list http://www.spout.com/ Recent community activity around Tokyo Drifter 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/Tokyo_Drifter/96373/default.aspx Title: Tokyo Drifter
Year: 1966
Director: Seijun Suzuki
Plot: Tokyo Drifter stands with Branded to Kill as one of the best-known and most acclaimed films of Seijun Suzuki, one of Japan's most talented maverick directors. A colorful riot of an action drama, Tokyo Drifter, like many of Suzuki's films, transforms a standard gangster film plot into a vehicle for his own loopy brand of filmmaking, featuring gorgeous cinematography, unconventional storytelling techniques, and a dark sense of humor. This particular example centers on Tetsu, a yakuza member who, when his gang is disbanded, remains loyal to his boss and attempts to go straight. This is no easy task, however, as the yakuza are determined to get him back into the life -- or kill him if he refuses. The pressure soon forces Tetsu to go on the road, becoming the "Tokyo drifter" of the title, but even this is not enough to prevent his past from violently catching up with him. The film's choreographed action and vibrant color palette make the frequent action sequences, including one of the most raucous barroom brawls ever put on film, seem almost like musical numbers, resulting in a spectacularly entertaining and truly original take on the gangster drama. ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide
Times Tagged: 4
Number of Lists: 19
Number of blog posts: 4
Number of discussion threads: 6
SpoutRating: 3
]]>Wed, 29 Jul 2009 21:57:04 GMTTokyo Drifter1966Seijun SuzukiTokyo Drifter stands with <a href=/films/96745/default.aspx style='text-decoration:underline'>Branded to Kill</a> as one of the best-known and most acclaimed films of <a href="/players/P___119458/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Seijun Suzuki</a>, one of Japan's most talented maverick directors. A colorful riot of an action drama, Tokyo Drifter, like many of Suzuki's films, transforms a standard gangster film plot into a vehicle for his own loopy brand of filmmaking, featuring gorgeous cinematography, unconventional storytelling techniques, and a dark sense of humor. This particular example centers on Tetsu, a yakuza member who, when his gang is disbanded, remains loyal to his boss and attempts to go straight. This is no easy task, however, as the yakuza are determined to get him back into the life -- or kill him if he refuses. The pressure soon forces Tetsu to go on the road, becoming the "Tokyo drifter" of the title, but even this is not enough to prevent his past from violently catching up with him. The film's choreographed action and vibrant color palette make the frequent action sequences, including one of the most raucous barroom brawls ever put on film, seem almost like musical numbers, resulting in a spectacularly entertaining and truly original take on the gangster drama. ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide4Slightly Tagged (1-5)19463http://www.spout.com/ProductImages/t02369hqkli.jpghttp://www.spout.com/films/Tokyo_Drifter/96373/default.aspxFilm http://www.spout.com/blogs/risselada/archive/2009/4/16/41621.aspx Post By: Risselada
Post To: Risselada Blog
Post Date: 4/16/2009 12:35:16 PM
Body: This blog entry is part of my "movie year countdown round #2". Read more about that here. Shane Shane is a legendary name in the history of Westerns, so I had to see it. It took me a while to get into it though. Jean Arthur bored me here actually and I usually get annoyed by prominent kids in movie like this sometimes. Maybe I just don't like kids and this is my personal issue. But I get annoyed with sweet and precocious kids in films. I'm actually more amused and even empathetic to kids in movies that are more dim and pathetic. Take the fat kid in Bad Santa or any of the kids in Welcome to the Dollhouse for instance. Anyways I know this was a totally different kind of movie from a different era, but I just wanted to express that. Shane became more interesting to me as it went along. I was glad when Elisha Cook Jr. showed up. It's always good to see him in a film. But it was at the point of the bar fight that I really took interest. This is one of the best bar fights I've seen in a movie. I'm interested in good movie bar fights. Refer to Tokyo Drifter and The Ninth Configuration for some examples of some other favorites of mine. I know bar fights are often a staple of westerns but this one was pretty exciting! Anyways, yeah, it's a pretty good flick. Rating: 8/10
]]>Thu, 16 Apr 2009 16:35:16 GMTRisseladaRisselada Blog4/16/2009 12:35:16 PMThis blog entry is part of my "movie year countdown round #2". Read more about that here. Shane Shane is a legendary name in the history of Westerns, so I had to see it. It took me a while to get into it though. Jean Arthur bored me here actually and I usually get annoyed by prominent kids in movie like this sometimes. Maybe I just don't like kids and this is my personal issue. But I get annoyed with sweet and precocious kids in films. I'm actually more amused and even empathetic to kids in movies that are more dim and pathetic. Take the fat kid in Bad Santa or any of the kids in Welcome to the Dollhouse for instance. Anyways I know this was a totally different kind of movie from a different era, but I just wanted to express that. Shane became more interesting to me as it went along. I was glad when Elisha Cook Jr. showed up. It's always good to see him in a film. But it was at the point of the bar fight that I really took interest. This is one of the best bar fights I've seen in a movie. I'm interested in good movie bar fights. Refer to Tokyo Drifter and The Ninth Configuration for some examples of some other favorites of mine. I know bar fights are often a staple of westerns but this one was pretty exciting! Anyways, yeah, it's a pretty good flick. Rating: 8/10 http://www.spout.com/groups/Movie_Polls/Re_Which_of_these_film_movments_have_produced_film/657/40557/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: Risselada
Post To: Movie Polls
Post Date: 2/19/2009 3:15:26 PM
