Filipp Yankovsky's The Sword Bearer (2006)

Artyom Tkachenko

opening w/two gents looking off of bridge with section of side missing, divers, boaters and dragging the river--cops? Military? no police

logging truck and wood cut in two scared nervous driver who must have picked up guy who has disappeared. pretty good opening with foreshadowing etx Filipp Yankovsky

cut to sailing vessel on the sea w/in young man wrapping white bandages around palmsflashback to children and dead older man with cut open stomach, old man was stabbed flashback of young boy lying in bed with mother and talking about other children being scared of himshot of boy and palms while sleeping

present day and man is ringing doorbell young man Sasha goes to see mother not there

port community hometown, possibly, sasha goes and sees a girl and gets beat up by a couple of dudes and they drive away--ice cold rich dudes nice threads mercedes

he goes and kicks the shit, maybe killing, the two dudes much to the girl's horror, sasha splits

minimal dialogue in beginning didnt kill the guy girl is a doctor and identifies Sasha as assailant

Klim Aleksey Gorbunov dude and blonde older woman Bella Tatyana Lyutaeva want to find him son was beat up before cops find him really effed him up bad

sashas moms doesnt say anthing to anybody and writes a note and is crying and gets some money

sasha gets off ferry in the rain a guy identifies sasha another guy offers to sell sasha a dagger and sasha beats him up and takes dagger--dagger might be poor translation--sasha rides bus and has moms note no translation

flashback drunk man beating sashas moms and sashas stabs him? unknown. mom flips. must be the reason she cant have sasha around gets off bus in the middle of nowhere the guy who identified him follows hims and tells klim

dude cooking a pot of stew or something and sasha arrives at dudes house beautiful yellow house old dude is very happy to see sasha but sasha kills him now whats up with that-- film is setting up this character as quite violent and mysterious old dude acted as if he knew him sasha gets rid of body his biological father flashback shows sasha and moms dumping body in river

flashback sashas moms gets in trouble in school again for messing things up and fighting

kid even tries to cut off his hands on a railway track great scene and trolley not train stops before it can happen

sashas still at his biological dads house but splits and starts to hitchhike and gets picked up by Klim who immediately hits hims and knocks him out tie him up and calls bella gets out of ropes sasha knocks guy out and leaves cops find dads corpse at house on the trail now whats up with that

sasha at post office mailing package first thirty minutes over moms gets sashas package lady from dads house identifies sasha to police by a sketch his package to moms cant read note someintg important musta told her that he killed pops and sent her the money he found at dads house

great scene of sasha lying on roof--sasha seen cutting his own hand off with axebellas pissed at klim that sasha got away

sasha either tried and effed up or didnt cut hand off

meets beautiful woman in the hall way of apartment house she tells him to het out of hallthe two immediately start fucking

both of them are getting along pretty well loks like they've both fallen hard go to freaky deaky party ladys artistic type some guy hits on her and shaha gets mad jealous and beings talking to him whats up with that dont know whats up
virtually no dialogue thats a plus forty five minutes in

some dude shows up blonde dude and everyone is cool so far dudes old lover and super pissed and gets gun sasha takes care of him and the two tie him up must be dudes apartment they take his car and get away

blonde dude gets masssive guy to free him and sasha and chick start fucking in car

sasha goes and gets her a drink and blonde dude and thug show up to fuck up girl

sasha throws blonde dude up in the air and violently bangs his head against windsheild

and kills him with sword in his hand chick freaks out a little but killed thug too sasha looks as if he is in pain when he puts sword back in hand

first real reveal of sword in hand halfway thru film chick faints


cops find dead dude still on the trail of sasha

chick wakes up and is freaking out about sashas superhuman abiliites

police know chick and come toher house and the two flee police and get on the road out to the coutnry

katya Chulpan Khamatova reveals her name only halfway thru in fact thats when they make introductions first real substantive dilagoue happens then

klim still on the trail

priest gave couple a ride and sasha confesses but not really confesses he just opens up that he cannot endanger katya becuase she is with him on the road klim shoots the car off the road but another car comes by to help before klim can kill them

