21st March 2009

WHY I TOOK ALL TAKASHI MIIKE’S TITLES OFF MY RENTAL QUEUE

One of the great advantages of online rental is the access to absolutely everything. Against that, one of the big disadvantages is access to absolutely everything.

I try and balance between the new and older genre releases, and stir in a healthy mix of so-called World Cinema (in practise it’s just a mixture of European and Asian sleaze movies). But I’m starting to veer away from the Asian ones as the titles they’ve sent me have just not been up to snuff. Even though they’ve delivered on the sex and violence I’m usually left with a feeling of “is that it?”.

For example: the wonderfully titled Teenage Hooker Became A Killing Machine. First off it’s a cheat because the actual English title on screen is just plain Killing Machine. Secondly it runs just shy of an hour and that includes long credit rolls at both ends. Thirdly, although the plot does indeed revolve around a schoolgirl prostitute who is eventually turned into a homicidal cyborg thing, the dizzying hand-held technique of the (video) camerawork makes it tough to get through. And fourthly, just because it’s a degenerate sleaze movie ona low budget doesn’t mean everyone has to overact.

I don’t think I’m jaded and I don’t think I’m constantly looking for things that are much stronger and sicker than the last one. Takashi Miike is one of those directors who is constantly doing this: going as far as possible and then a little further. Sometimes it’s worth it: Auditionwas included in the first FrightFest’s back in 2000, and is of course regarded as a modern genre classic. And The Happiness Of The Katakurisis sweet-natured enough to compensate for it being completely bonkers. Unfortunately, sometimes it’s not worth it. Gozuwas featured at FrightFest 2003 and includes wanton cruelty to small dogs and a man with a soup ladle inserted somewhere rude. To be honest I lost all track of whatever it was all about long before the end credits started. When he controls himself, as with Audition, the results are superb. Or with his original One Missed Call, which is an effective if largely unsurprising exercise in so-called J-Horror (especially as I’d already seen the near-identical Hollywood remake). But when he decides to make something a bit wild and crazy purely for the sake of it, it can end up as unwatchable gibberish. What on Earth is going on in Fudoh: The Next Generation? And I don’t want to see any more of his Triads and Yakuza movies either, after the horrible Ichi The Killer(from which the BBFC, even in these relatively enlightened times, saw fit to remove more than three minutes of footage).

The last Takashi Miike movie to drop into my mailbox was Visitor Q, which manages to pack in teenage prostitution and incest before the opening credits have even started, and then proceeds merrily through the Daily Mail Filth Alert checklist of drug abuse, domestic violence, bullying, family breakdown and bodily fluids before wheeling on a dead naked woman for a final act that was probably supposed to be absolutely hilarious, but isn’t. For all the taboo breaking, there’s still no discernible point to it all: he’s just pointing the camera at a parade of horrible behaviour and saying “Blimey! Isn’t this horrible? Stick around, there’s plenty more where this came from!” But why? Is it a portrait of modern Japanese middle-class society which he’s exaggerated for comic effect? Or is it just the ramblings of a deranged auteur who’s just going off on one? I can’t say, and in all honesty I’m no longer inclined to delve much deeper: the odds on finding a good, solid Takashi Miike film are a lot slimmer than the odds on ending up with something not just incoherent, but repulsive.

And it’s not that I’ve anything against Asian cinema in general: I’ve rather liked quite a few examples, such as the Female Prisoner series of the 1970s (deep breath: Female Prisoner No. 701: Scorpion, Female Convict Scorpion: Jailhouse 41and Female Prisoner No.701 Scorpion: Beast Stable), following the unjustly convicted Matsu’s quest for revenge on...well, pretty much everyone: guards, governors, inmates, cops, criminals, newsreaders, synchronised swimmers (okay, maybe not the last two). They are done with a sense of style and flair, particularly the first in the series. And it was oddly, pleasantly surprising to find a bit of music in one of the movies that later showed up on the Kill Bill soundtrack.

So the rental list remains pruned of Takashi Miike for now, except for the recent Sukiyaki Western Django, which only has a 15 so is unlikely to contain random scenes of lactation and incest. It doesn’t bother me: there are plenty of other films to get through and I’d probably enjoy them more.

Look, there’s no way I’m going to shell out £12 in HMV for a film I’m probably not going to watch more than once. Even though I could probably pick it up online for £5, I’m still stuck with it afterwards and frankly I need the space. So I’m more than happy to rent obscure, forgotten and pistol-packin’ mental movies. These things aren’t going to show up at Blockbuster any time (they need the wall space for two hundred copies of Mamma Miaand The Dark Knight) and BBC2 are strangely uninterested in putting them on either. What is a fan of tacky nonsense to do?

Until the next time.

Richard.