Body: [quote user="pippin06"] This is out of my league too. I consider myself an average to above average filmgoer/viewer but am not sure if I've seen anything in any category (maybe I have and I didn't know it...but maybe not). Like I said, I saw a lot of French films in college, but who knows if they fall under New Wave or something like that... ...but maybe we could somehow start a discussion somewhere where people schooled in these film schools could make recommendations for beginners. That would be cool, right? Or, maybe it's already somewhere...anyone know? [/quote] Ok, well I'll try to give some insight on what I know about them and any recommendations I may have. Czechoslovakian New Wave may be one of the lesser movements listed here. It kind of started in the 60s. A discription from wikipedia says "Trademarks of the movement contain long unscripted dialogues, dark and absurd humour, and the casting of nonactors." I don't know if I've actually seen any, but some of the more popular ones are available from the Criterion Collection like The Shop on Main Street (which people have mentioned on Spout before), Closely Watched Trains, and lots of Milos Forman's (One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, The Man on the Moon, Amadeus) early work like Loves of a Blonde and The Fireman's Ball. Dogme 95 was an official movement started by Lars Von Trier and a few other Danish filmmakers that had specific rules about it. You could actually submit your film to them to be labeled as an official Dogma 95 film. You can probably find the rules online somewhere, but it involved using only digital film and found locations, props, and costumes. You aren't supposed to add any special effects. The full rules are of course available at good old wikipedia. The most famous of the films would probably The Celebration, The Idiots, and my favorite, Julien Donkey-Boy. The French New Wave is a pretty broad movement usually referring to the iconoclastic filmmakers from France. I think the tail end of the 50s is really when this started to get into full swing. Like Tennenbaums mentioned earlier, Jean Luc-Godard and François Truffaut are often the most identifiable filmmakers with the movement, although there are probably dozens if not more who have been lumped into this movement. SkyPilot mentioned Jean-Pierre Melville's Bob le Flambeur. I have seen that one and was disappointed. I've also seen Godard's Breathless and Truffaut's Jules and Jim both of which I did not enjoy. Truffaut's The 400 Blows I appreciated a bit more, but still not a favorite. Some people throw Éric Rohmer into this category as well, although some argue his style is considerably different and stems from somewhere other than many other of the French New Wave filmmakers. I have enjoyed what little I've seen of his work. Expressionism was a movement in Europe in the early 20th century. It stressed intense emotion conveyed through exaggerated and distorted style and forms. The Germans took this movement and put it in film. I'm sure you recognize famous directors like F. W. Murnau and Fritz Lang. Some of these films had extremely expressionistic and highly unrealistic visuals like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Some like The Last Laugh were just more more distorted versions of reality. With all the Dracula talk that has happend on Spout at times I'm guessing you've also heard of Nosferatu. Some of Lang's works that came a bit later that are well known might also count like M and Metropolis. When I looked into it, I can't really define Iranian New Wave any better than just saying it's basically films that were made in Iran. I guess the most popular filmmaker is Abbas Kiarostami. Look him up and you may recognize a lot of his films. Maybe not. I have seen two films from Majid Majidi and would recommend The Color of Paradise. It's kind of recent though so I don't really know if it's a good representation of the first wave of the Iranian New Wave. Italian neorealism is what it probably sounds like. Italian films that stressed trying to give a realistic depiction of every day working class people. They did this by shootings things on location and often with non-actors. And a lot of the the "boring" action of normal life that might not find it's way into other films is here. Although I sure don't find it boring. The time frame we are looking at is the later forties. The most famous example is Vittorio De Sica's The Bicycle Thief which I would highly recommend, although De Sica's Shoeshine and Umberto D are also amazing. Other big name directors are Luchino Visconti and Roberto Rossellini. The Japanese New Wave like the French New Wave were a bunch of iconoclastic filmmakers that started with works being released around the end of the 50s through the 70s. You could put Seijun Suzuki in this category who is one of my favorite directors. Tokyo Drifter, Fighting Elegy, Branded to Kill, and Youth of the Beast are all fims of his that I love and are available on the Criterion Collection. Hiroshi Teshigahara also has some of his movies released through Criterion, one of which, Woman in the Dunes, I just saw recently and is amazing. Shohei Imamura also has some of his movies available through Criterion (this is basically just a big Criterion ad). Nagisa Oshima is probably the biggest name from this moment in my mind and I'm rather embarassed to say I still haven't seen any of his films. Mumblecore core is the newest term on this list and has gotten a lot of press on Spout, so maybe you've heard of it. I don't know if I've really seen any movies that would fit this category hardcore, but you probably recognize the trend in independent cinema. I think it has a lot to do with young adults living in big cities. Very low budget. Lots of slang and hip music and culture references with a realistic style. Correct me if I'm wrong on this. Joe Swanberg had a short film series on Spout for a while I think. New French Extremity is the other really new term here. I just came across the name recently to refer to a recent wave of confrontational French films ove the past decade or so. You know how we had a group here on spout called "extreme films"? Well a lot of these would probably fit in nice there. They show you the extreme fifth, cruelty, and violence of humanity often in graphic detail. You may recognize a lot of these names. Gaspar Noé's Irreversible is one of the most well known state side I think. It's the one that runs backwards. I've seen his I Stand Alone and let me say it's pretty striking and depression, very confrontational to the dark and depressing side of the human condition. Other examples are some of Claire Denis' and Leos Carax's recent work, Bruno Dumont (The Life of Jesus, Humanité), Catherine Breillat (Fat Girl). Maybe you have also heard of the infamous Baise-moi (Fuck Me). If you listen to a lot of the horror fans we have on the site too you may hear them rave about many of the violent horror films comming out of France recently. These could probably fit in well too. The most well known now being High Tension. As for New German Cinema, you've heard of Werner Herzog right?? He's one of my favorites (check out The Mystery of Kaspar Hauser, Aguirre: The Wrath of God, Stroszek, Fitzcarraldo). Well he and some other German folks such as R. W. Fassbinder (Ali: Fear Eats the Soul, The Marriage of Maria Braun, The Bitter Tears of Petra Von Kant (the guy made well over fourty films in a span of sixteen years including the fifteen hour long Berlin Alexanderplatz)), Wim Wenders (Wings of Desire, Paris, Texas), Volker Schlöndorff (The Tin Drum) and several others started making the first original movies starting in the late 60s since before the rise of the Nazis (Werner Herzog even made a remake of the classic German film Nosferatu). Finally Germany was a force in the world of Cinema making original and revolutionary films again. Anyone have anything to add?
