list http://www.spout.com/ Recent community activity around Pulse on Spout Copyright 2005-9 Spout, LLC Spout RSS http://www.spout.com/images/SpoutLogoRSS.jpg http://www.spout.com/ 136 30 http://www.spout.com/films/Pulse/192610/default.aspx Title: Pulse
Year: 2001
Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Plot: As one of the most cutting-edge Japanese filmmakers, Kiyoshi Kurosawa once again wraps a lowbrow, much-maligned genre -- in this case horror flicks (which were the rage in Japan at the time of this release) -- around some decidedly highbrow philosophical concepts. At the film's outset, Michi (Kumiko Aso) and her cohorts at a rooftop nursery cannot get ahold of their co-worker, Taguchi (Kenji Mizuhashi), who has an important floppy disk. When she ventures over to his apartment, she finds him pale, listless, and unusually quiet -- that is until he suddenly hangs himself. While the suicide is disconcerting, what really freaks Michi out is that Taguchi's body seems to dissolve into the wall, leaving a sickly black stain. Meanwhile, college slacker Ryosuke Kawashima (Haruhiko Kato) logs onto the Internet for the first time even though he is not particularly fond of computers. Instead of stumbling into a porn site or a chat room, he finds himself in a most peculiar site -- he just sees ghostly images of other people going about their everyday life. Then the computer prompts him, asking, "Would you like to meet ghosts?" Even though he eventually pulls the plug, the machine still on occasion springs to life. He eventually consults a comely computer maven named Harue (Koyuki), who is also utterly baffled. As more and more Internet users seal themselves into their rooms with red duct tape and melt into black splotches, Kawashima and Michi independently come to discover that the Internet has become portal for an increasingly crowded afterlife. As Tokyo becomes increasingly depopulated, Kawashima and Michi cross paths. This film -- which also features cameos by Kurosawa regulars Koji Yakusho, Jun Fubuki, and Sho Aikawa -- was screened at the 2001 Cannes and Toronto Film Festivals. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide
Times Tagged: 14
Number of Lists: 12
Number of blog posts: 6
Number of discussion threads: 2
SpoutRating: 3
]]>Thu, 14 May 2009 00:10:38 GMTPulse2001Kiyoshi KurosawaAs one of the most cutting-edge Japanese filmmakers, <a href="/players/P___236813/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Kiyoshi Kurosawa</a> once again wraps a lowbrow, much-maligned genre -- in this case horror flicks (which were the rage in Japan at the time of this release) -- around some decidedly highbrow philosophical concepts. At the film's outset, Michi (Kumiko Aso) and her cohorts at a rooftop nursery cannot get ahold of their co-worker, Taguchi (Kenji Mizuhashi), who has an important floppy disk. When she ventures over to his apartment, she finds him pale, listless, and unusually quiet -- that is until he suddenly hangs himself. While the suicide is disconcerting, what really freaks Michi out is that Taguchi's body seems to dissolve into the wall, leaving a sickly black stain. Meanwhile, college slacker Ryosuke Kawashima (Haruhiko Kato) logs onto the Internet for the first time even though he is not particularly fond of computers. Instead of stumbling into a porn site or a chat room, he finds himself in a most peculiar site -- he just sees ghostly images of other people going about their everyday life. Then the computer prompts him, asking, "Would you like to meet ghosts?" Even though he eventually pulls the plug, the machine still on occasion springs to life. He eventually consults a comely computer maven named Harue (Koyuki), who is also utterly baffled. As more and more Internet users seal themselves into their rooms with red duct tape and melt into black splotches, Kawashima and Michi independently come to discover that the Internet has become portal for an increasingly crowded afterlife. As Tokyo becomes increasingly depopulated, Kawashima and Michi cross paths. This film -- which also features cameos by Kurosawa regulars <a href="/players/P____77827/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Koji Yakusho</a>, Jun Fubuki, and Sho Aikawa -- was screened at the 2001 Cannes and Toronto Film Festivals. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide14Tag Target (>10)12623http://www.spout.com/ProductImages/t74469ixhkb.jpghttp://www.spout.com/films/Pulse/192610/default.aspxFilm http://www.spout.com/blogs/spoutblog/archive/2009/3/12/40986.aspx Post By: SpoutBlog
Post To: SpoutBlog on spout.com
Post Date: 3/12/2009 10:00:56 AM
Body: Tokyo Sonata is a horror film of sorts, but one without the ghosts and serial killers that have populated Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s earlier work. There aren’t even any killer trees, as in Charisma,  or poisonous jellyfish, as in Bright Future. Kurosawa’s films have always offered social commentary, but on their own eccentric terms. Cure responded obliquely to the Aum Shrinyiko subway gas attacks, while Pulse confronted a generation of lonely, Internet-obsessed otaku. Even Kurosawa films with no genre elements, like Bright Future and License To Live, have been pretty off-kilter. Tokyo Sonata’s first two-thirds are startlingly straightforward, commenting directly on Japan’s recession. After the disappointing Retribution, which recycled images and plotlines from Cure and Pulse, Tokyo Sonata marks a real comeback for Kurosawa - his best film since Pulse, made eight years ago - and a new direction. Businessman Ryuhei Sasaki (Teruyuki Kagawa) gets fired in the first few minutes of Tokyo Sonata. He’s a victim of downsizing: his firm has sent his job to China. He doesn’t tell his wife or two sons about this. Instead, he pretends to continue going to work. Everyday, he puts on a suit and tie and goes out to get free food from an open-air soup kitchen. He goes to a temp agency, but he finds only menial work available there. Meanwhile, his wife Megumi (Kyoko Koizumi) stays at home and looks after Takashi (Yu Koyanagi), a college student with little direction in life, and Kenji (Kai Inowaki), a 6th-grader who loves playing piano. Ryuhei eventually takes a job as a shopping mall janitor, but he keeps this from his family, although Megumi sees him in line at the soup kitchen one day and learns his secret. Kenji has some secrets of his own: he uses his lunch money to pay for private piano lessons, since Ryuhei disapproves of this interest. In interviews, Kurosawa stresses that the apocalyptic endings found in many of his films aren’t intended to be completely negative or hopeless. For him, there’s creative potential in the act of destruction. Without the safety nets of genre or metaphor, Tokyo  Sonata examines what it’s like to live through a social collapse. In it, the old, patriarchal values of family life have disintegrated, but nothing has yet arrived to replace them. Ryuhei obviously feels shame about his unemployment, but he’s incapable of expressing it in words. (Kagawa’s tightly clenched jaw  does much of his acting.) He can’t communicate with his children. When Takashi wants to join the U.S. Army, Ruyhei’s offended by his son’s statement that he’s doing so to protect his family, but Ryuhei has no real protection to offer. In school, Tokyo Sonata shows the same breakdown of authority. Kenji gets in trouble for possessing a comic book in the classroom. His anger at being punished for it is justifiable, since half the class had