sashas in jail cops got him and are interrogating him specifically about what weapon that he used to kill the blonde dude

klim visits a convict in jail and tells the guy to beat up sasha but not kill him in prision
sasha kills everyone in his cellkatya is in hospital so is priest
cops interrogate about cell killings but sasha evades questions bloody scenes shown in cut scenes of aftermath
katya is in a mental institution and looks as if shes crazy
sasha holds up his hand to reveal what he stabbed his cell mates with fairly powerful scenethis movie is like a poem some very beautiful music and cinematography
sasha is taken in truck out to the middle of remote field and when it stops blood pours out of it really no graphic violence is shown but sasha killed the truck folks and is able to escape

film is a love story and a tragedy

Kenta Fukasaku's X-Cross (2007)

The first point of comparison often for Cinema's children is with their Cinematic parent. Take, for example, the son of Mario Bava, Lamberto Bava. For well over a decade, I've seen comments on message boards, in blog entries, and during conversations with other film fans that Lamberto ain't Mario and nowhere close. While Mario Bava obviously influenced his son, he also influenced a whole slew of Italian film makers, including Dario Argento, but seemingly, Lamberto gets closely compared to his old man, more for his blood ties than his bloody movies. I find this comparison exceedingly unfair. Whether Lamberto Bava's films are good or bad, I believe criticism should be primarily leveled at the quality of his work. For what it's worth, I quite enjoy the overwhelming majority of Lamberto Bava's films, and to his credit, he made a highly successful transition from the dwindling Italian film industry in the 80s into Italian television of the 90s. Unlike some of his contemporaries, Lamberto Bava can say that he is still working.

On the flip side, there are some Cinematic children who receive no comparison at all with their Cinematic parents, perhaps because of their obscurity. Take, for example, Juan Bunuel, son of Luis, who helmed the effective and pre-Poltergeist (1982) creepy paranormal thriller, Expulsion of the Devil (1973) and numerous other works, mostly television. The most notable Cinematic child alluding comparison is the daughter of Francis Ford Coppola, Sofia Coppola. While her father's work is appropriately revered, Sofia has, in her own way, become one of the finest film makers of her generation. Highly influenced by Wong Kar-wai, Sofia Coppola has made three excellent films: The Virgin Suicides (1999), Lost in Translation (2003) (for which her screenplay garnered the Academy Award), and her best film to date, Marie Antoinette (2006). Sofia Coppola has earned more hisses for her performance in the pivotal role of Michael Corelone's daughter in her father's Godfather III (1990). Sofia can take comfort, however, in the fact that she didn't direct it.

