OUR LITTLE SISTER + MUSTANG - Reviews By Greg Klymkiw - Mongrel Media's Must-See Sister Act - The Film Corner's Handy-Dandy *****TIFF 2015 TOP PICKS***** continue.

MONGREL MEDIA'S MUST-SEE SISTER ACT AT TIFF 2015

Our Little Sister (above)
Mustang (below)

Our Little Sister (2015)
Dir. Hirokazu Kore-eda
Starring: Haruka Ayase, Masami Nagasawa, Kaho, Suzu Hirose

Review By Greg Klymkiw

When three sisters attend the funeral of their long-estranged father, they meet his daughter from a second marriage, the little sister they never met. They welcome her with open arms and she decides to live with them. For the first time in her life, she feels what it means to have family you can love and count on.

As far as I'm concerned, director Hirokazu Kore-eda (After Life, Nobody Knows, Still Walking, Like Father Like Son) has no equals in contemporary Japanese Cinema. He seems to be the one true and genuine successor to the legacy of Yasujiro (Tokyo Story) Ozu, the master of the groundbreaking tatami shots, long takes, figures moving in and out of frame, a stately pace allowing for deep contemplation of the dramas unfolding, a deep sense of humanity, a love for the properties of melodrama and an unflagging commitment to examining the intricacies of family. To a certain extent, the aforementioned Ozu grocery list of unbeatable properties seems not dissimilar to the work of Kore-eda.

Kore-eda, however, differs on two fronts. He downplays sentiment almost to the extent of eschewing it completely, but then, when you least expect it, he's not afraid of using melodrama sparingly as a legitimate storytelling tool (usually with a wallop to the solar plexus). Secondly, though Kore-eda is also primarily interested in the dynamics of family, he adds his own special thematic element, dealing heartbreakingly with the theme and dramatic action of abandonment.

Our Little Sister has got "abandonment" almost literally spilling out of its ears and he allows us to be privy to three, then four sisters filling various voids in their hearts with the love they have for each other. At times it feels like nothing much is really happening, but "it" most certainly is - in tiny, delicate and subtle ways. Kore-eda allows us time to luxuriate in each sister's unique qualities and how they play off each other.

He slowly builds to a handful of scenes during the final stretch of the picture that inspire overwhelming emotions in the hearts of its audiences. I bawled like a baby and still can't shake or forget its uplifts which are never machine-tooled, but burst forth naturally from within his film's very big heart.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: **** 4-Stars

Our Little Sister plays in the TIFF Masters program during TIFF 2015. For dates, times and tix, visit the TIFF website HERE.

Mustang (2014)
Dir. Deniz Gamze Ergüven
Starring: Gunes Sensoy, Dogba Doguslu, Tugba Sunguroglu,
Elit Iscan, Ilayda Akdogan, Ayberk Pekcan, Nihal Koldas

Review By Greg Klymkiw

The events depicted in Mustang are so horrific and harrowing, it's sometimes more unbearable to experience an equal number of story beats infused with fun, love, kindness, pleasurable abandon and humour since they're such powerful juxtapositions to the tragedy of the situation presented.

In a small Turkish coastal town on the Black Sea, a repressed, deeply traditional busybody neighbour spies five orphan sisters having fun on the last day of school. The innocent actions are deemed obscene. Their grandmother and stern uncle hit the roof and what should have been a glorious summer vacation turns into a living nightmare. They're immediately locked in the house, stripped of all items which could be considered immoral, informed that their education has come to an end and thrown into a rigorous indoctrination to be loyal, subservient wives. Parades of potential suitors are brought in to inspect their "wares" and the goal is to have all the girls, ranging from 12 to 16, married off by the end of summer.

The youngest sister proves to be the craftiest and most rebellious. She masterminds a brief escape for the girls to watch a soccer match, but the happiness is short lived when they're eventually caught in the act by their guardians. At this point, all bets are off. The home is then transformed into a literal prison replete with iron bars on all the windows, extra locks, barbed wire atop the walls surrounding the house and an intensified chaperoned courting/match-making process. In addition to the threat of physical and even sexual abuse, the girls are treated like so much chattel instead of individuals with minds of their own.

The first two-thirds of Mustang is so superbly directed and acted, it's a shame the screenplay takes a fairly conventional turn in its final act. What transpires comes close to negating the power of the rest of the film. Though some will find the denouement inspiring in all the right ways, it ultimately contradicts the reality of the girls' lives and offers up hope where none, in reality, would ever exist.

During one of the final set-pieces, first-time feature filmmaker Ergüven directs the proceedings with the urgent, nerve-jangling skill of a master. The suspense is virtually unbearable, but it's almost rendered moot when the yellow-brick-road to happiness rears its ugly head. Of course we want the girls to escape, but deep down we know a happy end to their short lives of freedom must surely be an impossibility. When these tables turn, it's not so much a cause for celebration, but a lament for honesty.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: *** 3-Stars

Mustang is a TIFF 2015 Special Presentation. For dates, times and tix, visit the TIFF website HERE.

THE MAKIOKA SISTERS - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Lesser Ichikawa on Criterion Blu-Ray

The Makioka Sisters (1983)
dir. Kon Ichikawa
Starring: Keiko Kishi, Yoshiko Kasuma, Sayuri Yoshinaga, Yuko Kotegawa, Juzo Itami

Review By Greg Klymkiw

I wanted to love this movie for three reasons.

First of all, I must admit that even after having seen over 30,000 movies in my life, there are still so many more to see. Japanese director Kon Ichikawa, one of the foremost masters of his country's cinema, is - for example - a filmmaker who inexplicably fell below my radar. I knew he existed, but bad timing forced me to keep missing the handful of massive retrospectives of his work at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) Cinematheque (now housed in the grand TIFF Lightbox complex in Toronto, Canada).

I had also been aware of Ichikawa's ongoing obsession with adapting the best of Japan's wealth of great literature and how this generally distinguished him amongst many of his contemporaries. Yasujiro Ozu and Akira Kurosawa were particularly interested in original screenplays - good on them, but I never look a road map in the mouth, so to speak. For me, Japanese literature (save for Yukio Mishima) continues to be an unknown commodity and I have been chomping at the bit to dine at the Ichikawa Buffet (as it were) to use his movies as a barometer and/or guide to some of these great literary works. In essence, I have been preparing to use Ichikawa like the "Classics Illustrated" comics from my childhood. They always promoted the notion of "now you've read the comic, read the full length book" and for me, that used to work wonders. I mean, really! What the hell! I'm technically not a kid anymore, but even adults with a bit of book learnin' can use some help now and again.

The second reason I wanted to love The Makioka Sisters is that the first half hour is utterly spellbinding. Though we focus only on the four sisters of the title (Keiko Kishi, Yoshiko Kasuma, Sayuri Yoshinaga, Yuko Kotegawa) and one husband (Juzo Itami, eventually a noted Japanese director in his own right), Ichikawa lays out an extremely complex backstory that forces us (not distractingly) to work overtime sorting out and digesting the relationships between the characters and the cultural/historical backdrop.

Add to the above, one of the most heart achingly beautiful visual set pieces imaginable - the sisters taking a lazy stroll to enjoy the cherry blossoms - and you feel like you're diving into what might be a life-changing masterwork (save for the intrusion of one execrable element I will mention much later in this piece).

The final reason I wanted to love this movie is that it's one of those potentially great Chekhovian stories I'm a sucker for - people looking desperately to make connections with each other (or ANYONE) against a major cusp period where it's easier to remain rooted in what's dying or dead than move forward and embrace or accept the new.

It's a world where the ghosts of the past - replete with all their sins and triumphs - want to be at peace, but the living will not let them go, much to the detriment of all concerned. Within this social/cultural/historical cusp period, some will make it, most will not - and out of this shift in the divide should come both tragedy and comedy - all the stuff of great drama.