]]>Thu, 19 Feb 2009 20:15:26 GMTRisseladaMovie Polls2/19/2009 3:15:26 PM[quote user="pippin06"] This is out of my league too. I consider myself an average to above average filmgoer/viewer but am not sure if I've seen anything in any category (maybe I have and I didn't know it...but maybe not). Like I said, I saw a lot of French films in college, but who knows if they fall under New Wave or something like that... ...but maybe we could somehow start a discussion somewhere where people schooled in these film schools could make recommendations for beginners. That would be cool, right? Or, maybe it's already somewhere...anyone know? [/quote] Ok, well I'll try to give some insight on what I know about them and any recommendations I may have. Czechoslovakian New Wave may be one of the lesser movements listed here. It kind of started in the 60s. A discription from wikipedia says "Trademarks of the movement contain long unscripted dialogues, dark and absurd humour, and the casting of nonactors." I don't know if I've actually seen any, but some of the more popular ones are available from the Criterion Collection like The Shop on Main Street (which people have mentioned on Spout before), Closely Watched Trains, and lots of Milos Forman's (One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, The Man on the Moon, Amadeus) early work like Loves of a Blonde and The Fireman's Ball. Dogme 95 was an official movement started by Lars Von Trier and a few other Danish filmmakers that had specific rules about it. You could actually submit your film to them to be labeled as an official Dogma 95 film. You can probably find the rules online somewhere, but it involved using only digital film and found locations, props, and costumes. You aren't supposed to add any special effects. The full rules are of course available at good old wikipedia. The most famous of the films would probably The Celebration, The Idiots, and my favorite, Julien Donkey-Boy. The French New Wave is a pretty broad movement usually referring to the iconoclastic filmmakers from France. I think the tail end of the 50s is really when this started to get into full swing. Like Tennenbaums mentioned earlier, Jean Luc-Godard and Fran&ccedil;ois Truffaut are often the most identifiable filmmakers with the movement, although there are probably dozens if not more who have been lumped into this movement. SkyPilot mentioned Jean-Pierre Melville's Bob le Flambeur. I have seen that one and was disappointed. I've also seen Godard's Breathless and Truffaut's Jules and Jim both of which I did not enjoy. Truffaut's The 400 Blows I appreciated a bit more, but still not a favorite. Some people throw &Eacute;ric Rohmer into this category as well, although some argue his style is considerably different and stems from somewhere other than many other of the French New Wave filmmakers. I have enjoyed what little I've seen of his work. Expressionism was a movement in Europe in the early 20th century. It stressed intense emotion conveyed through exaggerated and distorted style and forms. The Germans took this movement and put it in film. I'm sure you recognize famous directors like F. W. Murnau and Fritz Lang. Some of these films had extremely expressionistic and highly unrealistic visuals like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Some like The Last Laugh were just more more distorted versions of reality. With all the Dracula talk that has happend on Spout at times I'm guessing you've also heard of Nosferatu. Some of Lang's works that came a bit later that are well known might also count like M and Metropolis. When I looked into it, I can't really define Iranian New Wave any better than just saying it's basically films that were made in Iran. I guess the most popular filmmaker is Abbas Kiarostami. Look him up and you may recognize a lot of his films. Maybe not. I have seen two films from Majid Majidi and would recommend The Color of Paradise. It's kind of recent though so I don't really know if it's a good representation of the first wave of the Iranian New Wave. Italian neorealism is what it probably sounds like. Italian films that stressed trying to give a realistic depiction of every day working class people. They did this by shootings things on location and often with non-actors. And a lot of the the "boring" action of normal life that might not find it's way into other films is here. Although I sure don't find it boring. The time frame we are looking at is the later forties. The most famous example is Vittorio De Sica's The Bicycle Thief which I would highly recommend, although De Sica's Shoeshine and Umberto D are also amazing. Other big name directors are Luchino Visconti and Roberto Rossellini. The Japanese New Wave like the French New Wave were a bunch of iconoclastic filmmakers that started with works being released around the end of the 50s through the 70s. You could put Seijun Suzuki in this category who is one of my favorite directors. Tokyo Drifter, Fighting Elegy, Branded to Kill, and Youth of the Beast are all fims of his that I love and are available on the Criterion Collection. Hiroshi Teshigahara also has some of his movies released through Criterion, one of which, Woman in the Dunes, I just saw recently and is amazing. Shohei Imamura also has some of his movies available through Criterion (this is basically just a big Criterion ad). Nagisa Oshima is probably the biggest name from this moment in my mind and I'm rather embarassed to say I still haven't seen any of his films. Mumblecore core is the newest term on this list and has gotten a lot of press on Spout, so maybe you've heard of it. I don't know if I've really seen any movies that would fit this category hardcore, but you probably recognize the trend in independent cinema. I think it has a lot to do with young adults living in big cities. Very low budget. Lots of slang and hip music and culture references with a realistic style. Correct me if I'm wrong on this. Joe Swanberg had a short film series on Spout for a while I think. New French Extremity is the other really new term here. I just came across the name recently to refer to a recent wave of confrontational French films ove the past decade or so. You know how we had a group here on spout called "extreme films"? Well a lot of these would probably fit in nice there. They show you the extreme fifth, cruelty, and violence of humanity often in graphic detail. You may recognize a lot of these names. Gaspar No&eacute;'s Irreversible is one of the most well known state side I think. It's the one that runs backwards. I've seen his I Stand Alone and let me say it's pretty striking and depression, very confrontational to the dark and depressing side of the human condition. Other examples are some of Claire Denis' and Leos Carax's recent work, Bruno Dumont (The Life of Jesus, Humanit&eacute;), Catherine Breillat (Fat Girl). Maybe you have also heard of the infamous Baise-moi (Fuck Me). If you listen to a lot of the horror fans we have on the site too you may hear them rave about many of the violent horror films comming out of France recently. These could probably fit in well too. The most well known now being High Tension. As for New German Cinema, you've heard of Werner Herzog right?? He's one of my favorites (check out The Mystery of Kaspar Hauser, Aguirre: The Wrath of God, Stroszek, Fitzcarraldo). Well he and some other German folks such as R. W. Fassbinder (Ali: Fear Eats the Soul, The Marriage of Maria Braun, The Bitter Tears of Petra Von Kant (the guy made well over fourty films in a span of sixteen years including the fifteen hour long Berlin Alexanderplatz)), Wim Wenders (Wings of Desire, Paris, Texas), Volker Schl&ouml;ndorff (The Tin Drum) and several others started making the first original movies starting in the late 60s since before the rise of the Nazis (Werner Herzog even made a remake of the classic German film Nosferatu). Finally Germany was a force in the world of Cinema making original and revolutionary films again. Anyone have anything to add? http://www.spout.com/groups/Martial_Arts_Films/Re_Best_Fights/456/33648/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: Risselada