Soapbox ranting aside, I am of the complete belief that each artist should be judged against his/her own work and not by the work of of his/her parent. A comparison based solely on genetics and biology, at least to me, is quite irrational and ridiculous. Because of this strongly held belief, I went against my old prejudice and viewed a recent Japanese film by Kenta Fukasaku, X-Cross (2007). Kinji Fukasaku delivered at the dawn of the new millennium, capping off a brilliant career, delivering some of the best Japanese yakuza films this world has ever seen in the 70s, his perverse, stylish, and controversial Battle Royale (2000). In a lot of ways, Battle Royale is a perfect film: both culturally relevant in its contemporary time, beyond Japan, and also amazingly nuts and crazy to be enjoyable and horrifying to the curious genre fan. I hold the film in high regard and its novel by Koushun Takami. Kinji Fukasaku's son, Kenta Fukasaku, is credited with the excellent screenplay. The elder Fukasaku would slough off his mortal coil before finishing Battle Royale II (2003) with Kenta sharing a co-directorial credit and surviving with the final film. Battle Royale II is a phenomenally awful film and a complete disaster. Perhaps unfairly, I believed the elder Fukasaku's contribution could not be the fault of the film, so the majority of the disdain I lumped upon the younger director. I did little research on the film's production and do not know where fault lies in the sequel. I unfairly wrote off Kenta as no Kinji and quickly put Battle Royale II out of my mind and included a small note to ignore any future subsequent film from Kenta Fukasaku. I have since changed my opinion towards Cinematic children and decided when the recent opportunity presented itself to view Kenta Fukasaku's X-Cross. X-Cross is about two women, Shiyori and Aiko, who are taking a trip to a secluded village to bathe in its hot springs. Shiyori needs a break, since she's healing with her recent break up with her boyfriend. Aiko doesn't have a boyfriend nor does she believe in them. Aiko lives life without getting close to anyone, and Shiyori is unsure even of their own friendship. "Am I a 'sort of' friend?" she asks. Before Aiko can even give Shiyori an evasive answer, Shiyori nearly hits a figure in the road. Swerving and missing, the pair get out of the vehicle to encounter a tall lady in a dark overcoat with an eye-patch, who says "snip, snip" with a finger gesture like scissors. Quickly assuming that she's okay and freaking out, the two head to the village and are escorted by a sick-looking, hobbling man. He takes them to the springs. While the two are bathing, Shiyori and Aiko have a small misunderstanding. The film then splits the two characters' storylines: Shiyori has a horrific encounter with the villagers, while the mysterious, one-eyed lady confronts Aiko. Upon returning from her bath, Shiyori finds a white cell phone ringing in her closet at her hotel room. She answers it and a frantic male voice tells her to leave immediately. "They're coming and they're going to cut off your leg." The male caller believes Shiyori is his sister, but Shiyori corrects him. There's no sister, just her phone. The male caller reveals that he's a professor at a university who studies local folklore. The town is full of crazies: a long time ago, there was a shortage of women in the village. In order to keep the females around, the villagers decided to cut off the left leg of each woman. This tradition has survived into present day. Shiyori flips and the lights go out and a bunch of faces can be seen through her window.Aiko has an encounter in the hotel's public bathroom. The eye-patched woman from earlier confronts her, donning an outfit which is a cross between a traditional French Maid's uniform and a China doll. She has two pairs of large scissors in her hand. Why is she attacking Aiko? Apparently, Aiko stole her boyfriend away with a one-night stand. Aiko cannot even remember the guy. Aiko escapes the public bathroom only to get caught in a portable one, and Aiko and the Scissor Lady have a battle: Aiko with a chainsaw and the Scissor Lady with a massive pair of scissors, far larger than any garden shears. X-Cross concludes with the two reuniting, and Shiyori's boyfriend and the mysterious caller make an appearance. The final act is very reminiscent of Robin Hardy's The Wicker Man (1973). I have a very high tolerance for ineptitude combined with a gushing love for genre cinema, so I would certainly say that I am the ideal audience for X-Cross. During the first viewing, I enjoyed the suspense and mystery of Shiyori's tale with its twists and turns, although predictable. Shiyori's mistrust of Aiko is a key element of the film and provides the link to the mystery. Kenta Fukasaku's main visual symbol is the cell phone: a white cell phone for Shiyori and a red one for Aiko. X-Cross adeptly tells both woman's tales, alternatively, using the cell phone calls, texts, and emails as links between the two stories. Shiyori's sick villagers and Aiko's insane Scissor Woman are indulgent flourishes, combined with good pacing and nice atmosphere, which made ninety minutes fly by. Keep in mind, X-Cross is a low-budget horror film, pure and simple. Motifs can become gimmicks; what's effective can be tired; and the intriguing becomes sometimes boring, depending on what kind of mood you're in. I apparently was in a ranty mood for this entry, and Battle Royale II is still an awful film. However, Kenta Fukasaku shows promise with X-Cross and I will certainly see his future films.

Alejandro Amenábar's Thesis (1996)