Alas, The Makioka Sisters falls short of its goals. It is not even especially GOOD drama, let alone being great.

Its story is a simple one - as most great stories are. Four sisters in pre-war (1938) Osaka live a life of relative luxury. Buoyed as they are by the inheritance left to them by their late parents, all should be well. It isn't. Tradition dictates that the sisters marry in descending order of their age in order to qualify for their share of the loot - which is, essentially to be their dowries. This is all well and good for the two eldest sisters who are already hitched, but the third eldest is a major wallflower and the youngest is clearly a modern lass with a burning desire to get on with her life.

Tradition is holding her back, And ultimately, for the family as a whole to move "forward", marriage (and by extension, tradition) is seen as the only option - hence the central goal of the story being the marrying off of daughters three and four. Romance would be nice in the equation, but clearly low on the totem pole of what's seen as necessary for the preservation of the family. The needs of the individual are less than an afterthought. In fact, they're negligible.

What keeps the movie from soaring, even though it occasionally feels like it wants to, is Ichikawa's approach to rendering the narrative. He often hangs back in medium wide shots and lets long conversations play themselves out. God knows I'm happy to watch bearded warriors in lotus positions in Kurosawa pictures as they discuss WHY they're at war and HOW they will do battle. I'm especially happy to sit for hours on end while people talk to each other in tatami-level shots in Ozu. Their pictures are replete with emotion and narrative drive - unlike The Makioka Sisters.

For several reasons, Ichikawa's approach just doesn't cut it. Some will argue that his method is restraint - that he's avoiding the obvious pitfalls and clichés inherent in goosing every dramatic beat to the max. On the other hand, it could almost be argued that he's either lazy, incompetent or hampered by exigencies of production. Almost every single time he moves from his favourite (and I'd suggest rather dull) fixed camera position, so many of the cuts feel jarring and awkward (and not intentionally) while the variation of shots often seem to be from the wrong angle. Well, given the number of stunning set pieces in the movie, he's neither lazy nor incompetent, but I do think he was wrong to tell this story the way he chose to tell it.

This is a story that, while simple on the surface, is loaded with layer upon layer of complexity and yet, one is hardly compelled to even bother peeling back those layers as the director seems so disinterested in wrenching our guts for fear, I suspect, of being melodramatic.

Well, this is a bit of a problem when the story has all the hallmarks of great melodrama and none of the required execution. Ichikawa goes out of his way to mute every major melodramatic beat to the point where a handful of scenes compel you in a certain direction, then refuse to deliver up the goods. The movie has five major emotional set pieces (you'll discover those on your own) and they're exquisitely rendered on both visual levels and from the great cast (who are often wasted by Ichikawa's overall mise-en-scene).

Sorry, Kon. This is really annoying, bud. You need to loosen up a bit.

Ozu, for example, is able to wrench out drama from the smallest details and he is NEVER afraid of emotion. Some have suggested his approach is indeed restrained in order for the emotional core to open up and be real. I disagree. Ozu, like Kurosawa, is NOT afraid of being sentimental or even melodramatic. They are storytellers - first and foremost - and will use every trick up their sleeve to wrench emotion from an audience. As well, I'm not suggesting a measured, mannered approach can't work. It can. It just doesn't work in The Makioka Sisters due, at least based on this picture to Ichikawa either unwilling or incapable of achieving the heights his colleagues aimed for or worse, his inability to properly execute his own approach.

On a surface level, the movie's concluding moments come close to creating that heart breaking devastation that's as sad as it is soaring, but by then, it's too late. Ichikawa has spent most of the movie muting all the emotion, occasionally and sloppily tossing in a dollop of it here and there, then allowing it to all hang out at the end.

Great melodrama (or even straight-up drama) needs to build to such an explosion. Ichikawa seems so obsessed with his snobby attempts at restraint that he forgot he had an audience he needed to please.

I've thus far avoided any background on exigencies of production that might have lead to Ichikawa creating this supremely flawed work (wildly praised from people who really should know better). The above were my impressions knowing nothing about the making of the film (my preferred method of seeing anything for the first time). That said, upon discovering that Ichikawa was commissioned by Japan's Toho Company to make the feature as part of its 50th year celebrations and that he was subsequently and idiotically nickelled and dimed to death, is still not reason enough to change my mind. In fact, I watched the movie a second time and my conclusions stand - it's a movie with occasional beauty, tons of potential but finally, a mess.

I suspect this was probably not the best introduction to Ichikawa's work. I'll certainly see more and I'll eventually watch this again with the context of his fuller canon behind me. Maybe I'll change my mind., though I doubt highly I will - especially in light of the following:

The most bafflingly egregious element of The Makioka Sisters is the music. In spite of the fact that the movie was made in the '80s where the style of music chosen was popular for the RIGHT movies, it is completely, utterly and overwhelmingly incomprehensible to me why a movie that DEMANDED a full orchestral score is miserably fouled with synthesized music so god-awful it might as well have been crapped out by Harold Faltermeyer.

The problem with this is that The Makioka Sisters is not about a Detroit cop in Beverly Hills. Given the score, it might as well have been.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: *** 3 Stars

The Makioka Sisters has been lovingly restored and presented on a nice looking, but extras-lacking Criterion Collection Blu-ray.

MONSTERZ - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Ringu director Hideo Nakata explores mind control @FantAsia2014

Mind Control is not without merit when you're a monster.

Monsterz (2014)
Dir. Hideo Nakata
Starring: Tatsuya Fujiwara, Takayuki Yamada, Satomi Ishihara, Tomorowo Taguchi, Motoki Ochiai

Review By Greg Klymkiw

A young boy discovers he can telepathically control the minds of others. This comes in mighty handy when he manages to force his abusive father to snap his own neck. When the child reaches adulthood, he has the power to control anyone's mind and can even force large swaths of people in his purview to enter a state of suspended animation. This comes in especially handy when he wants to rob banks - mostly for fun. When he meets another young man with similar powers, all hell breaks loose.

Hideo Nakata (Ringu, Dark Water) is one of Japan's finest directors of horror and here he chooses to remake Haunters, a 2010 Korean film and even manages to trump the original. That the original is not especially good, is wherein the fault lies.

Nakata certainly creates a few creepy and fun set pieces and cannot be denied his natural virtuosity. That said, the film feels like a J-Horror version of such teen-oriented American franchise items like the Twilight and Hunger Games series. When the young man is wreaking havoc, all's well, but as it becomes more mano a mano rivalry gymnastics, not even Nakata's great style can breathe much life into this hoary horror of ponderous been-there-done-that.

THE FILM CORNER Rating **½

Monsterz had its Canadian Premiere at FantAsia2014 in Montreal.

REAL (aka "Riaru") - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Kiyoshi Kurosawa visits a subconscious ghosts @FantAsia2014

A fleeting childhood memory permeates a subconscious world
of love, loss and ghost-like shadows of a life once lived.

Real (aka "Riaru") (2013)
dir. Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Starring: Takeru Sato, Haruka Ayase, Joe Odagiri, Miki Natakani

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Pulse, Cure, Charisma) is nothing if not ambitious. His latest film Real is set in a future not too removed from our own in which it's possible to scan the subconscious of those we love who are deep in a coma.

Here, a young couple face their greatest challenge when a wife attempts suicide and her husband is wired to her mind as she lays dead to the living world. Here they are able to communicate in a strange living purgatory of ghosts, shadows and zombie-like replicas of life itself. The couple faces the challenge of solving a mystery which might be able to revive the wife, or at least provide some spiritual solace to her tragic decision. It involves a drawing of a plesiosaur which she gifted to her husband in their childhood and that he's misplaced.