Post To: Martial Arts Films
Post Date: 8/6/2008 3:22:16 PM
Body: I love a good bar fight. The best one ever is in Tokyo Drifter. It's cool, funny, brutal, and strange, and any other adjective you could think of. The Ninth Configuration has a pretty crazy one too! And Top Secret! has a great underwater saloon brawl.
]]>Wed, 06 Aug 2008 19:22:16 GMTRisseladaMartial Arts Films8/6/2008 3:22:16 PMI love a good bar fight. The best one ever is in Tokyo Drifter. It's cool, funny, brutal, and strange, and any other adjective you could think of. The Ninth Configuration has a pretty crazy one too! And Top Secret! has a great underwater saloon brawl. http://www.spout.com/blogs/tallquasimodo/archive/2008/7/14/32526.aspx Post By: tallquasimodo
Post To: tallquasimodo Blog
Post Date: 7/14/2008 12:08:07 PM
Body: I really wanted to be impressed by this movie, and I was, in a sense. The color is fantastic, and the cinematography is nothing to sneeze at either. It even had what must have been some very cool gunfights for its time. Unfortunately the narrative itself was too hard to follow. Call me racist, but I had trouble differentiating the various bosses from each other due to the similarity of their names to my western ear. This left the majority of dialogue fairly difficult to comprehend. I wish I had seen this movie before being exposed to some of the better handgun-based action movies made since, such as A Better Tomorrow, A Better Tomorrow II, The Killer, Hard Boiled, Desperado, etc. Even The Wild Bunch could be included in that category.
]]>Mon, 14 Jul 2008 16:08:07 GMTtallquasimodotallquasimodo Blog7/14/2008 12:08:07 PMI really wanted to be impressed by this movie, and I was, in a sense. The color is fantastic, and the cinematography is nothing to sneeze at either. It even had what must have been some very cool gunfights for its time. Unfortunately the narrative itself was too hard to follow. Call me racist, but I had trouble differentiating the various bosses from each other due to the similarity of their names to my western ear. This left the majority of dialogue fairly difficult to comprehend. I wish I had seen this movie before being exposed to some of the better handgun-based action movies made since, such as A Better Tomorrow, A Better Tomorrow II, The Killer, Hard Boiled, Desperado, etc. Even The Wild Bunch could be included in that category. http://www.spout.com/groups/Friends_of_Foreign_Flicks/Re_Foreign_Gems/591/30093/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: unclefestering
Post To: Friends of Foreign Flicks
Post Date: 5/28/2008 1:31:08 PM
Body: [quote user="Risselada"] I see he's been very prolific, so I've only seen quite a small percentage of his films. Specifically I've seen Branded to Kill, Tokyo Drifter, Youth of the Beast, and Fighting Elegy, and every single one of those are five stars to me! [/quote] Branded to Kill is my favorite of his. And if you want to watch him is his prime in terms of a balance of plot and visuals, you are looking in the right era. It is his later works like Pistol Opera where the visuals take over completely and wipe out the plot. Don't get me wrong the visuals of his later work are stunning. but it lacks the pure craft of his movies from the 60s and 70s.
]]>Wed, 28 May 2008 17:31:08 GMTunclefesteringFriends of Foreign Flicks5/28/2008 1:31:08 PM[quote user="Risselada"] I see he's been very prolific, so I've only seen quite a small percentage of his films. Specifically I've seen Branded to Kill, Tokyo Drifter, Youth of the Beast, and Fighting Elegy, and every single one of those are five stars to me! [/quote] Branded to Kill is my favorite of his. And if you want to watch him is his prime in terms of a balance of plot and visuals, you are looking in the right era. It is his later works like Pistol Opera where the visuals take over completely and wipe out the plot. Don't get me wrong the visuals of his later work are stunning. but it lacks the pure craft of his movies from the 60s and 70s. http://www.spout.com/groups/Friends_of_Foreign_Flicks/Re_Foreign_Gems/591/30079/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: Risselada
Post To: Friends of Foreign Flicks
Post Date: 5/28/2008 11:54:15 AM
Body: [quote user="unclefestering"]I have to say that I'm split on Seijun Suzuki, especially since his later films are essentially remakes of his earlier ones. I think his plots are much murkier in his remakes although they have an incredible visual palate.[/quote] I see he's been very prolific, so I've only seen quite a small percentage of his films. Specifically I've seen Branded to Kill, Tokyo Drifter, Youth of the Beast, and Fighting Elegy, and every single one of those are five stars to me!
]]>Wed, 28 May 2008 15:54:15 GMTRisseladaFriends of Foreign Flicks5/28/2008 11:54:15 AM[quote user="unclefestering"]I have to say that I'm split on Seijun Suzuki, especially since his later films are essentially remakes of his earlier ones. I think his plots are much murkier in his remakes although they have an incredible visual palate.[/quote] I see he's been very prolific, so I've only seen quite a small percentage of his films. Specifically I've seen Branded to Kill, Tokyo Drifter, Youth of the Beast, and Fighting Elegy, and every single one of those are five stars to me! http://www.spout.com/groups/Viewing_with_a_purpose/Re_Latest_unknown_fave/288/18310/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: Risselada
Post To: Viewing with a purpose
Post Date: 8/17/2007 4:20:06 PM
Body: [quote user="Puhnner"] Man oh man is his work great!Pistol OperaBranded to KillTokyo DrifterTattooed LifeHe has 48 listed on Spout! I need to see 'em all!!![/quote]Out of those I've seen Tokyo Drifter and Branded to Kill.Have you seen Youth of the Beast? I would highly recommend that one. There are some colorful compositions in that one that rival Tokyo Drifter.Oh and there are some good special features on the DVD including an interview with Jo Shishido where he talks about the regret for getting those outrageous cheek implants!
]]>Fri, 17 Aug 2007 20:20:06 GMTRisseladaViewing with a purpose8/17/2007 4:20:06 PM[quote user="Puhnner"] Man oh man is his work great!Pistol OperaBranded to KillTokyo DrifterTattooed LifeHe has 48 listed on Spout! I need to see &#39;em all!!![/quote]Out of those I&#39;ve seen Tokyo Drifter and Branded to Kill.Have you seen Youth of the Beast? I would highly recommend that one. There are some colorful compositions in that one that rival Tokyo Drifter.Oh and there are some good special features on the DVD including an interview with Jo Shishido where he talks about the regret for getting those outrageous cheek implants! http://www.spout.com/groups/Viewing_with_a_purpose/Re_Latest_unknown_fave/288/18293/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: Puhnner