Prior to his Foreign Language Academy Award for his genuinely beautiful and moving The Sea Inside (2004), Alejandro Amenábar delivered his quietly creepy (and also quite beautiful) The Others (2001). Prior to that pair, Amenábar made his fantastically trippy and meditative Open Your Eyes (1997) (which Cameron Crowe interestingly reduxxed with Vanilla Sky (2001)). While all of these films have made Alejandro Amenábar a favorite of mine, his earlier mystery, Thesis (1996) ranks as possibly my favorite film of his ("favorites" being a truly arbitrary label for me, however). Thesis is above all a very engrossing and intriguing mystery, richly-packed thematically but in a subtle way, and a tremendous amount of fun. Ángela (Ana Torrent) is sitting on the stopped subway train, because there has been an accident. Everyone has to disembark and take another train, but the conductor is going to make the transition difficult for the passengers: the conductor reveals that the actual "accident" on the tracks is a dead body split in two. The passengers are going to have a more difficult time fighting their curiosity than rush hour foot traffic; and no one is more curious than Ángela, who breaks the queue, to get a peek. "Stop being so morbid," shouts the conductor. Unfortunately for Ángela, she cannot help it. Ángela is a university student working on her thesis about "audiovisual violence." "Why would you pick such a subject," asks Professor Figueroa (Miguel Picazo), also her advisor. In so many words, she says that she is curious about the effect that it has upon viewers and the culture-at-large. In fact, would Figueroa mind going to the archives ("where they keep the more 'extreme' material") and getting Ángela some truly sick stuff to watch. Figueroa, knowing that he is breaking some unspoken rule by performing this task, agrees. In the archive, Figueroa takes a twist and a turn around the neat and categorized stacks of videocassettes into an alcove, almost cave-like, to find an unlabeled shelf littered with videocassettes. He hurriedly takes just one and goes to a viewing classroom. The following day, Figueroa doesn't show up to teach his classes and Ángela finds him, dead in the viewing room. Whatever he was watching was clearly related to his death. Ángela tells no one that she found the dead professor nor that she stole the videocassette which he was viewing. What's so extreme? Film geek and genre fan, who especially loves the hard stuff, Chema (Fele Martínez) shows Ángela, after she affirmatively seeks out his geeky expertise in the matter for her thesis, a Faces of Death-like film with apparent "real-life" violence. While she's appropriately disgusted by Chema's collection, Figueroa's archival videocassette is a little more genuine and a lot more disturbing: a snuff tape, made also seemingly by someone in at the university and its victim is a young woman student.Truth be told, Ángela is more obsessively curious about the dark side of life than anything else. She has an abnormally yet sweet stable home life: married and happy parents, a cute and bubbly sister, and a nice home (for which she gets extra kudos for having a My Own Private Idaho poster on her wall). Ángela is also quite smart and resourceful but extremely fearful. When she gets the first opportunity to view Figueroa's death-causing cassette, she chickens out on watching the images and just hears the sickening audio. Above all, Ángela is quite lonely: just as her curious side does with real life, she's looking for more interesting people who engage her in the most unusual and unexpected way. Chema becomes her most reluctant investigative partner in the mystery. Chema's an uber-geek (as it takes one to know one), and their relationship provides some of Thesis's comedic moments and dialogue. Watching these two together is like an old-time romantic comedy, although a romance never blossoms. Ángela is smitten with mysterious and quite handsome Bosco (Eduardo Noriega). After Chema discovers the camera source of the video in the snuff tape, Ángela spies Bosco using one in the break area at the university. Like a shark, Bosco comes on quite strong to Ángela, even showing up at her house and completely charming her family. Like most of her encounters, she's quite afraid of Bosco but develops a very obsessive attraction to him.Amenábar drafts and executes quite the mystery with Thesis. Although there are only a handful of suspects to the mystery, Amenábar provides enough twists and turns to make it interesting, and the conclusion is pretty satisfying. Along the way, throughout Thesis, Amenábar drops in the background his cultural criticism towards the media and our obsession with media violence (in all its forms, news, films, etc.). None of the criticism is trite or preachy. One professor expounds to his film students about why the American film industry is so far ahead of the Spanish industry: it's because it gives the audience, above all, what it wants. Is that what cinema, from anywhere, supposed to provide? Amenábar poses the question without a fixed answer. Appropriately, Amenábar shoots Thesis at its modern university in present-day Spain in clinical white light (as did Dario Argento in Tenebre (1982)) with the visual flares and atmospherics saved for the suspenseful moments. Later fanciful films would come from Amenábar, but Thesis shows a real flair for the classical. While I am eagerly awaiting Agora (2009), Thesis really should be viewed by fans of Alejandro Amenábar and those who like a good mystery.