To say more is to upset the delicate intricacies of this haunting and deeply moving tale of love and loss. Kurosawa's deliberate pacing is, as always, infectious and though he's lest interested in evoking terror, he does manage to give us the creeps.

Though the film overstays its welcome whilst watching it, you can't get the damn thing out of your head afterwards. As always, it's the mark of a genuine artist.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: ***½

Real enjoyed its Quebec Premiere at the FantAsia 2014 Film Festival.

ZOMBIE TV - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Lowbrow Zombie Spoof DeliversScads of Knee-Slappers @FantAsia2014

Surprise contestant on Zombie Wrestling: A HUMAN CANNIBAL!!!

A Virgin's Orgasm

Zombie TV (2013) ***
Dir. Maelie Makuno, Naoya Tashiro, Yoshihiro Nishimura
Starring: Ayumi Kuroki, Maki Mizui, Hiroko Yashiki, Jiji Bu, Iona

Review By Greg Klymkiw

In a world overrun by zombies, why wouldn't there be a specialty cable channel devoted to them? Indeed, that's what we get here: an 80-minute what-if sampling of said station in one of the year's most foul, grotesque and tasteless comedies. It's guaranteed to induce spontaneous urination from laughing long, hard and most prodigiously.

Zombie music videos? Of course. Zombie aerobics? Absolutely essential. Zombie beauty tips? Every lady zombie wants to look her best. And these are the relatively normal offerings on Zombie TV.

Nothing is sacred in this delectably idiotic, decidedly lowbrow and scattershot indulgence in hilarity of the flesh-slurping zombie kind. Do you find addled senior citizens funny? I know I do. Imagine an addled senior citizen zombie who has his own lifestyle show entitled "Zombie Walker" wherein the cameras follow the stumbling, bumbling, bone-headed Grandpa Zombie as he wanders through Tokyo shopping plazas to sample the multitudinous wares of only the finest shops and eateries. Zombies are clumsy and messy at the best of times, but when they're old, they're especially prone to accidentally breaking things or slopping their food all over themselves. And, of course, when senior citizen zombies moronically misplace their dentures, eating raw human flesh becomes nigh impossible.

And who doesn't enjoy regular professional wrestling matches? God knows I do, especially when they involve zombies. But, wait just a goddamn second, the latest episode of "Zombie Wrestling" has a surprise opponent for the champion Zombie wrassler. Normally, a live human being tied to a post in the middle of the ring is the quarry that two zombies must wrassle over, but not so this time. A human being has challenged the zombie and it's none other than a savage cannibal from the deepest, darkest, most backwards and savage jungle. With a frizzy afro, tusks jammed into his nostrils, white war paint adorning his blackface makeup and attired in a comfortable grass skirt to ensure better agility, he's bound and determined to beat a zombie to eat some raw human flesh. Who will survive? What will be left of them?

Delights of the flesh-eating variety are also to be found in the adventures of the beautiful, petulant and oh-so picky Pink Zombie as random humans beg her to bite them so they too can become one of the living dead. Yes, the residents of Tokyo are cottoning on to the fact that being a zombie is a pretty good deal - no cares, no job, no woes and lots of yummy human flesh to devour. It's Tokyo, after all. Last I heard they had one humungous population. Plenty of good eating in the Land of Nippon - if you're a zombie.

SQUEEZE THOSE
ZOMBIE FUN-BAGS

If continuing drama is your cup of green tea, there's plenty o' that on Zombie TV. One gripping tale involves an office worker who is bitten by a zombie, but continues to go to work as best she can - and nobody really notices much of a difference. Such is life as a worker-bee in a fluorescent-bathed corporate office. Eventually our heroine assists her lonely, grotesquely fat colleague by turning her into a zombie. It's the ultimate life-changer, don't you know? And, of course, one of the most touching dramas involves a male virgin hiding from zombies until he spots a living dead missy with the hugest breasts he's ever seen in his life. Will he risk all to squeeze those "water balloon fun bags"?

I'm sure you get the idea by now of what you're in for if you choose to partake of Zombie TV. Like all scattershot spoofs, it's hit and miss, but when it hits, it hits big, and you'll probably need major knee surgery from slapping it too hard.

Zombie TV enjoyed its Canadian Premiere
at the FantAsia 2014 International Film Festival in Montreal.

TOKYO DRIFTER and BRANDED TO KILL - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Seijun Suzuki X 2 Seijun Suzuki for you Seijun Suzuki for one, for all, Hip Hip Hooray on Criterion Blu-Ray

Is the director of these movies
CLINICALLY INSANE?
You be the judge, jury and executioner!

Tokyo Drifter (1966) dir. Seijun Suzuki ***1/2
Starring: Tetsuya Watari, Chieko Matsubara, Hideaki Nitani

Branded To Kill (1967) dir. Seijun Suzuki ****
Starring: Jô Shishido, Kôji Nanbara, Isao

Reviewed By Greg Klymkiw

Nobody. Seriously. Nobody. Nobody. Nobody. Nobody - and I'm dead serious - NOBODY ever or will ever make crime pictures like the supremely stylish and (quite possibly) clinically insane Japanese maestro of strange gangster shoot-em-ups - Seijun Suzuki. In the span of a decade, Suzuki directed 40 - count 'em - 40 B-movies for Japan's Nikkatsu studios.

Suzuki's favourite setting was against the backdrop of the Yakuza and his pictures just got increasingly delirious as he continued to grind out one after another. He hit his peak with Nikkatsu in 1966 and 1967 with, respectively, Tokyo Drifter and Branded To Kill. The latter picture was so confounding, so over-the-top, so disinterested in narrative logic, that the studio fired him - even though he delivered consistent product that made money for Nikkatsu. He successfully sued the company for wrongful dismissal, but his high ideals and legal victory effectively blacklisted him from making a movie for over ten years.

Tokyo Drifter, shot in lurid technicolor and scope, is a pure visceral rollercoaster ride of violence and - I kid you not - includes musical numbers. Even John Woo in his Hong Kong prime NEVER delivered such inspired nuttiness and nastiness in one fell swoop of a cinematic bushido blade.

The plot, such as it is, involves a loyal hit man, Phoenix Tetsu (Tetsuya Watari) who respects and acquiesces to his mob boss' desire to go straight. However, Tetsu is one bundle of trouble and every rival gang is drawn to creating a nightmare for his boss. Tetsu does the only thing honour will allow - he imposes a strange self-exile and becomes a drifter; a man without a country, so to speak. Loyalty, only goes so far, however, and when he realizes he's been set-up as a fall-guy, there is hell to pay.

One action scene after another is shot in near-fluorescent colour with lurid, yet stunning backdrops. The guns blaze and the blood flows freely. I'm also happy to declare that the climactic shootout ranks way up there with all the greats.

Oh, have I mentioned yet that there are musical numbers?

Tokyo Drifter made absolutely no sense to the top brass at Nikkatsu and they demanded that Suzuki tone it down for his next movie. He agreed.

Then, like all great filmmakers, he lied.

The next picture was the hypnotically demented Branded to Kill. Shot in glorious widescreen black and white with wall-to-wall sex, violence and tons of delectable nudity, it told the tale of hit man Goro Hanada (Jô Shishido) who is currently rated as Killer #3. When he screws up a job, his status in the Yakuza is threatened and soon, he finds himself the target of several hit men and hit ladies (including his mistress and wife). And soon, he is embroiled in a cat and mouse dance of death with the almost-ghost-like Killer #1.

Like Tokyo Drifter, Branded to Kill has absolutely no need or respect for issues like continuity and narrative clarity. Suzuki can barely acknowledge the plot and in its stead, stages one brilliantly shot and choreographed action set-piece after another. If Luis Bunuel had been Japanese, not even he would have approached the surrealistic heights that Suzuki ascends to so dazzlingly.