passed it around and he didn’t own it, but he responds by claiming that he saw his teacher reading pornographic comics on the subway. From there, the teacher’s power over his students is completely ruined; in a later scene, they throw confetti around and write “Ero-Bayashi,” mocking his name, on the blackboard. There’s a hint of conservative nostalgia here, but Tokyo Sonata is more concerned with finding solutions to present-day Japanese dilemmas. For its first eighty minutes, Tokyo Sonata is Kurosawa’s first foray into humanist social realism. One can recognize the same worldview present in all his films, but it’s never been expressed so directly before. His earlier work is much colder. Then, Tokyo Sonata goes off the rails, as the Sasaki family becomes separated and spin off in their own directions. Kurosawa proves himself a master of switching tones, balancing tension and humor ably. He also turns the focus away from Ryuhei to Megumi, showing that a housewife’s life is no easier than that of a laid-off salaryman. In Kurosawa’s earlier work, nuclear families are relatively rare. Instead, he focused on isolated loners, usually played by Koji Yakusho. (Yakusho pops up here in a small but crucial role.) At times, Tokyo Sonata presents a savage vision of family life as a charade that’s long since stopped meaning anything to its participants. Still, Ryuhei proves shockingly capable of violence to defend his nonexistent authority. In the end, Kurosawa has the courage to imagine a path out of chaos. For the first time, he shows the other side of apocalypse. Also, he finally seems to have something in common with earlier Japanese directors like Mikio Naruse and Yasujiro Ozu. (Cure and Charisma were unrecognizable as products of the same culture as Ozu’s Tokyo Story.) Ozu chronicled the changes in Japanese family life  from the ‘30s through the early ‘60s; here, Kurosawa does much the same for present-day Japan, finding hope without compromising the force of his critique. For more Tokyo Sonata, see our interview with Kurosawa from the 2008 Toronto Film Festival. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog
]]>Thu, 12 Mar 2009 14:00:56 GMTSpoutBlogSpoutBlog on spout.com3/12/2009 10:00:56 AMTokyo Sonata is a horror film of sorts, but one without the ghosts and serial killers that have populated Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s earlier work. There aren’t even any killer trees, as in Charisma,  or poisonous jellyfish, as in Bright Future. Kurosawa’s films have always offered social commentary, but on their own eccentric terms. Cure responded obliquely to the Aum Shrinyiko subway gas attacks, while Pulse confronted a generation of lonely, Internet-obsessed otaku. Even Kurosawa films with no genre elements, like Bright Future and License To Live, have been pretty off-kilter. Tokyo Sonata’s first two-thirds are startlingly straightforward, commenting directly on Japan’s recession. After the disappointing Retribution, which recycled images and plotlines from Cure and Pulse, Tokyo Sonata marks a real comeback for Kurosawa - his best film since Pulse, made eight years ago - and a new direction. Businessman Ryuhei Sasaki (Teruyuki Kagawa) gets fired in the first few minutes of Tokyo Sonata. He’s a victim of downsizing: his firm has sent his job to China. He doesn’t tell his wife or two sons about this. Instead, he pretends to continue going to work. Everyday, he puts on a suit and tie and goes out to get free food from an open-air soup kitchen. He goes to a temp agency, but he finds only menial work available there. Meanwhile, his wife Megumi (Kyoko Koizumi) stays at home and looks after Takashi (Yu Koyanagi), a college student with little direction in life, and Kenji (Kai Inowaki), a 6th-grader who loves playing piano. Ryuhei eventually takes a job as a shopping mall janitor, but he keeps this from his family, although Megumi sees him in line at the soup kitchen one day and learns his secret. Kenji has some secrets of his own: he uses his lunch money to pay for private piano lessons, since Ryuhei disapproves of this interest. In interviews, Kurosawa stresses that the apocalyptic endings found in many of his films aren’t intended to be completely negative or hopeless. For him, there’s creative potential in the act of destruction. Without the safety nets of genre or metaphor, Tokyo  Sonata examines what it’s like to live through a social collapse. In it, the old, patriarchal values of family life have disintegrated, but nothing has yet arrived to replace them. Ryuhei obviously feels shame about his unemployment, but he’s incapable of expressing it in words. (Kagawa’s tightly clenched jaw  does much of his acting.) He can’t communicate with his children. When Takashi wants to join the U.S. Army, Ruyhei’s offended by his son’s statement that he’s doing so to protect his family, but Ryuhei has no real protection to offer. In school, Tokyo Sonata shows the same breakdown of authority. Kenji gets in trouble for possessing a comic book in the classroom. His anger at being punished for it is justifiable, since half the class had passed it around and he didn’t own it, but he responds by claiming that he saw his teacher reading pornographic comics on the subway. From there, the teacher’s power over his students is completely ruined; in a later scene, they throw confetti around and write “Ero-Bayashi,” mocking his name, on the blackboard. There’s a hint of conservative nostalgia here, but Tokyo Sonata is more concerned with finding solutions to present-day Japanese dilemmas. For its first eighty minutes, Tokyo Sonata is Kurosawa’s first foray into humanist social realism. One can recognize the same worldview present in all his films, but it’s never been expressed so directly before. His earlier work is much colder. Then, Tokyo Sonata goes off the rails, as the Sasaki family becomes separated and spin off in their own directions. Kurosawa proves himself a master of switching tones, balancing tension and humor ably. He also turns the focus away from Ryuhei to Megumi, showing that a housewife’s life is no easier than that of a laid-off salaryman. In Kurosawa’s earlier work, nuclear families are relatively rare. Instead, he focused on isolated loners, usually played by Koji Yakusho. (Yakusho pops up here in a small but crucial role.) At times, Tokyo Sonata presents a savage vision of family life as a charade that’s long since stopped meaning anything to its participants. Still, Ryuhei proves shockingly capable of violence to defend his nonexistent authority. In the end, Kurosawa has the courage to imagine a path out of chaos. For the first time, he shows the other side of apocalypse. Also, he finally seems to have something in common with earlier Japanese directors like Mikio Naruse and Yasujiro Ozu. (Cure and Charisma were unrecognizable as products of the same culture as Ozu’s Tokyo Story.) Ozu chronicled the changes in Japanese family life  from the ‘30s through the early ‘60s; here, Kurosawa does much the same for present-day Japan, finding hope without compromising the force of his critique. For more Tokyo Sonata, see our interview with Kurosawa from the 2008 Toronto Film Festival. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog http://www.spout.com/blogs/spoutblog/archive/2008/10/9/36105.aspx Post By: SpoutBlog
Post To: SpoutBlog on spout.com
Post Date: 10/9/2008 3:00:57 PM
