hausu / House by Nobuhiko Ōbayashi : you're maybe familiar with this if you're into B cinema, as this 1977 film gained a lot of cult status a few years ago. A teen, along with some of her friends, goes to her estranged aunt as a way to escape vacation with her new step mom. It quickly becomes apparent her aunt house is haunted...
I knew the reputation of the film beforehand but I did not expect for the weirdness to be so relentless : before going to the haunted house part the film has two reels of high school saccharine and melodrama played straight to a fault, and the whole thing is a non stop sensory bombardment (the music never ever stops... And there's like only 4 tracks throughout). I'm honestly not sure if the intent was parody or if the makers were just stoned out of their minds. It's not the worst psychedelic film (there's no downtime... At all), it mixes typical Nippon horror film imagery from the 60-70 with some tropes from Western classics at a fevered hysterical pace and there's very striking and distinctive visuals. I'm at a loss to form on opinion on the film to be honest, I walked out interested yet exhausted. There's bound to be a lot of waste when you throw everything like that at the audience.
Cold Fish by Sion Sono : The fortunes of the family of a meek store owner seem to take a turn for the better when an eccentric, rich and successful fellow tropical fish seller takes a liking to them... Except their benefactor is a ruthless serial killer.
That's the first Sono Sion film I see and I'm afraid it's not the best introduction : I reeled back a bit when I saw the Sushi Typhoon logo at the beginning, a label I associate with films I always felt were a little too artificially outrageous and quirky (obviously playing up the expectations of foreign audiences for "Japanese weirdness"). By the end of the film the misanthropy, pointless exploitation, grime and gore gets so ridiculously edgy that I felt vindicated and mentally checked out -though it made for great comedy with the audience audible squirming-. With movies, first and last impressions are almost everything and mine was tainted very negatively at that point. A shame because the first half or two thirds are more than competent and I don't feel that story needed to escalate to gory schlock or trading relatable characters for a pseudo-nihilistic charge of "The world is shit, everyone is shit
". I grew less and less indulgent of this cheap cynicism, your film need to earn this sort of ending and convince me it's not just for shock.
Let me know if I should try Love Exposure or Suicide Club one of these days...