Branded to Kill is populated with some utterly delicious babes - all of whom sport guns and remove their clothing a lot. Our hero Goro, is played by the suave, ultra-cool Jô Shishido. With his odd puffy cheekbones and wry expression, Shisedo invests his role with steely intensity. The movie oozes with style like lava chugging out of a roiling volcano. The stunning black and white photography is worthy of John Alton's great noir work and the movie is driven by a terrific score that blends ultra-cool jazz styling with Ennio Morricone-influence spaghetti-riffs with crazed orchestral action genre music as if performed by the Kronos Quartet on crack cocaine.

If the picture has one crowning glory (and frankly, it has many) it surely must be Goro's fetish for the smell of boiling rice. Any excuse Suzuki can give his hero to demand it and then sniff away with abandon he manages to find it. Sometimes, there isn't even a good reason for it. Sometimes, it's just the thing to do. Sometimes, a man's just got to sniff boiling rice.

This, I understand. I hope you do, too.

If not, go to Hell.

"Tokyo Drifter" and "Branded To Kill" have been released with mind-bogglingly stunning Blu-Ray transfers on the Criterion Collection label. Both films are replete with fine added content, but ultimately, it's the movies that count. These are keepers and belong in any self-respecting cineaste's collection.

TOKYO STORY - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Ozu Masterpiece Gets Deluxe Criterion BD

One of the great, if not the greatest of all films ever made about family by one of cinema's true masters. Tokyo Story often feels like it stands alone in its indelible and consummately perfect portrait of lives well lived to lay a groundwork - for better or worse - for future generations to benefit and carry on from the love and sacrifices of those who came before and that life, in all its joy and sadness is a never-ending cycle of growth and regeneration through death.

(Top L to R) Setsuko Hara, Haruko Sugimura, Sō Yamamura, Kuniko Miyake
(Bottom L to R) Mitsuhiro Mori, Chieko Higashiyama, Chishū Ryū, Zen Murase 

As Noriko, Setsuko Hara, Japanese Cinema's greatest actress
and one of its biggest and most beloved stars.

Tokyo Story (1953) *****
Dir. Yasujirō Ozu
Scr. Kōgo Noda, Ozu
Starring: Chishū Ryū, Chieko Higashiyama, Setsuko Hara
Review By Greg Klymkiw

Is there anything sadder than children living their own lives at the expense of forgetting their parents, or worse, acknowledging their parents' "mere" existence as something which, annoyingly, impedes upon their own growth, their own lives? Is there, finally, anything more selfish? Probably not, but is it simply a terrible truth we all must accept as the normal course of life, love and death? Is forgetfulness an act of thoughtlessness or is it that thing we ultimately need to keep living?

These are questions that face us during and after seeing Yasujirō Ozu's perfect film, Tokyo Story. It is a film that instills considerable pain in us, yet it's not one we experience solely within the context of viewing the lives of others - a deep sorrow that we can toss off as one experienced by watching sad figures on a celluloid landscape belonging to fictional characters or, indeed, dramatic recreations of those we know exist, but that we can feel a complacent disconnect from by the act of passively witnessing their actions up on a screen. No, these are finally real people and in Ozu's masterful hands, they are, indeed, all of us.

The tale told here is as simple, and as such, as complex as life itself. Shūkichi and Tomi Hirayama (Ryū, Higashiyama) are the elderly parents of three sons (one of whom never returned from World War II), two daughters and two grandchildren. They have never left their rural enclave and in their waning years, they decide to visit Tokyo, the city they've never seen and the home of their married children.

Their presence, however, is merely tolerated and the greatest welcome and kindness they receive is from their widowed daughter-in-law Noriko (Hara). The elders' vacation is a bittersweet affair - some sightseeing, an uneventful stay in a spa, less than hospitable treatment from their children, a madcap night of drinking for Shūkichi and an old buddy, several warm visits with the daughter-in-law who still carries a torch for their deceased son and finally, a sad journey back to their home far away from the bustle of Tokyo - a sojourn that ends in an unexpected loss.

There aren't any beats in this narrative bereft of emotion. As seemingly straightforward as the events are, Ozu manages to touch us more deeply than any film seems to have the right to do. He achieves this by employing the same deft simplicity in his style as he and his screenwriting collaborator Kōgo Noda bring to bear upon their gorgeous script.

Ozu compliments the writing perfectly by training his camera steadily upon the life of the story, allowing the events to unfurl naturalistically within the frame of a fixed position - never moving, except for one shot, and another that feels like it's moving, but isn't - and rooted in low, yet eye-level perspectives that resemble the position taken by the characters as they sit upon their traditional Japanese tatami mats. Dialogue never seems to overlap, nor does Ozu cut away (at least not so we notice) from characters when they are speaking.

The pace is slow, but always riveting in spite, or rather, because of the stillness. In fact, what tends to move us in the deepest ways is how we watch, ever-so painstakingly and painfully as we see a family torn by time, space and finally the sort of differences inherent in all the characters and their sense of individuality. There are no shrill screaming matches or barbed verbal sparring - instead it is both time and silence that provides us with an ineffaceable sense of decay.

Life, as it unfolds, is death - one that creeps slowly, yet inexorably to where all our lives do. Is there disappointment experienced and expressed? Of course and it's conveyed with both delicacy and the kind of matter-of-factness that we all recognize as the way things are.

At one point, Shūkichi notes: "We can't expect too much from our children." On one hand, it feels like he's almost sighing this notion in defeat and disappointment, but the character is also someone who observes life pass almost like a wry Cheshire Cat. Rather than betraying inscrutability, he expresses a truth that seems less terrible and rather one of acceptance. This is finally what's so heartbreaking. He does not say this with resignation, but with the kind of truth that can only be gained by a lifetime of both observation and just plain living.

Shūkichi's consideration of the reality of what parents must or rather, must not expect from their children parallels the equally powerful moment in Tokyo Story when Kyōko (Kyōko Kagawa), the youngest (and unmarried) Hirayama daughter asks, "Isn't life disappointing?" and the wise, warm Noriko offers up a knowing smile and replies, so simply and so tellingly, "Yes, it is."

And damned if Noriko isn't right! Life is disappointing, but so it must be to allow for those momentary bursts of joy and elation to shine like the light sparkling upon us in the clear of a night sky. When youngest son Keizo (Shiro Osaka) says, "No one can serve his parents beyond the grave," he delivers yet another of the film's seemingly terrible truths, but in the end, it's actually not so terrible - our parents ultimately never want us to serve them beyond or even before the grave.

The glorious (and yes, somewhat melancholy) truth Ozu delivers is that it is our parents who selflessly serve us, and if we're doing the right thing, what we must all do to preserve the regeneration and perpetuation of life is to selflessly serve our children, but to never expect or demand that it be reciprocated.

This then, is love and Tokyo Story is nothing if it's not about that.

"Tokyo Story" as presented in the glistening new Criterion Collection dual format package is yet another home entertainment package to own and to cherish. In addition to the exquisite film itself, Criterion has pulled out all the stops and gone well above and beyond the call of duty and included the following supplements to our enjoyment and appreciation of this truly great film: a new digital 4K restoration and transfer to Blu-Ray, a commentary track by Ozu expert David Desser, "I Lived, But . . .", a feature length 1983 doc about Ozu’s life and career, "Talking with Ozu", a forty-minute 1993 "Tribute to Ozu" by Lindsay Anderson, Claire Denis, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Aki Kaurismäki, Stanley Kwan, Paul Schrader and Wim Wenders, a 1988 doc on actor Chishu Ryu, a trailer, an all-new English subtitle translation and a lovely booklet featuring an essay by David Bordwell. It doesn't get better than this, folks!