Antti-Jussi Annila's Sauna (2008)

Set in 1585, Antti-Jussi Annila's Sauna (2008), at the conclusion of a twenty-five year war between Finland and Russia, with the former under the crown of Sweden, is about two brothers, Erik (Ville Virtanen) and Knut (Tommi Eronen). Knut is the younger and a cartographer, with the promise of a professorship in Stockholm upon completion of his task. Erik is war-torn, tired, and often violent. Erik and Knut represent the Swedish crown in the mapping and creation of a new border between Finland and Russia. They are joined on their expedition by three Russian emissaries, led by Semensky (Viktor Klimenko). There is hostility between the two sides, but they are united honorably in their task for both of their respective countries. The majority of the hostility that the party encounters is from the locals in the various villages in and around the new border. Eventually, the party comes upon an isolated village in the dead center of a swamp where a sauna serves as its centerpiece.Previous to Erik and Knut joining their Russian compatriots to complete the border marking, the pair stopped with a local family, a father and his teenage daughter. One evening, Erik notices that a shelf looks recently emptied, as if the father and the daughter are hiding something. Erik confronts the father and forces him to show the wares. In a cellar, there is a stockpile of rations. Erik pulls the father back to the cabin, while Knut stays below with the young daughter. Knut makes an attempt to kiss the young lady, but in fear, she covers her face and cowers. Knut locks the girl in the cellar and finds Erik having murdered the father. Erik claims it was self-defense. (Semensky later says to Erik, who dons glasses for his poor eyesight, that although his glasses give him the air of civility, they do not hide his eyes which miss the war and the opportunity to continue violent acts.) Knut says nothing upon finding his brother having bloodily killed the man, as Erik mutters only the words, "seventy-three." Knut tells his brother that he's locked the girl in the cellar, and Erik says that he will let her out.

After meeting with the Russians, Erik and Knut begin their long journey towards the North. Knut sees at several intervals what looks like a young woman in the distance, and eventually, Knut tells Erik that he believes the young girl from the cellar is following them. Erik shocks Knut with his revelation: he never let her out. Knut says that they must go back, but Erik vehemently disagrees: they must trudge forward and complete this task for the crown. Knut is quite wrecked with guilt for the girl's trapping; however, he hides a deeper guilt (that Erik is able to later pull out of him) about the girl. The five come upon a swamp. Semensky says lets go around it and split the middle of the swamp with the border. Erik, characteristically and hostilely, disagrees: give the whole of the swamp to Sweden or trek forward. As they move through the swamp, the party spies an sauna eerily out of the blue and come into the neighboring village. The village has seventy-three residents, only one of whom is a child, and are all unnaturally clean.Antti-Jussi Annila's Sauna is a gorgeous-looking film and really represents how technology can be used well with cinema. Only with the new-finagled cameras can the lines in Semensky's and Erik's face be captured: just by looking at the detail on their skin can the viewer tell that these gentlemen have seen very hard times. The titular sauna looks oddly clinical yet tainted, as the mold and mildew is around the dark opening. The dying vegetation and the cold weather are not just shown in glorious detail, but the detail is so overwhelming that the viewer can almost feel it. Cinematography aside, Sauna presents a dense and maybe esoteric theme of seemingly redemption and cleansing, tied to the titular sauna. What is certain, however, are the stellar performances by Ville Virtanen and Tommi Eronen, as Erik and Knut, respectively, two very complex characters. Their fraternal relationship is so genuine, and despite the often totally bleak nature of the film, their love never wavers. Virtanen and Eronen give very emotional and sometimes vulnerable performances, which alone make Sauna worth viewing. The David Lynch-like mystery involving the sauna and the nearby village is intriguing. I sat through the film twice before blogging: once as a passive viewer and the second more critical and sensitive, attempting to link the the themes and pick up clues. I do not believe I was wholly successful but I will certainly revisit Sauna again. Sauna is above all a very disorienting film: sometimes real-world-like harsh violence combined with darkly ethereal and creepy imagery and elements. A tight and focused film, densely-packed, richly-detailed, and a curious gem.

