seijun suzuki Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Opening in 800 theaters on Friday, Hayao Miyazaki's Ponyo promises to be another enchanting experience. The English-language version features a voice cast that appears to have been chosen from a name recognition menu (one Cyrus girl, one Jonas boy, etc.) but John Lasseter has been as faithful as possible to the original-language versions in the past, and if this is the price to pay to see Miyazaki on the big screen, so be it.

Out on DVD tomorrow, Seijun Suzuki's A Tale of Sorrow (Hishu monogatari), his only film from the 70s, is "a sexy psycho-drama," says Jasper Sharp of Midnight Eye, "based around the popularity of that most bourgeois of sports, golf! ... This long-overlooked work simply cries out for revival." The Samurai I Loved (Semishigure), based on a novel by Shuhei Fujisawa and directed by Mitsuo Kurotsuchi, features "scenes that are absolutely heart-wrenching," Zack Davisson writes at his Japan Review Blog. "What works far outweighs what doesn't." King Eagle (1971), directed by Chang Cheh and starring Ti Lung, is the latest Shaw Brothers release from Image Entertainment. Revenge, swordplay, Chang Cheh: is there anything else we need to know?

Zhang Ziyi stars in the romantic comedy Sophie's Revenge, which opens in China and Hong Kong on Friday. She plays "a comic book artist who plots to get her fiance back after losing him to an actress," according to an Associated Press story. Sophie's Revenge also marks the actress' debut as a producer: writer / director Eva Jin "approached her with her script and she secured funding for the project." Check out the Chinese-language official site; the trailer looks like a fun romp. No word on US distribution yet.

Watch the Sophie's Revenge teaser trailer after the jump!

Innovative director Seijun Suzuki created a string of dazzling films for the Nikkatsu Studio in Japan stretching from 1963's Youth of the Beast to 1967's Branded to Kill. The breathtaking but sometimes bewildering artistry of those films played to increasingly empty theaters and so befuddled the head of the studio that Suzuki was finally fired and didn't work again for a decade. Suzuki's story has become well known and many of his films have now been restored, screened at festivals and released on DVD.

According to film critic Mark Schilling, though, Suzuki was not the only innovative director working within the Nikkatsu Studio system in the 1960s. Based on the tantalizing evidence presented in the three rarely-seen films screened in the Nikkatsu Action Cinema Retrospective at Fantastic Fest, Schilling has a strong case. A Colt is My Passport is a vivid hitman drama that anticipates Branded to Kill, while The Warped Ones is a completely unhinged exercise that feels like 75 minutes of free jazz improvisation and Velvet Hustler masterfully deconstructs a routine crime story with color and finesse.

Schilling appeared in person to introduce the films and answered questions after each screening. Based in Tokyo since 1975, he has been reviewing films for The Japan Times since 1989 and currently also serves as Japan correspondent for Variety. He latest book is No Borders, No Limits: Nikkatsu Action Cinema, just published by Fab Press. The book was originally written to accompany a 16-film retrospective he curated for the Far East Film Festival in Udine, Italy, in 2005, and has now been expanded and slightly revised. In the introduction, Schilling explains that his aim is "not to challenge the critical consensus -- Suzuki is a master, after all -- but to broaden the discussion." Schilling provides a history of the Nikkatsu Studio and puts Suzuki's accomplishments, and those of his peers, into perspective. The book is well-written, lavishly illustrated and highly recommended.