Post To: Viewing with a purpose
Post Date: 8/17/2007 12:49:29 PM
Body: Man oh man is his work great!Pistol OperaBranded to KillTokyo DrifterTattooed LifeHe has 48 listed on Spout! I need to see 'em all!!!
]]>Fri, 17 Aug 2007 16:49:29 GMTPuhnnerViewing with a purpose8/17/2007 12:49:29 PMMan oh man is his work great!Pistol OperaBranded to KillTokyo DrifterTattooed LifeHe has 48 listed on Spout! I need to see &#39;em all!!! http://www.spout.com/blogs/analogzombie/archive/2007/6/24/11963.aspx Post By: analogzombie
Post To: analogzombie Blog
Post Date: 6/24/2007 4:16:00 PM
Body: Unless you’re a fan of cult Japanese film, chances are you don’t know who Seijun Suzuki is. One way to describe him would be a studio hack director for Nikkatsu who primarily worked in the 60’s. You’d be just as justified in describing his as an auteur working within a genre to find his niche. Or even as a visual maverick whose flare for the garish has left an indelible mark on cinema. Yes you could refer to him as all those things and more, but you’d be pompous. What’s worse is that you’d be doing a disservice to the man and his films. So we’re going to take a more humanist look at one of the best directors Japan has ever produced. To understand Seijun Suzuki’s place in film you have to understand how the Japanese film industry operated for the better part of the last century. The studios in Japan signed directors, actors, lighting technicians, and everybody else who worked in movies, to contracts obligating them to work only for their company except in rare instances when talent or crew would be ‘loaned out’. This is basically the system that existed in Hollywood before United Artists broke the mold in the 1930’s. Unlike Hollywood however, Japanese studios had a rigidly defined system in which an aspiring director would have to rise through the ranks before being given control over a film. There existed a three tier qualifier for movies. A level films starred the best actors, got the most money, and the biggest marketing push. Top B movies were usually the bottom half of a double feature bill, got less money than A pictures, but still could be avenues for talent. C pictures were the top half of a double feature, were almost always black and white, and were really the testing ground for up and comers within the company. A director would enter the studio as a script assistant for an older mentor-like director. If they showed promise they would move on to be an assistant director and eventually move into directing C pictures, than B pictures. Only the masters like Ozu, Mizoguchi, Shinoda, and Kurosawa directed A level films for the major studios. This is the system that Suzuki entered into when he went to work for Nikkatsu, the nastiest and lowest of studios, in the mid 1950’s a fter leaving the lower paying Shochiku studio. It’s a system that ended up being a perfect fit for him. Suzuki got the chance to direct his first feature with 1956’s Satan’s Town: a basic action-exploitation picture with truly awful acting. Between 1956 and 1963, when his acknowledged breakthrough film Youth of the Beast was released, he directed 25 films. This may seem like a lot, but for a production line genre director like Suzuki it was par for the course. Most productions were given 25 days for shooting and 3 for editing. With a week prior to shooting to iron out the pre-written script. Each type of film A, B, and C, had a specific budget for its type, not the film itself. The director was expected to turn in a completed film every five weeks, and going over budget was unheard of. In fact refusing scripts was also a taboo. The studio assigned directors to scripts, believing at that time that a director was no more important to a film than a camera operator. A director turned down a script at the peril of losing their job. Suzuki himself only turned down 2 while at Nikkatsu. This all may seem like things weren't geared towards making quality films, and that's basically correct. It did, however, offer amazing opportunities for directors like Suzuki to learn all sorts of techniques, and hone their craft over a relatively short period of time. Within one year of producing films you could be considered a veteran. He never moved above the B level status, something he has never felt bad about. For Suzuki, who never thought of himself as an auteur, that is where he thrived. Eventually though, making whatever film comes down the pipeline can get extremely boring. For a person like Suzuki, who has an extremely short tolerance level it had to be maddening. This is why he began to experiment with films. If he couldn't change the script he would change lighting cues, add unrelenting music, strange scenery, out of place extras, or extreme time changes within a scene. He would do anything and everything to make the films he was creating interesting to him. 1963's Kanto Wanderer is a perfect example of his desire to imbue a typical yakuza film with some interesting flare. The film plays like any number of its genre kin up until the last 15 minutes when suddenly, it takes a turn into the surreal. As our hero yakuza exacts his revenge a wall falls to reveal a brilliant red background, as if his rage has just exploded on screen. It's as if Suzuki knew the audience would be flagging under the weight of this mediocre film by the time the climax rolled around. It's his way of saying, "okay pay attention now." It works like gangbusters, and you can't help but watch that sequence 2 or 3 more times afterwards to be sure you saw what you think you saw. While his flourishes in Kanto Wanderer piqued the interests of some of Nikkatsu's execs it was One Generation of Tattoos, also known as Tattooed Life, that earned Suzuki his first official caution from the studio. Ever wondered where the under the floor shot during Kill Bill's 'house of blue leaves' sequence comes from? You guessed it, Tattooed Life. This scene, shot for only about 20 seconds form under a tatami mat was the climax of an elaborate fight scene that highlighted a thrilling chase through a house with a seemingly endless number of sliding doors. Once again red is used as a symbol for our hero's, White Fox Tetsu, seething rage. This time is appears in the form of window dressings, and lights that lead intot he final showdown. Under strict orders to 'play it straight', he went on to make 1966's Tokyo Dirfter which can be nothing else than a total 'fuck you' to his bosses. Using the most dramatic color changes yet, Suzuki crafted a pop art masterpiece. The story concerns the last honorable yakuza battling for survival against the corporate corruption of his own gang as they attempt to wipe him out to make peace with their rivals. With its minimalist plot, and total disregard for narrative flow Tokyo Drifter is what you might have expected from Andy Warhol, had he ever made a James Bond movie. During one sequence we see the seasons change