The bases are loaded with Three Samurai Warriors. Hollis Frampton is at bat. It's a GRAND SLAM for the Criterion Collection!!! Two Stellar Blu-Rays tie for a spot on Greg Klymkiw's 10 Best Blu-Ray/DVD Releases of 2012 - There'll be one new posting everyday until we hit the magic number. Today's Klymkiw Blu-Ray/DVD 2012 Accolade is THE SAMURAI TRILOGY and A HOLLIS FRAMPTON ODYSSEY from the Criterion Collection.

The Best Blu-Ray and DVD Releases
of 2012 as decreed by Greg Klymkiw

This was a stellar year for Blu-Ray and DVD collectors that it's been difficult to whittle my personal favourites down to a mere 10 releases, but I've more or less been able to do so. So hang on to your hats as I'll be presenting a personal favourite release from 2012 EACH and EVERY single day that will comprise my Top 10. At the end of all the daily postings, I'll combine the whole kit and kaboodle into one mega-post with all titles listed ALPHABETICALLY. My criteria for inclusion is/was thus: 1. The movie (or movies). How much do I love it/them? 2. How much do I love owning this product? 3. How many times will I re-watch it? 4. Is the overall physical packaging to my liking? 5. Do I like the picture and sound? There was one more item I used to assess the material. For me it was the last and LEAST area of consideration - one that probably surprise most, but frankly, has seldom been something I care that much about. For me, unless supplements really knock me on my butt, their inclusion is not that big of a deal. That said, I always go though supplements with a fine tooth comb and beyond any personal pleasure they deliver (or lack thereof), I do consider the educational value of such supplements for those studying film and/or those who might benefit from them in some fashion (film students or not). So, without further ado, here goes.

Greg Klymkiw's 10 Best Blu-Ray & DVD Releases of 2012 (which will be compiled in alphabetical order in one final mega-post). Today's Title (more to follow on subsequent days) is a tie between two magnificent releases that best exemplify why the Criterion Collection continues to be a leader in home entertainment product:

Criterion Collection: The Samurai Trilogy & A Hollis Frampton Odyssey

These 2 Great Criterion Collection Blu-Ray Releases Among the 10 Best Home Entertainment Releases of 2012

By Greg Klymkiw

The Criterion Collection is the Tony Lazzeri of home entertainment product. If the Criterion Collection was, in fact, a baseball player, they would, like Mr. Lazzeri, not only have been the first player to score two grand slams in the game's history (accomplished for the Yankees against the Athletics in 1936), but they'd be hitting grand slams every game, every season and well into infinity.

Let's face facts! Criterion rocks!

I've been a loyal Criterion Collection supporter since the laserdisc days. I still own my lovely collection of LP-sized movies that I secured during the first two-thirds of the 1990s.

Being an inveterate collector, I'd become quite disillusioned in the 80s when my favourite - nay, beloved home entertainment format Betamax was edged completely out of the marketplace by the dastardly and decidedly inferior VHS. I hung on to my Beta movies and my VHS buying was extremely limited.

Then I met Jim Murphy, the legendary Canadian film distributor, educator and mentor. Over a delicious buffet at the Golden Griddle (the first of hundreds), he waxed poetic for about four hours on the joys of laserdiscs and in particular, those discs issued by the Criterion Collection - remastered versions of significant films from all over the world and jam-packed with all manner of supplemental materials - including the very new (at the time) notion of directors' commentaries on separate tracks of sound.

Keep in mind, I was a ridiculous collector of books, comics, vinyl, cds, movies and all manner of tchokes. Collecting (or accumulating) is an addiction and every addict needs an enabler. Jim was my enabler. In fairness, we became one another's enablers - going once or twice a week to the now-defunct Sam the Record Man on Yonge Street in Toronto for what we referred to as "a laser run". This we did for many years and once DVD took over, we continued the same pilgrimages - not JUST to Sam's anymore (they used to have the largest and best selection of laserdiscs), but now, stores purveying all manner of movies on this "new" digital format were popping up all over the place.

In 2007, Jim passed away. He left the Earth well before he should have and the void this created all across the country was (and still is, frankly) incalculable. However, Jim left behind a tremendous legacy for filmmaking in Canada - providing tutelage and mentorship through the National Screen Institute, but also supporting the financing and distribution of many important Canadian films - most notably the ultra-cool cult werewolf picture Ginger Snaps. On a personal level, though, his loss felt especially and almost egregiously unfair to so many of his closest friends.

Jim was a generous man in his life and this continued after he passed on. Jim's last will and testament bequeathed - to his closest group of movie-mad collector pals - his enormous collection of vinyl, books, cda, tchochkas and . . . movies. In typical Jim Murphy fashion, his will specified that we were to split this treasure trove "in a manner of [our] own devising."

Us laddies agreed upon a most gentlemanly manner to do so. We gathered in Jim's apartment and each took a turn selecting one movie of our choosing. Sometimes, in true collector fashion this involved bartering. And all through this strange day, it gave us pause to spend much time reminiscing about our dear departed friend.

And, of course, amongst the DVDs, the first to be snapped up were the Criterion Collection.

Then it came to the laserdiscs. Hundreds upon hundreds of them. Almost every Criterion Collection laserdisc known to man sat there. This was long after laserdiscs were dead and buried. To everyone in that room, save for me, laserdiscs were six feet under. The gentlemen looked at me with knowing grins. I looked to the Heavens - a habit of my Catholic upbringing - and said, "Jim! You fucker! You had to die for me to finally have a bigger laserdisc and movie collection than you." With the generous assistance of all these strapping fellows, my entire van - every inch except where I sat to drive - was full of laserdiscs.

As I drove home with box-loads of Jim's movies, I remember very distinctly looking over to the passenger seat where Jim sat - possibly more times than anyone else on this planet and that would include, up to that point, my wife and daughter. In his hallowed co-pilot spot were boxes. Nope. These were no substitute.

That said, whenever I watch one of "Jim's" titles, it's like he's not really gone. Whatever spirit exploding from the movie itself is, I like to think, the same one that touched him the way it touches me. And since so many of our conversations revolved around Criterion titles, those are the ones that bring me closest to him.

Movies are pretty much almost everything to me and while I get those strange feelings of spiritual reunification with my old pal, they're somehow strongest when I'm watching the laserdiscs. It was Jim who introduced me to the Samurai Trilogy. On Criterion laserdiscs. I still have them, even though I now own the Blu-Rays.

Today, I occasionally watch many of the Criterion laserdiscs since a number of their titles have yet to find their way onto DVD and Blu-Ray. It's a mystery to me why James Whale's stunning version of Show Boat lives only on extremely rare laserdiscs. Others are M.I.A, because of contentious material on the commentary tracks. The first three James Bond pictures issued in sumptuous editions will never again be available after EON Pictures' Cubby Broccoli demanded all unsold Criterion discs be withdrawn (for reasons never publicly stated, but if you ever hear the tracks, they are a far cry from the often polite, controversy-free puffery on many contemporary commentaries).

And recently, in light of all the hoopla surrounding Skyfall, I took the time to cleanse my palate of that overrated abomination and watch all three Criterion Bond discs WITH the illicit commentaries. It was as if Jim and I were chuckling together over the irascible, witty and often curmudgeonly old-school tidbits. He'd regale me on endless drives to movie stores, flea markets and other purveyors of home entertainment product, with all his favourite moments from those Bond commentaries with a delightful regularity that bordered on the fanatical. And now I could hear them myself. They were Jim's copies. And I could listen to the commentaries and occasionally be reminded of Jim's spirited paraphrasing of their contents.