Body: Kiyoshi Kurosawa (no relation to Akira) has mostly been known for Japanese horror films Cure, Pulse, and Doppelganger, but with his last few movies he’s been moving more into the dramatic. Tokyo Sonata explores a Japanese household, led by a father who is laid off from his job and is too embarrassed to tell his family. He leaves home every day, but instead of going to work he visits parks and libraries until it is time to return. Meanwhile, his rebellious older son wants to leave Japan and go to the United States to join the military, and his youngest son is secretly taking piano lessons, which he has been forbidden to do. It’s a stark look inside the family culture in Japan, and the rift between generations. We sat down to ask Kurosawa about the film, and learned that he’s pretty definitively left the genre with which he’s most associated behind. More after the jump. Tokyo Sonata feels similar to Bright Future, your other film, except the family members in Bright Future are much younger and this more revolves around the father, and to some extent the family as a whole. Is this an evolution from that film? I think your theory is probably more or less correct. In between the horror films, I have made several more or less what you would call “family” type films and different versions. I’m sure you remember License to Live. But this time what I did, I portrayed a super-duper ordinary family, at least in shape, at least in form. So in a sense maybe I’m going back before Bright Future, back in time when there is such a thing as a family, if just barely functioning. The attitudes of the family in the film, do you feel like that’s particularly Japanese, or could it apply to any family in the world? You know, I really wasn’t sure. What I did was really try to stay true to the problems that a typical Japanese family would meet up with. I had no idea or any intention to portray kind of universal problems, but based on the reactions that I got at Cannes, it seems like I had hit on something that seems to be fairly universal, or at least traveled outside the borders of Japan. Certainly it goes without saying that Japan is hardly an isolated country. Contemporary life in Japan today is deeply intertwined to that of the world. Also film, I really believe, has a universal power and has a universal impact. So as a medium, borrowing that power of film language, I felt really confident that I would be able to reach a large audience. The traditions of honor and shame seem to be inherent traits that the Japanese have embraced and continue to find to be strong, especially the older generations; the younger generations, maybe not so much. In this film there seems to be a disconnect between the father and the oldest son. The oldest son wants to go to the USA to join the military. The father is meanwhile concealing the fact that he has been let go from his job. The younger son is also concealing that he is taking these piano lessons. Are these all signs of a larger disconnect and problem within modern day Japan as a whole? Yes. I think in some ways they do symbolize Japan. But I think if anything, much more is always that I sort of tried to portray what has always been a family. In other words, if there are internal problems that have always been internal to the family, then each member of the family then has their own problems that are outside of the family. You can’t resolve those problems within the context of the family. So I think if anything, I was really much more aiming at the precarious balance that has always characterized Sonata. I think Bright Future was the first film that you shot digitally. Are you continuing to shoot digitally? This one I shot on film. I was intentionally wanting to shoot this movie on film because of the drama. Do you have a next project lined up? Are you thinking about ever returning to the horror and thriller genre? I doubt I will go back to horror. If I have a good idea I will go back to it, but probably not in my next film. But neither am I interested in another family drama. This film was something quite unexpected. If you were asked by an American studio to do an English language film, would you be interested? I am interested in making an English language film. I would be perfectly happy to, but I somehow doubt that the Hollywood system would allow me to make the kind of movie I want. So I think of them as two separate things. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog
]]>Thu, 09 Oct 2008 19:00:57 GMTSpoutBlogSpoutBlog on spout.com10/9/2008 3:00:57 PM Kiyoshi Kurosawa (no relation to Akira) has mostly been known for Japanese horror films Cure, Pulse, and Doppelganger, but with his last few movies he’s been moving more into the dramatic. Tokyo Sonata explores a Japanese household, led by a father who is laid off from his job and is too embarrassed to tell his family. He leaves home every day, but instead of going to work he visits parks and libraries until it is time to return. Meanwhile, his rebellious older son wants to leave Japan and go to the United States to join the military, and his youngest son is secretly taking piano lessons, which he has been forbidden to do. It’s a stark look inside the family culture in Japan, and the rift between generations. We sat down to ask Kurosawa about the film, and learned that he’s pretty definitively left the genre with which he’s most associated behind. More after the jump. Tokyo Sonata feels similar to Bright Future, your other film, except the family members in Bright Future are much younger and this more revolves around the father, and to some extent the family as a whole. Is this an evolution from that film? I think your theory is probably more or less correct. In between the horror films, I have made several more or less what you would call “family” type films and different versions. I’m sure you remember License to Live. But this time what I did, I portrayed a super-duper ordinary family, at least in shape, at least in form. So in a sense maybe I’m going back before Bright Future, back in time when there is such a thing as a family, if just barely functioning. The attitudes of the family in the film, do you feel like that’s particularly Japanese, or could it apply to any family in the world? You know, I really wasn’t sure. What I did was really try to stay true to the problems that a typical Japanese family would meet up with. I had no idea or any intention to portray kind of universal problems, but based on the reactions that I got at Cannes, it seems like I had hit on something that seems to be fairly universal, or at least traveled outside the borders of Japan. Certainly it goes without saying that Japan is hardly an isolated country. Contemporary life in Japan today is deeply intertwined to that of the world. Also film, I really believe, has a universal power and has a universal impact. So as a medium, borrowing that power of film language, I felt really confident that I would be able to reach a large audience. The traditions of honor and shame seem to be inherent traits that the Japanese have embraced and continue to find to be strong, especially the older generations; the younger generations, maybe not so much. In this film there seems to be a disconnect between the father and the oldest son. The oldest son wants to go to the USA to join the military. The father is meanwhile concealing the fact that he has been let go from his job. The younger son is also concealing that he is taking these piano lessons. Are these all signs of a larger disconnect and problem within modern day Japan as a whole? Yes. I think in some ways they do symbolize Japan. But I think