Hello and welcome dear readers to the annual blog update. Honestly, I can’t believe that it has been seven years since I set up this blog and started posting. A lot of stuff happened to me in the meantime for sure, but I have always felt motivated to write whenever some kind soul left a like or a comment under a review/article.
This latter half of 2022 was especially challenging to me in terms of personal life, which affected the frequency of updates in November and December. Still,I did manage to pull off my desired quota of 52 posts for 52 weeks of a year. The idea is to do the same for the upcoming year.
Evidently, I did not forget about articles as well. I have yet to finish my Rising Sun over Hollywood: American Imaginings of the Japanese Setting in Cinema series with parts 2 and 3. What is more, I will release throughout January my reviews of Nobuhiko Obayashi’s films plus more thoughts on the Heisei Godzilla flicks. I also intend to write a new article devoted to Obayashi for AsianFilmFans, and an article focusing on Haruki Murakami adaptations for MyDramaList. This is the rough plan for the first half of 2023, and I sincerely hope that I will be able to have sufficient free time to complete these passion projects.
Rest assured, I will continue to update the blog itself. I realise that after seven years, its appearance may be a bit dated, but I do not have the necessary strength and stamina to go deep inside the HTML labyrinth and do a complete makeover of the site. Maybe sometime in the distant future…
Well, that’s it from me. As I wrote the previous year, Thank You for being here. Running this blog for the past few years has been a humbling experience which allowed me to stay sane in the midst of real-life insanity. I send you warmest wishes. Please keep on appreciating the grandeur of East Asian Cinema.
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Noriko’s Dinner Table; or, Dirty Horrible Things You wanna put a memory in here? Note: This review was originally written for an external site in April this year, but I decided against its publication in view of the sexual misconduct allegations involving Sion Sono. After over half a year, there are no recent news on the matter, so I am posting my text on the blog. The review appears in its unabridged form.
Let’s take a trip back to the past and explore Sion Sono during his pre-Love Exposure fame. Back in 2002, Siono made cult indie horror called Suicide Circle. This movie focused on the taboo topic of suicides and questionable morality of the Japanese youth in an extremely dark, brutal, and harrowing manner. The innovative (and undoubtedly postmodernist) project would not have gained so much popularity nowadays had it not been for its 2006 follow-up Noriko's Dinner Table.
Release Info
Directed by: Sion SonoStarring: Kazue Fukiishi, Tsugumi Otake, Ken Mitsuishi
Language: JapaneseOriginal Title: 紀子の食卓 Runtime: 159 min
Synopsis
Meet Noriko (Kazue Fukiishi) who is a 17-year-old girl from a small town. She desires to enrol at a Tokyo university' however, her overprotective father (Ken Mitsuishi) objects to the idea. He is afraid that Noriko may meet some random stranger and become pregnant. Still, Noriko decides to run away from home. In Tokyo, she meets up with a friend whom she chatted with via an online website, Ueno Station 54 (Tsugumi Otake). Noriko changes her identity and joins her friend's business that rents out people to act as part of family members. After a few months, Noriko's younger sister Yuko (Yuriko Yoshitaka) joins her as well.
Depression Walk With Me
The film in question takes place before, during, and after the events presented in Suicide Circle. Some Sion Sono online fans claim that it is impossible to understand Suicide Circle without Noriko’s Dinner Table, but I dare to say this is not the case at all. Noriko’s Dinner Table is a strong enough movie to stand on its own and does not require the knowledge of Suicide Circle to be enjoyed.
Evidently, the story of the film presents us with the character of Noriko, an introverted girl who spends her free time chatting on a website haikyo[dot]com (literally ruins[dot]com). A friendship she forges there encourages Noriko (Kazue Fukiishi) to abandon her family and boring small-town lifestyle. She arrives in Tokyo and joins her friend, Kumiko (Tsugumi Otake), who goes by the moniker “Ueno Station 54”. Soon after, Noriko’s sister, Yuka (Yuriko Yoshitaka), joins them as well. Noriko’s father (Ken Mitsuishi), desperate to track down his missing daughters, also rushes to Tokyo. Will he be able to re-establish his family?
In terms of its narrative structure, Noriko’s Dinner Table feels more like a novel rather than a movie. This stems from the fact that the film was inspired by Sono’s original novel Suicide Circle: The Complete Edition in which the director outlines the events from the perspective of four major characters: Noriko, Yuka, Kumiko, and Tetsuzo. The movie expands on the themes of suicides and the fragility of life by adding the motif of the degradation of family unit. What seemed to be a perfect family in a photograph is not always like that, according to Sono. There is a generational gap which renders the parents unable to recognise the individuality and true worth of their children.
Another concerning matter is the meta-theatricality presented in the film. Almost every main character assumes an additional identity. Noriko becomes Mitsuko, Yuka becomes Yoko, whereas Kumiko introduces herself as Ueno Station 54. These are parentless people who pretend to be fake family members for money. This in turn allows them to confront their emotions and provide a much-needed catharsis, especially towards the bloody finale. In my opinion, Noriko’s Dinner Table does better in this performance-within-a-performance modus operandi than the recent Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Drive My Car (2021).
Excellent cinematography cannot go unnoticed. I would not say that the controversial technique of “shaky cam” was utilised, but definitely the majority of scenes were shot in a handheld way, which really enhances the otherworldly perception of reality, as if what we are seeing is a dream. As for the flashback memories of Noriko, it was a surprise to see 8mm footage.