If truth be told, there's a perverse part of me that prefers laserdisc to DVD and/or Blu-Ray. It's similar to why I still prefer films projected on actual celluloid rather than by digital means. The Criterion laserdiscs were, of course, masterful - the best of the lot, the best of the best. My dear friend, director Peter Lynch, bestowed upon me early Criterion laserdisc templates of Citizen Kane and King Kong which he had received when he curated an early festival devoted to digital production. They still provide me with lovely alternative modes of viewing.

Of course, you're probably wondering why I'm unloading my personal history and deep love for Criterion laserdiscs when I'm supposed to be championing Criterion's astounding Blu-Ray releases for 2012. The answer is quite simple - Criterion led the way. End of story. They were the first company to market specifically to die-hard collectors - connoisseurs, if you will. Laserdiscs were the first ultimate collectors' sell-through item. And the technology of laserdisc was one that purists could really embrace. For me, and yes I'm one of those analog-is-better-than-digital nuts, it all comes down to the warmth of the picture and with laserdisc, it was the only analogue system of home entertainment that yielded a picture quality closer to film than any other format (save perhaps for early analogue Betamax). Where Criterion really excelled here was in their exquisitely mastered and produced laserdiscs on the high quality CAV format. The frame accuracy for detailed study of the films (especially on the ins and outs of specific cuts) remains unparalleled. To this day, when I need to hunker down and analyze cuts, I haul out my CAV Criterion laserdiscs of Raging Bull, Taxi Driver and The Red Shoes. Nothing does a better job.

We are, however, in a digital age that is here to stay and rather than remain a complete curmudgeonly naysayer, I have embraced both DVD and Blu-Ray and continue to do so. The best companies (like Criterion and a handful of smaller independents like Milestone, Kino, Zeitgeist and Olive) maintain extremely high standards when restoring and/or remastering films to digital formats. Criterion, above all, was not only the first and best, they've maintained that position. If, God forbid, all home entertainment goes in the direction of on-demand and streaming, I suspect the last man standing to be the likes of Criterion. Their avid followers will accept no less than the ability to hold the precious film in their hands.

And in 2012, I held plenty of great movies in my hands - most of which came from Criterion - so many, in fact that I was initially flummoxed as to which of their pictures would find their way onto  a 10-Best list devoted to home entertainment. Some wonderful Criterion releases this year included such gems as Heaven's Gate, Umberto D, Les visiteurs du soir, Quadrophenia, Rosemary's Baby. Rosetta, La Promesse, Summer Interlude, The Gold Rush, ¡ALAMBRISTA!, Harold and Maude and La Haine.

Well, if truth be told, they all deserve to be on such a list, but for my money, the pinnacle of Criterion's excellence was in the astounding box set of Hiroshi Inagaki's Samurai Trilogy and the utterly, insanely and fascinating box of Hollis Frampton's brilliant experimental films.

The Samurai Trilogy dir. Hiroshi Inagaki *****

Samurai I: Musashi Miyato won an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film and like its two sequels, the movie stands alone as great motion picture entertainment. When watched one after the other, these three classically structured and beautifully directed films comprise a genuinely sprawling epic, often referred to as Japan's Gone With The Wind.

Musashi Miyato is a tale of two friends who begin together on the same path, go to war, but eventually take separate forks in the road of life which results in a series of surprises in their respective love lives - none which either of them would have ever seen coming. The title character (Toshiro Mifune) begins a journey towards becoming a samurai warrior. His somewhat weaker-willed pal Matahachi, abandons his wife-to-be and takes up with a manipulative dragon lady. The picture is bursting at the seams with first-rate melodrama, action scenes of unparalleled excitement and a deeply-felt rendering of a time, place and tradition now gone with the wind.

Samurai I is a tough act to follow, but Samurai II: Duel at Ichijoji Temple delivers a thousand-fold. When we last left Musachi, he'd become quite a skilled warrior and after some womanly dalliances, he declared his love to one very special lady, but in spite of this pulling at his heart strings, he decided to bugger off in search of his samurai mojo. Samurai II features several spectacular duels, more romance, our hero's first meeting with the man who becomes his ultimate nemesis and, if this isn't enough for you, he squares off against 80 - count 'em - 80 warriors. Will he survive? Well, as this is a trilogy, we certainly do hope so.

Samurai III: Duel at Ganryu Island is, without question, a corker of a conclusion to the stunning Samurai Trilogy. Our hero accepts the love of a good woman, settles down to a peaceful agrarian life, but just as he thinks he's out, they pull him back in again. He not only assists a group of helpless villagers to battle a gangster warlord, but he agrees to one more duel with the young man who has been itching to fight him for many years and might be the only swordsman skilled enough to take down the incomparable Musashi Miyamoto - Samurai of the highest order.

It's an astounding box. The pictures have been digitally restored in eye-popping hi-def and happily, the sound is presented in wonderful uncompressed mono. In addition to the array of essays there's an especially interesting newly produced segment on the real Musashi Miyamoto.

A Hollis Frampton Odyssey dir. Hollis Frampton *****

The legendary experimental American filmmaker is given a magnificent platform via the Criterion Collection to showcase the art he created during his tragically short life. Hollis Frampton, subject of this insanely exhaustive Criterion Blu-Ray was very much a structuralist. Identified as such by P. Adams Sitney, the foremost academic scholar on experimental cinema, Frampton's films would be, according to Sitney, "predetermined and simplified" and that this overall, almost carved-in-stone minimalist structure was what leapt from the formative pre-shooting stage to the film itself.

For me, experimental movies are just plain cool. Or at least they can be. Like any genre, there's good, bad, in-between and yes, great. Traditionally, experimental film has no real concern with narrative and yet, non-narrative experimentation - at least some of the best work - can be as structured as a narrative film that adheres to the Syd Field or Robert McKee approaches to visual storytelling.

A Hollis Frampton Odyssey is, without question, one of the seminal achievements in what could be seen as the ART of home entertainment creation, production and distribution. Assembling, restoring and providing a wealth of supplemental materials focusing upon this visionary and highly influential artist has been rendered with such loving care that Criterion continues to maintain their well-deserved reputation of going above and beyond the call of duty in their service to preserving the art of cinema (rivalled only by that of Milestone Film and Video whose recent commitment to the work of Lionel Rogosin and their ongoing restoration of silent cinema also places them in this pantheon).

The Criterion disc places 24 of Frampton's films in three sections comprising "Early Works" (including his groundbreaking feature film Zorns Lemma), films from his Hapax Legomena cycle and several key works from the stunning, though sadly unfinished Magellan cycle.

Watching the disc from beginning to end speaks volumes of the care taken by the Criterion team to curate the films. The cumulative effect of screening the early short works prior to watching the feature length Zorns Lemma ultimately yields the riches inherent in the said early titles, but also delivers a perfect platform to succumb to the sheer, unadulterated joy to be found in Frampton's feature.

Experimental cinema - especially in this package of Hollis Frampton's works - should always first be viewed experientially. Just sitting back and letting "IT" happen to you is not only pleasurable, but at times becomes impossible to do and you find yourself mysteriously and surprisingly engaged in a form of dialogue with the film. Frampton not only brilliantly EXPLORES the relationship between film and audience, but creates a relationship in and of itself.

Hollis Frampton died at the age of 48 from cancer. He was plucked from us far too early. The Magellan films, once complete, would have provided an epic work based upon the calendrical cycle and as such, would have delivered one movie for every day of the year.

Seriously, if this isn't cool, nothing is.

A Hollis Frampton Odyssey is available on Blu-Ray and DVD via the Criterion Collection. The restoration and picture transfers are stunning and happily, the sound is presented in uncompressed mono - the way it should be experienced. The extra features - many of which include interviews, footage and "commentary" from Frampton himself - are a treasure trove of insight into the artist and his extraordinary work. If you've never seen Frampton's work, or haven't for a long time, I highly suggest watching all the films first - from beginning to end before you dive into any of them extras. Let your senses and intellect mingle with his art. Get to know the artist through his work first - THEN get to know him with the terrific additional features. Most importantly, those who care deeply about film should NOT rent this. BUY IT!!!