if anything, much more is always that I sort of tried to portray what has always been a family. In other words, if there are internal problems that have always been internal to the family, then each member of the family then has their own problems that are outside of the family. You can’t resolve those problems within the context of the family. So I think if anything, I was really much more aiming at the precarious balance that has always characterized Sonata. I think Bright Future was the first film that you shot digitally. Are you continuing to shoot digitally? This one I shot on film. I was intentionally wanting to shoot this movie on film because of the drama. Do you have a next project lined up? Are you thinking about ever returning to the horror and thriller genre? I doubt I will go back to horror. If I have a good idea I will go back to it, but probably not in my next film. But neither am I interested in another family drama. This film was something quite unexpected. If you were asked by an American studio to do an English language film, would you be interested? I am interested in making an English language film. I would be perfectly happy to, but I somehow doubt that the Hollywood system would allow me to make the kind of movie I want. So I think of them as two separate things. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog http://www.spout.com/blogs/theworkingdead/archive/2007/9/1/19208.aspx Post By: TheWorkingDead
Post To: TheWorkingDead Blog
Post Date: 9/1/2007 12:07:00 AM
Body: It may be fading now, but Asian horror films, predominantly Japanese horror films, have had a pretty good representation on American shores of late. Prior to the turn of the century, American audiences usually thought of Godzilla-style rubber monsters when thinking of Japanese horror cinema, and most never even thought of Chinese or Korean cinema at all. That all changed in 1998, when word started to get back to adventurous horror fans of what was being touted as a completely original and utterly frightening film from Japan called Ringu. In 2002 the sub-genre burst into the mainstream consciousness when Ringu got a first class Hollywood remake courtesy of director Gore Verbinski. Say what you will about remakes in general, and I don't mean any disrespect to the original, but the American remake was a perfect translation, a great way to take the horror sensibilities from Japan and inject them into American cinema. It was familiar enough to not be offputting, but different enough to scare the bejesus out of unsuspecting audiences used to the current lackluster Hollywood offerings. The success of The Ring meant that more would be coming, and we soon got American remakes of top Asian horror films such as Ju On(AKA the Grudge) and Dark Water. At the same time, for those purists interested in originals only, and those simply looking for more scares, the home video market was bursting with Asian imports.The halfassed remakes that made it to theatres, the knock off films that followed the popularity of The Ring, and the overwhelming similarities between many Asian horror films, all led to the decline of the Asian horror boom. But waning popularity in America does not mean the market is entirely gone, and horror films remain a prominent export from eastern shores. One of those films testifying to the continuing J-Horror trend is One Missed Call 2, the sequel to the 2003 film from wildly divisive director Miike Takashi. And really, your enjoyment of this film is going to depend on your tolerance for logic-defying bullshit twist endings and halfassed philosophizing.The problem with the original One Missed Call was that it came to the game a bit late. By the time it was released there had already been 5 years of horror films dealing with haunted technology and creepy long haired women. It was Miike's most generic and standard film, but he still managed to inject it with flashes of his own gonzo sensibilities(there's a scene of a ghostly murder captured live in a television studio that had my jaw in my lap). Made without Miike's involvement, One Missed Call 2 is no less well made, but has virtually no trace of the style which attempted to make the original stand out.Most of the problem in this film comes from what plagued the original; a sense of 'been there, done that', with every stereotype from Asian horror cinema making an appearance, like a J-Horror best-of. There's the pale woman with long hair covering most of her face, slithering jerkily out of a well(the Ring) or sliding headfirst after her victim down a flight of stairs(Ju On), the creepy pale child(Ring, Ju On, Dark Water, Every Japanese Horror Movie Since 1998), and a general fear of technology that seems specific to Asia. Not that other countries don't have their own fears of technology, but it seems to manifest itself in a very specific way in Japanese cinema. In Buddhism, hate, anger, sadness and negativity aren't just emotions, they are physical ailments that can be passed on like a virus(think of Princess Mononoke where the hero has an ever growing wound from the mere touch of an angry boar-god), and as technology increases humanity's networking capabilities, it also increases our susceptibility to these curses. It's how we got the haunted video tape in Ringu, the haunted Internet in the excellent(and underseen) Pulse, and here the haunted cell phone in One Missed Call.The basic premise is that you get a phone call, which on your caller ID is listed as you, three days in the future. On this call you hear your own death, and three days later you die. More so than Ringu, this setup has a built in fatalism, a sense of hopelessness against your own doom, that the first one was wise enough to capitalize on. The sequel, however, changes the rules a bit, and it no longer seems as dangerous to get that call, with it's creepy music-box ringtone. The virus, to continue a metaphor, has mutated, which explains how it's continued on from the first movie. The phone call no longer kills only it's intended victim, but anyone who happens to answer/hear the message, and getting the call no longer means certain death. A disregard for it's own internal logic is another mark against this film. Without this inevitability, the film loses most of the tension inherent in the series, and must depend on carefully crafted scare scenes to spook the audience. And it does have those. Unfortunately the film never can escape the fact that everything we're seeing has been done before, many many times. One Missed Call 2 is slicker, more appealingly made than most of this sort of stuff out there, but it still falls short of the films it apes. However, enough time has passed between this film and it's predecessors that these stereotypes gave me a slight shiver of nostalgic horror, and they unfold in a way that I can admire and enjoy without actually being moved by them. All of this is ruined, however, by a twist ending that confused and angered me to such a degree that it almost rivals the ending to Mindhunters in sheer frustration(see my review of THAT film by clicking the title). I won't reveal it all here, for those of you interested in watching this series, but it will suffice to say that I no longer know who lives and who dies, who the killer is, or even if there was a killer. This may all lead up to the third movie(already released), but my suspicion is that the filmmakers thought they were totally blowing the audiences minds, not just confusing them into apathy.I tried for awhile to think of what to rate this film, and whether or not to tell people I liked it, because to say I hated it would be untrue, nor was I bored by it; the film kept me interested once it got going. But then, I wouldn't say I liked it either, or that I'm neutral about it, because I have some very strong opinions about it. It's an odd film that straddles all of those categories. In the end, though, I honestly can't recommend it to anyone. Hardcore Asian horror fans may find some gems in there, but they'll also most likely be bored by all too familiar scenery. Beginners might enjoy it, but I'd really suggest they look elsewhere(perhaps to the predecessors I mentioned above) for their introduction to this subgenre.