from Spring, to Winter, to Fall, back to Winter, and then Summer. It's unclear if these time shifts are disjointed to reflect the main characters unstable state of mind, are meant to leap over a few years of story, or have any meaning at all other than to liven things up a bit. The final showdown between our hero yakuza and his old boss is set in the most surreal nightclub I have ever seen. Everything contained within it, which isn't much, from the floor, to the walls, the bar and piano is white. As the shoot out begins between the parties, a sculpture is flooded with corresponding colored light to mirror the escalating tensions. It's simply the most beautiful scene I have ever watched in a film. Hero's Chinese landscapes have nothing on this film's interiors. All of these experiments culminated in the film that finally got him fired from Nikkatsu in 1967: Branded to Kill. The film starts out as many others of the genre did. It concerns a yakuza assassin, called '#3 Killer', who must escort a VIP through a perilous cityscape. While doing so he realizes this is no ordinary assignment when, in a shoot out, the VIP takes deadly aim on their pursuers. Aroused only by the smell of rice, '#3 Killer' begins to get intertwined with a series of foxy go-go girls, to no romantic avail, and one who wants him to show her the ropes a la The Professional. When our man commits the greatest hit man sin by bungling as assignment he must go into hiding from '#1 Killer' who must put him down. This is where the film veers off wildly into Suzuki's most elaborate time shifts and narrative disruptions. '#1 Killer' gets pleasure out of torturing his mark, playing a twisted form of cat and mouse. By the time '#3 Killer' emerges from his seclusion to take on his enemy and the his entire yakuza clan the film has broken down into an extremely cerebral experience heavy on the symbolism. This turned out to be absolutely more than the studio could take. After repeated warnings, Suzuki had defied them again and they excised him for it. Being that he had a contract with them, he sued Nikkatsu to, as he put it 'protect his dignity'. While the lawsuit didn't really amount to much, he did receive support from film fans and the public at large. Protests of Nikkatsu cost the ailing company so much money that it ended up being the death nail for them, they closed their doors a few years later. It has come to light since, that while Nikkatsu didn't appreciate Suzuki's films, the real reason they fired him was to cut expenses. Why they decided to go about in such a way as they did, we will never know, but Suzuki wasn't the only director to lose his job at that time. In his 12 twelve years at Nikkatsu, Seijun Suzuki made 42 films. The last 13 of which are some of the most provocative, thrilling, and inspiring genre films ever made. In the 26 years since, he has gone on to make only 6 features. Many of these seem to be merely retreads of themes and ideas he has already visited. While he definitely thrived under the strict rules and regulations of the 1960's Japanese studio system, his years since can definitely not be counted as a failure. He has had quite a successful career as a tv actor in his homeland, and in 1985 he was voted 'Best Dressed Japanese Man' by the Japanese Fashion Society. Only recently have his films found critical acceptance abroad, with many retrospectives of his films taking place in Germany, France, the UK, and the US, but he has always been loved in Japan. It would be easy to compare him to the auteur directors of France, or America, but he contends that his movies are not about himself. 'Films should be about ideas', Suzuki says, and if there's anything you can say about his work it's that his certainly do contain some rather imaginative ideas.
]]>Sun, 24 Jun 2007 20:16:00 GMTanalogzombieanalogzombie Blog6/24/2007 4:16:00 PMUnless you&rsquo;re a fan of cult Japanese film, chances are you don&rsquo;t know who Seijun Suzuki is. One way to describe him would be a studio hack director for Nikkatsu who primarily worked in the 60&rsquo;s. You&rsquo;d be just as justified in describing his as an auteur working within a genre to find his niche. Or even as a visual maverick whose flare for the garish has left an indelible mark on cinema. Yes you could refer to him as all those things and more, but you&rsquo;d be pompous. What&rsquo;s worse is that you&rsquo;d be doing a disservice to the man and his films. So we&rsquo;re going to take a more humanist look at one of the best directors Japan has ever produced. To understand Seijun Suzuki&rsquo;s place in film you have to understand how the Japanese film industry operated for the better part of the last century. The studios in Japan signed directors, actors, lighting technicians, and everybody else who worked in movies, to contracts obligating them to work only for their company except in rare instances when talent or crew would be &lsquo;loaned out&rsquo;. This is basically the system that existed in Hollywood before United Artists broke the mold in the 1930&rsquo;s. Unlike Hollywood however, Japanese studios had a rigidly defined system in which an aspiring director would have to rise through the ranks before being given control over a film. There existed a three tier qualifier for movies. A level films starred the best actors, got the most money, and the biggest marketing push. Top B movies were usually the bottom half of a double feature bill, got less money than A pictures, but still could be avenues for talent. C pictures were the top half of a double feature, were almost always black and white, and were really the testing ground for up and comers within the company. A director would enter the studio as a script assistant for an older mentor-like director. If they showed promise they would move on to be an assistant director and eventually move into directing C pictures, than B pictures. Only the masters like Ozu, Mizoguchi, Shinoda, and Kurosawa directed A level films for the major studios. This is the system that Suzuki entered into when he went to work for Nikkatsu, the nastiest and lowest of studios, in the mid 1950&rsquo;s a fter leaving the lower paying Shochiku studio. It&rsquo;s a system that ended up being a perfect fit for him. Suzuki got the chance to direct his first feature with 1956&rsquo;s Satan&rsquo;s Town: a basic action-exploitation picture with truly awful acting. Between 1956 and 1963, when his acknowledged breakthrough film Youth of the Beast was released, he directed 25 films. This may seem like a lot, but for a production line genre director like Suzuki it was par for the course. Most productions were given 25 days for shooting and 3 for editing. With a week prior to shooting to iron out the pre-written script. Each type of film A, B, and C, had a specific budget for its type, not the film itself. The director was expected to turn in a completed film every five weeks, and going over budget was unheard of. In fact refusing scripts was also a taboo. The studio assigned directors to scripts, believing at that time that a director was no more important to a film than a camera operator. A director turned down a script at the peril of losing