THE SAMURAI TRILOGY Samurai III: Duel at Ganryu Island - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Criterion Collection

Samurai III: Duel at Ganryu Island is, without question, a corker of a conclusion to this stunning Samurai Trilogy.  Our hero accepts the love of a good woman, settles down to a peaceful agrarian life, but just as he thinks he's out, they pull him back in again. He not only assists a group of helpless villagers to battle a gangster warlord, but he agrees to one more duel with the young man who has been itching to fight him for many years and might be the only swordsman skilled enough to take down the incomparable Musashi Miyamoto - Samurai of the highest order.

Samurai III: Duel at Ganryu Island (1956) *****
dir. Hiroshi Inagaki
Starring: Toshiro Mifune, Koji Tsuruta

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Honour and chivalry of the highest order permeate this stunning final chapter in Hiroshi Inagaki's Samurai Trilogy. It is the weight of these noble characteristics that make this the most emotional, romantic and profoundly moving film in the entire series.

It is ultimately a tale of how one extraordinary individual (Musashi Miyamoto, of course) achieves and maintains inner peace in a profession that calls for him to kill.

It's not as nutty as it sounds.

In William Saroyan's Pulitzer-Prize-winning play The Time of Your Life from 1939, the great Armenian-American writer opens his groundbreaking work with a prayer-like manifesto which insists, mantra-like that all of us in our lives must strive to find goodness everywhere, to place more value in the spiritual than the material, to encourage virtue in every heart, to ignore the obvious, to be the inferior of no other and yet, to also be the superior of no other. And though Saroyan ultimately asks us to not add to the world's misery and sorrow, but to rejoice in its infinite wonder and mystery, he includes the following words of wisdom:

"Remember that every man is a variation of yourself. No man's guilt is not yours, nor is any man's innocence a thing apart. Despise evil and ungodliness, but not men of ungodliness or evil. These, understand. Have no shame in being kindly and gentle but if the time comes in the time of your life to kill, kill and have no regret."

These words were written on the precipice of World War II - when the world shuddered at the rise to power of Adolph Hitler and the madness sweeping Europe, Asia and the rest of the world. Saroyan, like many writers before and after him, realized that war and violent conflict are a natural element of human existence and that if it was necessary to take a life in the preservation of goodness, then so be it. "Necessary" is a key word here and though there is a great degree of sadness attributable to the taking of a life, Samurai III is a film insists that if a life must be taken, it should never come easily, never BE easy and should NEVER be forgotten.

We, the audience, must not forget the fact that the Samurai Trilogy, though set in the seventeenth century and as true to the period as any cinematic rendering could be, is a film born out of the ashes of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, in an occupied country that was decimated by a force WITHOUT honour. The post-war period of Japan rendered these three great films set in an earlier century and yet, are films that speak so loudly and profoundly on notions of war, peace and honour in ways that are universal.

The sentiments attached to the gravity of taking a life will, by the end of this extraordinary film and trilogy, infuse you with waves of emotion and leave you with considerable thought on matters of life, love and war. Like all great works, its virtues are not ephemeral, but eternal. So many of Japan's historians, playwrights, poets, novelists and filmmakers looked to the heroic exploits of Musashi Miyamoto and saw in him the same struggle that has plagued mankind from its beginnings and does so to this day.

The narrative flow of Samurai III is devoted to the pursuit of peace, but a peace that can only be attained when one has mastered the art of killing and, in so doing, has experienced what it is to personally snuff out a life - to REALLY know and understand the gravity of such an action. In order for Musashi to achieve and understand this pure state of harmonic conciliation is to find love, which he does. However, he must ACCEPT this love - which he also does. For him to know love and to bring it so deeply into his heart is what informs his need to maintain peace, but also informs his deep understanding of what it means to kill.

Once he accepts the love of Otsu, the good woman spurned in the first film by her betrothed and throughout the trilogy by Musashi himself, he is able to settle down and live a peaceful agrarian life - not just with Otsu, but with the young orphan boy who looks to him as both mentor and father.

Musashi has numerous opportunities to kill, but instead, he turns the other cheek and offers forgiveness, but when a group of helpless villagers are besieged by a ruthless gangster warlord - the time comes in the time of Musashi's life to kill and have no regret.

Saddest of all is that Sasaki is the one young man who is Musashi's equal on so many levels, a young man who could have been his son or his best friend or his brother. They both know and respect the fact that they are inextricably linked to fight to the death so that they may do each other the greatest honour. The duel is inevitable. Sasaki might be the only swordsman skilled enough to take down the incomparable Musashi Miyamoto and if he does, he will have taken down a true Samurai of the highest order. And when the final death blow comes, its aftermath is genuinely one of the most profoundly moving sequences in all of cinema.

Samurai III is a great film within a great trilogy. Astoundingly, Inagaki created a hugely popular work, but what's especially magnificent is just how each part of the trilogy can stand separately and yet how together they form an even more enriching whole.

Inagaki is a great classical director. His eye is always on nailing the salient dramatic beats, but doing so with grace and an almost John-Ford-like painterly artistry. The choreography of the duels and battle scenes are balanced perfectly with the superb work Inagaki does with the dramatic aspects of the tale. His elegant eye sits back with incomparably sumptuous compositions and the fights take place with a balletic quality. Some have suggested that the lack of sound when metal connects with flesh is attributable mostly to the techniques and fashions of sound design when the film was made. I think this is nonsense. One of the aspects of every violent death in the film is that when a death blow finally comes, it is not only deadly, but silent.

It's chilling and ultimately far more powerful that hearing the rending of flesh.

It's utterly silent.

Just like a Samurai's heart when it ceases to beat.

"Samurai III: Duel at Ganryu Island" is part three of the glorious Criterion Collection set of "Samurai Trilogy" Blu-rays and DVDs. The pictures have been digitally restored in eye-popping hi-def and happily, the sound is presented in wonderful uncompressed mono. In addition to the array of essays there's an especially interesting newly produced segment on the real Musashi Miyamoto."

THE SAMURAI TRILOGY Samurai II: Duel at Ichijoji Temple - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Criterion Collection

Samurai I is a tough act to follow, but Samurai II: Duel at Ichijoji Temple delivers a thousand-fold.  When we last left Musachi Miyamoto, he'd become quite a skilled warrior and after some womanly dalliances, he declared his love to one very special lady, but in spite of this pulling at his heart strings, he decided to bugger off in search of his samurai mojo. This instalment features several spectacular duels, more romance, the return of Matahachi, our hero first meeting his ultimate nemesis and, if this isn't enough for you, he squares off against 80 - count 'em - 80 warriors. Will he survive? Well, as this is a trilogy, we certainly do hope so.

Samurai II: Duel at Ichijoji Temple (1955) *****

dir. Hiroshi Inagaki

Starring: Toshiro Mifune, Koji Tsuruta, Kaoru Yachigusa, Mariko Okada, Michiyo Kogure, Mitsuko Mito, Akihiko Hirata, Kenjin Iida Eijiro Tono

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Planned feature film trilogies tend to suffer most from sagging middles with sporadic touches so inspired that they still compel viewers to eagerly anticipate the final instalment (if they're good, that is - unlike say, a certain overrated Chriostopher Nolan trilogy). The most recent and salient example of the old faithful narrative sinkhole effect is the theatrical cut of Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers from 2002 (though not the extended home video version which proves that "longer" can actually quicken the pace of something).