]]>Sat, 01 Sep 2007 04:07:00 GMTTheWorkingDeadTheWorkingDead Blog9/1/2007 12:07:00 AMIt may be fading now, but Asian horror films, predominantly Japanese horror films, have had a pretty good representation on American shores of late. Prior to the turn of the century, American audiences usually thought of Godzilla-style rubber monsters when thinking of Japanese horror cinema, and most never even thought of Chinese or Korean cinema at all. That all changed in 1998, when word started to get back to adventurous horror fans of what was being touted as a completely original and utterly frightening film from Japan called Ringu. In 2002 the sub-genre burst into the mainstream consciousness when Ringu got a first class Hollywood remake courtesy of director Gore Verbinski. Say what you will about remakes in general, and I don&#39;t mean any disrespect to the original, but the American remake was a perfect translation, a great way to take the horror sensibilities from Japan and inject them into American cinema. It was familiar enough to not be offputting, but different enough to scare the bejesus out of unsuspecting audiences used to the current lackluster Hollywood offerings. The success of The Ring meant that more would be coming, and we soon got American remakes of top Asian horror films such as Ju On(AKA the Grudge) and Dark Water. At the same time, for those purists interested in originals only, and those simply looking for more scares, the home video market was bursting with Asian imports.The halfassed remakes that made it to theatres, the knock off films that followed the popularity of The Ring, and the overwhelming similarities between many Asian horror films, all led to the decline of the Asian horror boom. But waning popularity in America does not mean the market is entirely gone, and horror films remain a prominent export from eastern shores. One of those films testifying to the continuing J-Horror trend is One Missed Call 2, the sequel to the 2003 film from wildly divisive director Miike Takashi. And really, your enjoyment of this film is going to depend on your tolerance for logic-defying bullshit twist endings and halfassed philosophizing.The problem with the original One Missed Call was that it came to the game a bit late. By the time it was released there had already been 5 years of horror films dealing with haunted technology and creepy long haired women. It was Miike&#39;s most generic and standard film, but he still managed to inject it with flashes of his own gonzo sensibilities(there&#39;s a scene of a ghostly murder captured live in a television studio that had my jaw in my lap). Made without Miike&#39;s involvement, One Missed Call 2 is no less well made, but has virtually no trace of the style which attempted to make the original stand out.Most of the problem in this film comes from what plagued the original; a sense of &#39;been there, done that&#39;, with every stereotype from Asian horror cinema making an appearance, like a J-Horror best-of. There&#39;s the pale woman with long hair covering most of her face, slithering jerkily out of a well(the Ring) or sliding headfirst after her victim down a flight of stairs(Ju On), the creepy pale child(Ring, Ju On, Dark Water, Every Japanese Horror Movie Since 1998), and a general fear of technology that seems specific to Asia. Not that other countries don&#39;t have their own fears of technology, but it seems to manifest itself in a very specific way in Japanese cinema. In Buddhism, hate, anger, sadness and negativity aren&#39;t just emotions, they are physical ailments that can be passed on like a virus(think of Princess Mononoke where the hero has an ever growing wound from the mere touch of an angry boar-god), and as technology increases humanity&#39;s networking capabilities, it also increases our susceptibility to these curses. It&#39;s how we got the haunted video tape in Ringu, the haunted Internet in the excellent(and underseen) Pulse, and here the haunted cell phone in One Missed Call.The basic premise is that you get a phone call, which on your caller ID is listed as you, three days in the future. On this call you hear your own death, and three days later you die. More so than Ringu, this setup has a built in fatalism, a sense of hopelessness against your own doom, that the first one was wise enough to capitalize on. The sequel, however, changes the rules a bit, and it no longer seems as dangerous to get that call, with it&#39;s creepy music-box ringtone. The virus, to continue a metaphor, has mutated, which explains how it&#39;s continued on from the first movie. The phone call no longer kills only it&#39;s intended victim, but anyone who happens to answer/hear the message, and getting the call no longer means certain death. A disregard for it&#39;s own internal logic is another mark against this film. Without this inevitability, the film loses most of the tension inherent in the series, and must depend on carefully crafted scare scenes to spook the audience. And it does have those. Unfortunately the film never can escape the fact that everything we&#39;re seeing has been done before, many many times. One Missed Call 2 is slicker, more appealingly made than most of this sort of stuff out there, but it still falls short of the films it apes. However, enough time has passed between this film and it&#39;s predecessors that these stereotypes gave me a slight shiver of nostalgic horror, and they unfold in a way that I can admire and enjoy without actually being moved by them. All of this is ruined, however, by a twist ending that confused and angered me to such a degree that it almost rivals the ending to Mindhunters in sheer frustration(see my review of THAT film by clicking the title). I won&#39;t reveal it all here, for those of you interested in watching this series, but it will suffice to say that I no longer know who lives and who dies, who the killer is, or even if there was a killer. This may all lead up to the third movie(already released), but my suspicion is that the filmmakers thought they were totally blowing the audiences minds, not just confusing them into apathy.I tried for awhile to think of what to rate this film, and whether or not to tell people I liked it, because to say I hated it would be untrue, nor was I bored by it; the film kept me interested once it got going. But then, I wouldn&#39;t say I liked it either, or that I&#39;m neutral about it, because I have some very strong opinions about it. It&#39;s an odd film that straddles all of those categories. In the end, though, I honestly can&#39;t recommend it to anyone. Hardcore Asian horror fans may find some gems in there, but they&#39;ll also most likely be bored by all too familiar scenery. Beginners might enjoy it, but I&#39;d really suggest they look elsewhere(perhaps to the predecessors I mentioned above) for their introduction to this subgenre. http://www.spout.com/groups/HORROR_MOVIES_101/Re_Favorite_Foreign_Scary_Movie/222/17785/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: TheWorkingDead