their job. Suzuki himself only turned down 2 while at Nikkatsu. This all may seem like things weren&#39;t geared towards making quality films, and that&#39;s basically correct. It did, however, offer amazing opportunities for directors like Suzuki to learn all sorts of techniques, and hone their craft over a relatively short period of time. Within one year of producing films you could be considered a veteran. He never moved above the B level status, something he has never felt bad about. For Suzuki, who never thought of himself as an auteur, that is where he thrived. Eventually though, making whatever film comes down the pipeline can get extremely boring. For a person like Suzuki, who has an extremely short tolerance level it had to be maddening. This is why he began to experiment with films. If he couldn&#39;t change the script he would change lighting cues, add unrelenting music, strange scenery, out of place extras, or extreme time changes within a scene. He would do anything and everything to make the films he was creating interesting to him. 1963&#39;s Kanto Wanderer is a perfect example of his desire to imbue a typical yakuza film with some interesting flare. The film plays like any number of its genre kin up until the last 15 minutes when suddenly, it takes a turn into the surreal. As our hero yakuza exacts his revenge a wall falls to reveal a brilliant red background, as if his rage has just exploded on screen. It&#39;s as if Suzuki knew the audience would be flagging under the weight of this mediocre film by the time the climax rolled around. It&#39;s his way of saying, "okay pay attention now." It works like gangbusters, and you can&#39;t help but watch that sequence 2 or 3 more times afterwards to be sure you saw what you think you saw. While his flourishes in Kanto Wanderer piqued the interests of some of Nikkatsu&#39;s execs it was One Generation of Tattoos, also known as Tattooed Life, that earned Suzuki his first official caution from the studio. Ever wondered where the under the floor shot during Kill Bill&#39;s &#39;house of blue leaves&#39; sequence comes from? You guessed it, Tattooed Life. This scene, shot for only about 20 seconds form under a tatami mat was the climax of an elaborate fight scene that highlighted a thrilling chase through a house with a seemingly endless number of sliding doors. Once again red is used as a symbol for our hero&#39;s, White Fox Tetsu, seething rage. This time is appears in the form of window dressings, and lights that lead intot he final showdown. Under strict orders to &#39;play it straight&#39;, he went on to make 1966&#39;s Tokyo Dirfter which can be nothing else than a total &#39;fuck you&#39; to his bosses. Using the most dramatic color changes yet, Suzuki crafted a pop art masterpiece. The story concerns the last honorable yakuza battling for survival against the corporate corruption of his own gang as they attempt to wipe him out to make peace with their rivals. With its minimalist plot, and total disregard for narrative flow Tokyo Drifter is what you might have expected from Andy Warhol, had he ever made a James Bond movie. During one sequence we see the seasons change from Spring, to Winter, to Fall, back to Winter, and then Summer. It&#39;s unclear if these time shifts are disjointed to reflect the main characters unstable state of mind, are meant to leap over a few years of story, or have any meaning at all other than to liven things up a bit. The final showdown between our hero yakuza and his old boss is set in the most surreal nightclub I have ever seen. Everything contained within it, which isn&#39;t much, from the floor, to the walls, the bar and piano is white. As the shoot out begins between the parties, a sculpture is flooded with corresponding colored light to mirror the escalating tensions. It&#39;s simply the most beautiful scene I have ever watched in a film. Hero&#39;s Chinese landscapes have nothing on this film&#39;s interiors. All of these experiments culminated in the film that finally got him fired from Nikkatsu in 1967: Branded to Kill. The film starts out as many others of the genre did. It concerns a yakuza assassin, called &#39;#3 Killer&#39;, who must escort a VIP through a perilous cityscape. While doing so he realizes this is no ordinary assignment when, in a shoot out, the VIP takes deadly aim on their pursuers. Aroused only by the smell of rice, &#39;#3 Killer&#39; begins to get intertwined with a series of foxy go-go girls, to no romantic avail, and one who wants him to show her the ropes a la The Professional. When our man commits the greatest hit man sin by bungling as assignment he must go into hiding from &#39;#1 Killer&#39; who must put him down. This is where the film veers off wildly into Suzuki&#39;s most elaborate time shifts and narrative disruptions. &#39;#1 Killer&#39; gets pleasure out of torturing his mark, playing a twisted form of cat and mouse. By the time &#39;#3 Killer&#39; emerges from his seclusion to take on his enemy and the his entire yakuza clan the film has broken down into an extremely cerebral experience heavy on the symbolism. This turned out to be absolutely more than the studio could take. After repeated warnings, Suzuki had defied them again and they excised him for it. Being that he had a contract with them, he sued Nikkatsu to, as he put it &#39;protect his dignity&#39;. While the lawsuit didn&#39;t really amount to much, he did receive support from film fans and the public at large. Protests of Nikkatsu cost the ailing company so much money that it ended up being the death nail for them, they closed their doors a few years later. It has come to light since, that while Nikkatsu didn&#39;t appreciate Suzuki&#39;s films, the real reason they fired him was to cut expenses. Why they decided to go about in such a way as they did, we will never know, but Suzuki wasn&#39;t the only director to lose his job at that time. In his 12 twelve years at Nikkatsu, Seijun Suzuki made 42 films. The last 13 of which are some of the most provocative, thrilling, and inspiring genre films ever made. In the 26 years since, he has gone on to make only 6 features. Many of these seem to be merely retreads of themes and ideas he has already visited. While he definitely thrived under the strict rules and regulations of the 1960&#39;s Japanese studio system, his years since can definitely not be counted as a failure. He has had quite a successful career as a tv actor in his homeland, and in 1985 he was voted &#39;Best Dressed Japanese Man&#39; by the Japanese Fashion Society. Only recently have his films found critical acceptance abroad, with many retrospectives of his films taking place in Germany, France, the UK, and the US, but he has always been loved in Japan. It would be easy to compare him to the auteur directors of France, or America, but he contends that his movies are not about himself. &#39;Films should be about ideas&#39;, Suzuki says, and if there&#39;s anything you can say about his work it&#39;s that his certainly do contain some rather imaginative ideas. http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/revenge/MemberTagFilms.aspxrevenge
Number of films tagged: 5189