The first part of Jackson's film trilogy of Tolkien's fantastical tall tale has the bonus of the origin story of the Ring's "Fellowship", whereas narratively, much time is spent in " The Two Towers with a lot of "to and fro" journeying that is only enlivened by a few astounding set-pieces. (And no, The Godfather Part II doesn't count as a middle because it really wasn't planned that way hence the genius of it and the disappointment generated by woeful, unnecessary Godfather III.)

Let us for a moment imagine Samurai I and III as beautiful thick-cut slices of Bagel World Caraway Seeded Rye Bread and Samurai II: Duel at Ichijoji Temple as nothing less than mouth-wateringly delectable Goldin's Montreal Smoked Meat - bursting with zesty peppercorn and pickling salt flavour and the scrumptious ooze of generously marbled beef fat (that you can get directly from the Goldin Boys in Toronto or dine exclusively upon at Free Times Cafe). While ace Japanese director Hiroshi Inagaki might have never imagined his masterpiece of cinema favourably likened to a Montreal Smoked Meat sandwich, I suspect that if he'd ever tasted one, he'd wholeheartedly agree. This movie is a corker of a samurai epic and still has the punch to thrill and delight audiences the world over.

Our tale begins with one of the best samurai duels in screen history (many of the others in this category are sprinkled throughout Inagaki's trilogy) Misashi (Toshiro Mifune) takes on the burly Baiken (Eijiro Tono), who in spite of his girth moves like Baryshnikov and uses a double weapon approach - wielding a deadly ball and chain (the ball, of course has sharp metal spikes) in one hand and a humungous scythe-like weapon in the other. Jitaro (Kenjin Iida), a little orphan boy looking for a mentor is ordered away by Misashi, but he stays to observe the final death thrust of the match, which, as per usual, ends with Misashi's victory.

Alas, this is not enough to vault our hero into the venerable tradition of the samurai. An old monk chastises him for being proficient, but lacking all the inner virtues a samurai needs. Dejectedly, Misashi continues on the road to enlightenment, now accompanied by the unwanted companion, Jitaro.

In Kyoto, the narrative spins itself out like the gorgeously woven web it is. Three- count'em - THREE gorgeous babes are vying for Musashi's love. His old friend Matahachi (Rentaro Mikuni) is now a sad-sack drunk married to the conniver he took off with in the first film. The conniver is trying to pimp her Musashi-obsessed daughter to the local samurai Master (who eventually rapes her anyway). Musashi, sets his sights on a duel with Seijuro (Akihiko Hirata) the aforementioned rapist and Master of Kyoto's leading Samurai school.


The school's administrative heads and pupils all act as buffers twixt their Master and Musashi. This is fine. It allows us the fortune of watching more duels. At one point even Seijuro's brother goes up against Musashi and is, of course, defeated.

Now Seijuro is shamed into fighting Musashi and demands no further interventions be made on his behalf. He asks the seemingly loyal, young swordsman Sasaki(Koji Tsuruta) to set the duel up. Sasaki, however, is a genuinely first-rate swordsman and he longs to duel Musashi himself. Even still, when Musashi is yet AGAIN attacked by Seijuro's men, Sasaki intervenes and the two warriors work together as a team to cut down the would-be assassins.

The plot thickens further with more duels, more betrayals and more romantic entanglements than you can shake a stick at - all building to a semi-climactic duel between Musashi and 80 men and eventually with Seijuro himself. Sasaki waits in the wings, studying and admiring Mishashi's skill. He knows they too will fight someday.

That someday awaits us in Samurai III: Duel at Ganryu Island. If Samurai I is the top slice of Bagel World Caraway Rye, swathed in delicious French's mustard, then Samurai III is the bottom slice of rye - the one that has soaked up all the natural, flavourful juices from the Goldin's Montreal Smoked Meat stuffing the middle of Samurai II.

"Samurai II: Duel at Ichijoji Temple" is part two of the glorious Criterion Collection set of Blu-rays and DVDs. The pictures have been digitally restored in eye-popping hi-def and happily, the sound is presented in wonderful uncompressed mono. In addition to the array of essays there's an especially interesting newly produced segment on the real Musashi Miyamoto."

THE SAMURAI TRILOGY Samurai I: Musashi Miyamoto Reviewed By Greg Klymkiw Criterion Collection Blu-Ray Box

Samurai I: Musashi Miyamoto is an Oscar-winning Samurai action epic by Hiroshi Inagaki that spawned two more films and such international success that it's oft been referred to as the Japanese Gone With The Wind.  

Samurai I: Musashi Miyamoto (1954) *****
dir. Hiroshi Inagaki
Starring: Toshiro Mifune, Rentaro Mikuni, Kaoru Yachigusa, Mariko Okada, Mitsuko Mito, Kuroemon Onoe

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Young men dream of going to war. I know I did. Then I read Stephen Crane's "The Red Badge of Courage" and Erich Maria Remarque's "All Quiet on the Western Front" and put that thought to rest mighty quick (in spite of my Sands of Iwo Jima John Wayne fetish).

Alas, the same cannot be said for young men living deep in the sleepy provinces of seventeenth-century Japan - especially not the devil-may-care orphan Takezo (Toshiro Mifune) who is perched up in a tree with his equally restless, though somewhat more rooted pal Matahachi (Rentaro Mikuni). They both gaze with equal dreams of glory upon their village and the picturesque countryside as a huge army assembles to go into battle.

Nothing is ultimately stopping the brash, Takezo, but Matahachi has ties that indeed bind him with his betrothal to the most desirable catch in their village - the kind, sexy and radiantly beautiful Otsu (Kaoru Yachigusa). Though he admits a ready willingness to join his lusty pal on the battlefield, it's Takezo who reminds his chum, with a mixture of benevolence and braggadocious bravado, that some men have commitments that must keep them behind. This, of course, inspires Matahachi to do the unthinkable and abandon all that is sacred. Takezo does what he was born to do, but Matahachi let's macho pride rule his decisions and a terrible price will eventually be paid for this.

So then begins Musashi Miyamoto, a tale of two friends who begin together on the same path, but eventually take separate forks in the road of life which results in a series of surprises in their respective love lives - none which either of them would have ever seen coming.

Mostly, though, the bulk of this stirring adventure charts the growth of the young, headstrong Takezo who bravely venerates himself on the fields of battle and develops into an extremely proficient, fame-hungry killer. Changing his identity to that of the title moniker Musashi Miyamoto, his modus operandi is to live as a masterless ronin warrior and indeed, to become respected as a full and true Samurai.

The road to the latter will prove more difficult - genuine Samurai must be imbued with the more noble qualities of honour and compassion - something our hero is decidedly bereft of.

Between battle scenes, duels, chases, narrow escapes and general derring-do, the picture is entertainingly peppered with several affairs of the heart involving three different babes - one virtuous, one not-so virtuous and another just plain villainous.

Musashi Miyato won an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film and like its two sequels, the movie stands alone as great motion picture entertainment. When watched one after the other, these three classically structured and beautifully directed films comprise a genuinely sprawling epic. Musashi Miyato is bursting at the seams with first-rate melodrama, action scenes of unparalleled excitement and a deeply-felt rendering of a time, place and tradition now gone with the wind.


The proceedings are so passionately recreated by the elegant Inagaki that it's no surprise that this film and the entire Samurai Trilogy is oft-referred to as a Japanese Gone With The Wind. In terms of its scope, popularity, narrative drive and stratospheric levels of production value, the description is definitely on the mark.

"Musashi Miyamoto" is the first part of the glorious Criterion Collection set of Blu-rays and DVDs. The pictures have been digitally restored in eye-popping hi-def and happily, the sound is presented in wonderful uncompressed mono. In addition to the array of essays there's an especially interesting newly produced segment on the real Musashi Miyamoto."