Post To: HORROR MOVIES 101
Post Date: 8/10/2007 2:11:28 PM
Body: Oldboy was not bad. Not bad at all. If you can stand a lot of violence, and a general tone of nastiness and some fairly disgusting goings on(including the scene where he eats a live octopus in a single take), than it's actually very good. I've seen only 2 films in this Vengeance Trilogy(they aren't sequels, they just all deal with revenge), this and Sympathy for Lady Vengeance. I enjoyed Lady Vengeance a lot more than Oldboy. Still, recommended, and it's nastiness is much deeper and more meaningful than current torture porn flicks. You should check out Audition, which takes awhile to get going, but is totally worth it. I screamed aloud like a little girl at one point in this movie, and I'm not ashamed to admit it. Just don't watch the trailer, it gives too much away. Pulse, and Cure(both by Kyoshi Kurosawa) are really damn good, but very vague. Still, he grasps the melancholy aspect of ghosts and horror better than any other director I've seen. Of course, if your just looking for fun times, Uzumaki is a pretty odd, comic-book-inspired Lovecraftian movie with some gnarly makeup effects. And to get off the topic of Asian horror films, Riget(Kingdom), by Lars Von Trier, is one of the most awesome, scary, and just plain cool things I've ever seen. It's a couple of Danish television miniseries' and so far I think the second one is unavailable in the US. It's about Denmark's most technologically advanced hospital, and the cracks that are appearing between our world and the spirit world. The patients know something is wrong, but the doctors are oblivious to anything outside of medical science.The first hour is dry, setting up all the characters and their little dramas, but the second episode goes deeper into the occult, and it never looks back. It was remade in America by Stephen King as Kingdom Hospital, but I wouldn't recommend you check that out. Not even taking into account what it changed, it was just a shitty series. Be prepared for a cliffhanger. It was supposed to have a third miniseries, but Lars Von Trier went off to do other things, and now several of the main characters are dead. According to him thats the end of that.
]]>Fri, 10 Aug 2007 18:11:28 GMTTheWorkingDeadHORROR MOVIES 1018/10/2007 2:11:28 PMOldboy was not bad. Not bad at all. If you can stand a lot of violence, and a general tone of nastiness and some fairly disgusting goings on(including the scene where he eats a live octopus in a single take), than it&#39;s actually very good. I&#39;ve seen only 2 films in this Vengeance Trilogy(they aren&#39;t sequels, they just all deal with revenge), this and Sympathy for Lady Vengeance. I enjoyed Lady Vengeance a lot more than Oldboy. Still, recommended, and it&#39;s nastiness is much deeper and more meaningful than current torture porn flicks. You should check out Audition, which takes awhile to get going, but is totally worth it. I screamed aloud like a little girl at one point in this movie, and I&#39;m not ashamed to admit it. Just don&#39;t watch the trailer, it gives too much away. Pulse, and Cure(both by Kyoshi Kurosawa) are really damn good, but very vague. Still, he grasps the melancholy aspect of ghosts and horror better than any other director I&#39;ve seen. Of course, if your just looking for fun times, Uzumaki is a pretty odd, comic-book-inspired Lovecraftian movie with some gnarly makeup effects. And to get off the topic of Asian horror films, Riget(Kingdom), by Lars Von Trier, is one of the most awesome, scary, and just plain cool things I&#39;ve ever seen. It&#39;s a couple of Danish television miniseries&#39; and so far I think the second one is unavailable in the US. It&#39;s about Denmark&#39;s most technologically advanced hospital, and the cracks that are appearing between our world and the spirit world. The patients know something is wrong, but the doctors are oblivious to anything outside of medical science.The first hour is dry, setting up all the characters and their little dramas, but the second episode goes deeper into the occult, and it never looks back. It was remade in America by Stephen King as Kingdom Hospital, but I wouldn&#39;t recommend you check that out. Not even taking into account what it changed, it was just a shitty series. Be prepared for a cliffhanger. It was supposed to have a third miniseries, but Lars Von Trier went off to do other things, and now several of the main characters are dead. According to him thats the end of that. http://www.spout.com/blogs/analogzombie/archive/2007/7/24/15735.aspx Post By: analogzombie
Post To: analogzombie Blog
Post Date: 7/24/2007 5:27:00 PM
Body: Kiyoshi Kurosawa's Pulse is a decent into dread. The theme, as in some of Kurosawa's other films, is the loneliness modern society creates within us. Technology is pushing us into a world where information is abundant, but interpersonal communication is on the wane. It makes sense then, that a film about this should emerge from Japan. It's funny how the closer people come physically to each other (as in population density) the further they drift emotionally. Everyone is caught up in their personal reality and fiercely protective of their privacy. Pulse explores this theme through an odd internet site that some of the characters come across. "Do you want to see a ghost?" the website asks. Computers turn themselves on to reveal solitary beings sitting in rooms with plastic bags over their heads. Isolated apparitions emanating from the screens of isolated people. Claustrophobia is Kurosawa's mise en scene here.It's hard to say exactly what the plot of Pulse is, except that it follows a handful of characters as they come into direct and indirect contact with ghosts. The world in which the spirits inhabit is becoming full it seems, and they are using the internet to emerge into our realm. Red taped forbidden rooms hide them, and once confronted, your days are numbered.As the film progresses characters disappear, drop out, and the remaining few are left in a near desolate world that mirrors their loneliness. By the end of the film only two are left to witness the personal apocalypse that isolation can bring. Pulse is one of the m ost poignant and horrifying visions of modern society yet committed to film.
]]>Tue, 24 Jul 2007 21:27:00 GMTanalogzombieanalogzombie Blog7/24/2007 5:27:00 PMKiyoshi Kurosawa&#39;s Pulse is a decent into dread. The theme, as in some of Kurosawa&#39;s other films, is the loneliness modern society creates within us. Technology is pushing us into a world where information is abundant, but interpersonal communication is on the wane. It makes sense then, that a film about this should emerge from Japan. It&#39;s funny how the closer people come physically to each other (as in population density) the further they drift emotionally. Everyone is caught up in their personal reality and fiercely protective of their privacy. Pulse explores this theme through an odd internet site that some of the characters come across. "Do you want to see a ghost?" the website asks. Computers turn themselves on to reveal solitary beings sitting in rooms with plastic bags over their heads. Isolated apparitions emanating from the screens of isolated people. Claustrophobia is Kurosawa&#39;s mise en scene here.It&#39;s hard to say exactly what the plot of Pulse is, except that it follows a handful of characters as they come into direct and indirect contact with ghosts. The world in which the spirits inhabit is becoming full it seems, and they are using the internet to emerge into our realm. Red taped forbidden rooms hide them, and once confronted, your days are numbered.As the film progresses characters disappear, drop out, and the remaining few are left in a near desolate world that mirrors their loneliness. By the end of the film only two are left to witness the personal apocalypse that isolation can bring. Pulse is one of the m ost poignant and horrifying visions of modern society yet committed to film. http://www.spout.com/blogs/slipofthetongue/archive/2007/5/30/9784.aspx Post By: slipofthetongue