Songsak Mongkolthong's The Screen At Kamchanod (2007)

Without a doubt, and I'm certain my few readers are sick of hearing it, but I absolutely love what I call "quiet" films: nothing loud or obnoxious or quickly-paced or product-laden but mostly sparse and leisurely-paced and unassuming and sometimes still. Don't get me wrong, I certainly very much love films of the former but really prefer the latter. I don't really know why. Perhaps it's because most of life is fairly intense, where I see logic fail on an grand scale daily, I take solace in cinema which doesn't attempt to grab and keep me entertained as if I have ADD but like a slow continuous current I can wade through it without fighting or just let myself float away with it. So give me five characters, an irrational experiment, unforeseen consequences, the confrontation of inner demons and external ones, a soft celluloid palate, and a little bit of history, and we have Songsak Mongkolthong's The Screen At Kamchanod (2007). Twenty years prior in the Kamchanod forest, there was an outdoor screening, and at the start of the screening, there was no audience. However, as the night drew on, the film spooled or broke, and to a white screen, an audience appeared out of the forest. Myth or real, paranormal or coincidence, young Dr. Yut wants to find out with an experiment to recreate the screening ("Is there an overlap between this world and the next?") but is missing the actual film. With the help of a couple, Ji and Pun, who are also reporters, Roj, the lonely, drug-addicted assistant to a shopkeeper, and Yut's girlfriend, Aon, who has about had it with this life, Yut begins to assemble the clues and learn the location of the film. Through the network of projectionists, Yut and his cohorts learn that the film's original projectionists were Pradrab, whose whereabouts are unknown, and Chin, who's at a local hospital, unresponsive and nearly vegetative. Chin has a bandaged fist, and when Chin refuses to talk to Yut about the screening, Yut decided to cut the bandages from his hand revealing a small trinket. Chin flips out and begins to see things. Yut promises to give it back, if Chin reveals the location of the film. Pradrab has it, says Chin, and as Roj arrives to deliver Yut some documents, almost fortuitously, Roj tells Yut that there's an abandoned movie theatre. The theatre has been abandoned for years and the projectionist, Pradrab, was famous for screening movies for ghosts. One evening, he locked himself inside his booth with the intention of burning the film, but rumor has it, that the ghosts killed him to save the film. When Yut's crew of five arrive, they will be the first folks to visit the theatre since the last screening.

Needless to say, they find the film and screen it (its images are Kamchanod forest?), and The Screen At Kamchanod takes on the feeling of the world ending not with a bang but a whimper. Evocative of Kiyoshi Kurosawa's masterful Kairo (2001), the answer to Yut's original question ("Is there an overlap between this world and the next?") comes much sooner than the film's ending (where the original screening is replicated). "Have you noticed," asks Aon to Yut, "that we are seeing fewer living people and more ghosts?" Yut believes seeing ghosts everyday is normal; however, it's taking quite the toll on the others. Pun breaks down from her encounters and Ji begins breaking down, because the woman he loves is breaking down. Roj starts sleeping on the roof and begins using more, since the dope is better up in his head than the ghosts. Aon, who was first glimpsed by the viewer in nearly a trance and wanting to kill herself, wanders throughout the whole film. She's haunted by not just the other-worldly but by the real world, which isn't such a happy and safe place to begin with. While Mongkolthong attempts to provide the bang to the wonderful whimper of The Screen At Kamchanod with the ending, although clever and intriguing, the real attraction of the film is not the investigative mystery behind the original screening but the film's bulk in the middle. Aon, portrayed by beautiful Pakkramai Potranan, and Roj (Namo Tongkumnerd) are Screen's most interesting characters: they are from the wonderful WKW/French New Wave mold, where crying is often covered by sunglasses. Roj is reluctant and really drawn to the mystery because he's quite lonely. His initial encounter with Aon is on a train platform, where he saves her from nearly killing herself. Roj becomes entranced with Aon, often stealing noticeable glances of her and her legs when he can. Aon's self-destructive beauty is also alluring to Roj, and to the viewer, and the two consummate their relationship in almost the most unexpected way. Potranan's Aon, initially, would seem a collateral character and her only involvement is as Yut's girlfriend. However, Potranan really conveys a lot of the heartfelt emotion of the film and is easily the most captivating to watch. Aon's and Yut's relationship, also, comes to a very interesting conclusion, as well.Finally, it should be mentioned, since this is a horror movie, the creepy ghost imagery runs the gamut from ineffective to effectively creepy. I really enjoyed just watching these five characters fill Screen with their supernatural encounters. Mongkolthong creates some beautiful set pieces, such as the scene in the movie theatre when the crew views the film. The ending, although a little over-dramatic, is quite effective and creepy in its own way. I love the photography and the look of Thailand in the film: some gorgeous imagery with the colors of brown and grey, alongside weathered concrete temples, the nearly ancient-looking movie theatre, and wonderful glimpses of a quiet city (mostly populated by ghosts). The Screen At Kamchanod is a film likely to alienate horror fans and kind of float away into obscurity. Also kind of appropriate for a film about the dangers of crossing over into unknown worlds, don't you think?