Number of people who tagged: 145

Number of times used: 489

]]>Wed, 02 Dec 2009 23:13:41 GMT5189145489Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/gangster/MemberTagFilms.aspxgangster
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]]>Mon, 17 Aug 2009 01:37:08 GMT406560145Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/criterion/MemberTagFilms.aspxcriterion
Number of films tagged: 396

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Number of times used: 407

]]>Wed, 02 Sep 2009 02:08:23 GMT39617407Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/loyalty/MemberTagFilms.aspxloyalty
Number of films tagged: 149

Number of people who tagged: 17

Number of times used: 30

]]>Fri, 27 Nov 2009 18:10:04 GMT1491730Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/drifter/MemberTagFilms.aspxdrifter
Number of films tagged: 231

Number of people who tagged: 8

Number of times used: 10

]]>Fri, 04 Dec 2009 00:50:39 GMT231810Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/bar-fight/MemberTagFilms.aspxbar-fight
Number of films tagged: 5

Number of people who tagged: 2

Number of times used: 5

]]>Sat, 08 Aug 2009 21:42:22 GMT525Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/goingstraight/MemberTagFilms.aspxgoingstraight
Number of films tagged: 400

Number of people who tagged: 2

Number of times used: 3

]]>Thu, 09 Apr 2009 13:02:15 GMT40023Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/awesome-color/MemberTagFilms.aspxawesome-color
Number of films tagged: 1

Number of people who tagged: 1

Number of times used: 1

]]>Mon, 14 May 2007 08:51:36 GMT111Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/japanese-noir/MemberTagFilms.aspxjapanese-noir
Number of films tagged: 1

Number of people who tagged: 1

Number of times used: 1

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