Post To: SlipOfTheTongue Blog
Post Date: 5/30/2007 11:47:00 PM
Body: PULSE (2001, a.k.a. Kairo) isn't particularly scary but it does a pretty good job of creating a sense of impending doom.  The film is another in the long string of arguments in favor of evoking tension and mood rather than over explaining or clobbering the audience with exposition.  Things happen slowly in this movie.  That's not necessarily a bad thing but the payoff isn't a big one in terms of scares.  Instead the film aims for creating a sense of doom and gloom that hangs rather substantially over the entire second half.  It's not quite enough but it is interesting and at times chilling to watch.  We know that something is happening in Tokyo, something that involves ghosts crossing over into our world and sucking unsuspecting victims into its own but we are never really told what is literally going on.  It's all speculation on the part of the main characters.  I don't suppose one really needs a true explanation though and it does help that many of the scenes are visually stark and creepy in a way that has more to do with color desaturation and tonal restraint than with giving away everything and the kitchen sink.The American remake (2006, also called PULSE) has some inventive visual effects but goes too far in the other direction.  Everything is literalized until we just don't care anymore about anything or anyone.If the original is a tease and we're just not sure we are getting enough out of the seduction then the remake is someone who sleeps with you on the first date and you're sorry afterward that you did it.  I don't strongly recommend the original but it does have its moments.  The remake deserves a pass.  It's the kind of movie you walk out on even though you wasted 11 bucks.http://www.spout.com/films/192610/default.aspxhttp://www.spout.com/films/260502/default.aspx
]]>Thu, 31 May 2007 03:47:00 GMTslipofthetongueSlipOfTheTongue Blog5/30/2007 11:47:00 PMPULSE (2001, a.k.a. Kairo) isn&#39;t particularly scary but it does a pretty good job of creating a sense of impending doom.  The film is another in the long string of arguments in favor of evoking tension and mood rather than over explaining or clobbering the audience with exposition.  Things happen slowly in this movie.  That&#39;s not necessarily a bad thing but the payoff isn&#39;t a big one in terms of scares.  Instead the film aims for creating a sense of doom and gloom that hangs rather substantially over the entire second half.  It&#39;s not quite enough but it is interesting and at times chilling to watch.  We know that something is happening in Tokyo, something that involves ghosts crossing over into our world and sucking unsuspecting victims into its own but we are never really told what is literally going on.  It&#39;s all speculation on the part of the main characters.  I don&#39;t suppose one really needs a true explanation though and it does help that many of the scenes are visually stark and creepy in a way that has more to do with color desaturation and tonal restraint than with giving away everything and the kitchen sink.The American remake (2006, also called PULSE) has some inventive visual effects but goes too far in the other direction.  Everything is literalized until we just don&#39;t care anymore about anything or anyone.If the original is a tease and we&#39;re just not sure we are getting enough out of the seduction then the remake is someone who sleeps with you on the first date and you&#39;re sorry afterward that you did it.  I don&#39;t strongly recommend the original but it does have its moments.  The remake deserves a pass.  It&#39;s the kind of movie you walk out on even though you wasted 11 bucks.http://www.spout.com/films/192610/default.aspxhttp://www.spout.com/films/260502/default.aspx http://www.spout.com/groups/HORROR_MOVIES_101/Re_Zombie_Comedy/222/8350/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: patches
Post To: HORROR MOVIES 101
Post Date: 5/7/2007 10:17:56 AM
Body: That's so simialr to what I was feeling too! My husband and I had our Netflix Queue packed full of cult classics, horror films, cheesy teen girl movies, slasher films, Korean thrillers, documentaries.... RANDOM stuff! And that's what we both LOVE. Blood, guts and teen angst!We started making our friends "contacts" on the site and they were looking at our rented movies, and sending us messages like, "How can you watch that stuff! It's so gross!" or "I hated that movie, it was too 'thinky' why did you like it so much?" so I started filtering our netflix Queue so OTHERS weren't offended my our tastes. I realized that we started adding movies and watching movies that we really didn't care about, so that everybody else wasn't creeped out! Then we switched to Blockbuster online, and I decided NOT to add anyone to our "contacts" list... and just watch what we want to watch. So, just like this past weekend, we watched great movies like the I Drink Your Blood and the original version of Pulse. And it was perfect. It IS perfect :-).
]]>Mon, 07 May 2007 14:17:56 GMTpatchesHORROR MOVIES 1015/7/2007 10:17:56 AMThat&#39;s so simialr to what I was feeling too! My husband and I had our Netflix Queue packed full of cult classics, horror films, cheesy teen girl movies, slasher films, Korean thrillers, documentaries.... RANDOM stuff! And that&#39;s what we both LOVE. Blood, guts and teen angst!We started making our friends "contacts" on the site and they were looking at our rented movies, and sending us messages like, "How can you watch that stuff! It&#39;s so gross!" or "I hated that movie, it was too &#39;thinky&#39; why did you like it so much?" so I started filtering our netflix Queue so OTHERS weren&#39;t offended my our tastes. I realized that we started adding movies and watching movies that we really didn&#39;t care about, so that everybody else wasn&#39;t creeped out! Then we switched to Blockbuster online, and I decided NOT to add anyone to our "contacts" list... and just watch what we want to watch. So, just like this past weekend, we watched great movies like the I Drink Your Blood and the original version of Pulse. And it was perfect. It IS perfect :-). http://www.spout.com/blogs/ironabacus/archive/2007/2/14/5440.aspx Post By: IronAbacus
Post To: Haiku Reviews of Extreme Asian Cinema
Post Date: 2/14/2007 6:11:00 AM
Body: A relentlessly bleak and eerie film rife with existential dread | ●●●●○ | IMDb | Spout
]]>Wed, 14 Feb 2007 11:11:00 GMTIronAbacusHaiku Reviews of Extreme Asian Cinema2/14/2007 6:11:00 AMA relentlessly bleak and eerie film rife with existential dread | ●●●●○ | IMDb | Spout http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/death/MemberTagFilms.aspxdeath
Number of films tagged: 4306