With regard to performances, Kazue Fukiishi definitely steals the movie as Noriko, but at times, it is Tsugumi Otake as Kumiko who feels as the story’s primary heroine. Yuriko Yoshitaka does well in a supporting role, especially in view of the fact that this was the actress’ onscreen debut. Last but not least, Ken Mitsuishi is unforgettable as the father.
Recommendations All things considered, if you wish to avoid the overt creepiness of Suicide Circle and jump onto something more palpable, then I recommend Noriko’s Dinner Table. I think if you like postmodern horror vibes, you can’t go wrong with Sion Sono and his certainly larger-than-fiction idiosyncratic style when it comes to filmmaking.
Overall score: 7/10
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Godzilla vs. Mothra; or, For Mother Earth! There isn't a job that is too tough for me, except, the one time I was married to a real stubborn woman. I am back at my revisitation of Godzilla movies. This time, I would like to focus on the fourth instalment of the Heisei series, Godzilla vs. Mothra from 1992. This text is going to be actually a re-review, but I have already discussed this film on the blog years ago, but I felt that my initial reaction was too crude and too emotional. So here it is: my new thoughts on one of my least favourite Godzilla films.
Language: JapaneseOriginal Title: ゴジラ対モスラ Runtime: 102 min
Synopsis A large meteoroid crashes in the Ogasawara Trench and awakens Godzilla. An explorer Takuya Fujito (Tetsuya Bessho), his ex-wife Masako (Satomi Kobayashi), and a representative of the Marumoto company Ando (Takehiro Murata), go to the Infant Island and discover the hidden egg of Mothra which is guarded by two representatives of an ancient civilisation known as the Cosmos. They explain that thousands of years ago Mothra used to fight Battra, a monster created by the Earth’s ecosystem as a punishment for the Cosmos’ vanity. The team decides to transport the egg to Japan, but Mothra hatches while en route. What is more, it turns out that Battra got reawakened as well. With Godzilla thrown into the mix, all three monsters rush for a showdown in Yokohama.
Mothra Strikes Back As I have already mentioned in my review of Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991), Toho had various plans for a follow-up, including making a direct sequel that would bring back the Big G’s arch-nemesis once again. However, special effects director Koichi Kawakita together with Minoru Yoshida and Marie Terunuma submitted a script called Godzilla vs. Gigamoth, which was inspired by an unmade Mothra vs. Bagan story. In its essence, the basic storyline is very similar to the final film, but the main difference is the fact that Godzilla fights an amalgam of a good Mothra and evil Mothra in the finale. It is unknown whether the series veteran Kazuki Omori read the script for Godzilla vs. Gigamoth or maybe he based his premise on Mothra vs. Bagan, but under the supervision of producer Tomoyuki Tanaka he penned his own screenplay that was ultimately filmed.
It is clear from the get-go that Toho wanted to cater to as many groups of cinema-going audiences as possible. Women constituted the majority of moviegoers in Japan in the mid-1990s, so it goes without saying that bringing back Mothra was a logical decision. However, the film also tries as hard as possible to be family-friendly: we get light action (see the first act being a rehash of Indiana Jones), parental conflicts, twin fairies (who are not actual twins) and an Oblivion NPC child who struggles to be kawaii in every scene.
Well, the strategy worked for Toho because Godzilla vs. Mothra turned out to be a massive box office success, basically financing the rest of the Heisei era movies. Nevertheless, this movie is not by any means decent. The pacing is uneven, the editing is jarring at times, and all the action reaches a standstill in the second act because there has to be room for family-friendly drama (Fujito actually tries to sell the Cosmos, but Mothra rushes to save them).
I believe the main cause of these issues is the direction done by Takao Okawara. Indeed, this man is an experienced director who worked with the best of the best, serving as an associate director on Akira Kurosawa’s and Kihachi Okamoto’s films, but in my opinion, Okawara fundamentally does not understand Tokusatsu action. He finds it hard to tell a compelling story with Kaiju monsters at the helm. All of his Godzilla films have grand finales, but the middle segments are frequently forgettable.
With regard to special effects and cinematography, Godzilla vs. Mothra is the film that has the best looking Heisei Godzilla. I just love all the close ups of the new BattleGoji suit worn by Kenpachiro Satsuma. What is more, Koichi Kawakita did an amazing job with the battles between Godzilla, Battra, and Mothra; however, the moves of the latter two monsters are a bit clunky at times. The underwater sequences are also great to look at.
Speaking about additional advantages, Akira Ifukube obviously delivers yet another brilliant music score as the film’s composer. Of course, he reuses and repurposes Yuji Koseki’s Song of Mothra from the original 1961 film, but this piece of music is so synonymous with the Queen of the Monsters that it is a given it accompanies her all the time.
With regard to performances, all the actors and actresses feel like a wasted opportunity. Tetsuya Bessho has a more commanding presence than Isao Toyohara from the previous film, but most of the time he is forced to play an Indiana Jones/Han Solo type of guy, which does not add anything to the film. The always-wonderful Satomi Kobayashi plays a bitter ex-wife and her character's objective is to either comment on the monster action or carry the Cosmos around in a special basket. Veterans of the series, such as Akira Takarada, Megumi Odaka, Akiji Kobayashi, and Yoshiko Tanaka do not have anything compelling to do apart from standing in front of giant monitors and observing the monster rumble.
Recommendations All things considered, I did not hate Godzilla vs. Mothra as much as I did during the first viewing. Still again, I regard it as a deeply flawed entry in the Godzilla franchise. The Big G deserved better and Mothra deserved better as well. Ultimately, she received better treatment in the Rebirth of Mothra Trilogy, and Millennium entry Godzilla: Tokyo SOS (2003).
Overall score: 6/10
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