Number of people who tagged: 140

Number of times used: 526

]]>Mon, 16 Nov 2009 17:27:13 GMT4306140526Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/disturbing/MemberTagFilms.aspxdisturbing
Number of films tagged: 283

Number of people who tagged: 119

Number of times used: 394

]]>Wed, 04 Nov 2009 21:55:54 GMT283119394Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/scary/MemberTagFilms.aspxscary
Number of films tagged: 155

Number of people who tagged: 104

Number of times used: 197

]]>Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:30:07 GMT155104197Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/suicide/MemberTagFilms.aspxsuicide
Number of films tagged: 1828

Number of people who tagged: 80

Number of times used: 185

]]>Fri, 04 Dec 2009 01:40:50 GMT182880185Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/ghost/MemberTagFilms.aspxghost
Number of films tagged: 1219

Number of people who tagged: 58

Number of times used: 137

]]>Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:30:06 GMT121958137Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/ghosts/MemberTagFilms.aspxghosts
Number of films tagged: 58

Number of people who tagged: 42

Number of times used: 79

]]>Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:29:59 GMT584279Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/japanese/MemberTagFilms.aspxjapanese
Number of films tagged: 72

Number of people who tagged: 30

Number of times used: 80

]]>Sat, 01 Aug 2009 09:37:10 GMT723080Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/technology/MemberTagFilms.aspxtechnology
Number of films tagged: 688

Number of people who tagged: 23

Number of times used: 54

]]>Thu, 25 Jun 2009 13:02:23 GMT6882354Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/afterlife/MemberTagFilms.aspxafterlife
Number of films tagged: 319

Number of people who tagged: 19

Number of times used: 28

]]>Thu, 09 Jul 2009 13:13:22 GMT3191928Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/computers/MemberTagFilms.aspxcomputers
Number of films tagged: 395

Number of people who tagged: 18

Number of times used: 30

]]>Thu, 25 Jun 2009 13:02:23 GMT3951830Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/freaky/MemberTagFilms.aspxfreaky
Number of films tagged: 20

Number of people who tagged: 14

Number of times used: 20

]]>Sat, 31 Jan 2009 18:20:04 GMT201420Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/internet/MemberTagFilms.aspxinternet
Number of films tagged: 219

Number of people who tagged: 13

Number of times used: 29

]]>Tue, 06 Oct 2009 03:08:41 GMT2191329Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/j-horror/MemberTagFilms.aspxj-horror
Number of films tagged: 8

Number of people who tagged: 4

Number of times used: 8

]]>Fri, 30 Jan 2009 21:01:14 GMT848Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/culture-social-culture/MemberTagFilms.aspxculture-social-culture
Number of films tagged: 798

Number of people who tagged: 1

Number of times used: 1

]]>Thu, 09 Jul 2009 13:13:22 GMT79811Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/ghostsinthemachine/MemberTagFilms.aspxghostsinthemachine
Number of films tagged: 1

Number of people who tagged: 1

Number of times used: 1

]]>Thu, 31 May 2007 15:40:03 GMT111Tag