Shimako Sato's Eko Eko Azarak: Wizard of Darkness (1995)

After a prologue with some lines from John Milton's Paradise Lost, specifically invoking the name of Lucifer, an unknown woman is seen running frantically through the streets of Tokyo, where, unsurprisingly, no one cares. However, the red-robed Satanists, in the midst of some serious mumbo jumbo during a ritual, have her in mind; and after the unknown woman takes a dark corner, she is met with a gruesome girder killing. One of the red-robed is singled out to finalize the plan in their Satanic conquest, and it is happening at a high school. As the teenagers are walking towards the school to the hauntingly minimal piano score, Mr. Numata waits at the front gate. After groping one young woman, Kazumi, Numata stops another, saying he doesn't recognize her. The new student is Misa Kuroi (Kimika Yoshino), who is also a witch, arriving to stop the Satanic evil in the school in Shimako Sato's Eko Eko Azarak: Wizard of Darkness (1995).What follows in Eko Eko Azarak: Wizard of Darkness is a little Harry Potter, some Nancy Drew, and a tinge of Degrassi High, with a lesser budget, some steamy sex, and a healthy dose of bloody violence: a perfect potion for cinematic exploitation. There's the jock, Shindo, who's immediately enamored when he first glimpses Misa. There's also the poseur, Mizuno, who likes the attention he receives, because he's into magic. Mizuno does reveal that the rash of recent murders all have taken place geographically in the shape of a pentagram with the school in the center; however, when he tries cast a spell for Kazumi on the roving-handed Mr. Kumata, he's upstaged by Misa. Mizuno becomes jealous of Misa's genuine talent and he attempts to turn her classmates against her. Kurahashi is Misa's doting new friend, who Misa ends up saving after someone sinister casts a spell upon her. Mr. Kumata ends up dying, and Mizuno's plan of turning Misa's classmates against her nearly comes to fruition, as all eyes fall on Misa as the cause for not just Kumata's death but all the mysterious occult deaths occurring around Tokyo. One evening, while all the students are summoned after school to take a math test by Ms. Shirai, they are all going to need Misa's help as they get locked into the school with the number "13" written on the board (and the Satanic shenanigans begin). Oh, and by the way, to spice up this mix, Ms. Shirai is sleeping with Kazumi. They like to do it in an empty classroom and provide Eko Eko Azarak with its steamy lesbian sex scenes.

The final two-thirds of Eko Eko Azarak becomes survival horror involving spell-casting and possession with lots of arterial spray and some gruesome killings. The film's location is primarily the school but absent, however, are the pop songs and cell phones. Eko Eko Azarak has a good overall sense of dread and mystery, which is aided by the low budget. Sato is able to use a singular location, as did Toshiharu Ikeda with Evil Dead Trap (1988), and focus on it tightly, so it appears to the viewer as claustrophobic. It works. The absence, also, of any positive happy images or music adds to the dread and foreboding of the mystery and horror. Even on a very subtle level, Sato takes his quiet and focused style and is able to make a profound criticism of the current school system, its teacher-student relationships, and even modern relationships between adults and children. The best aspect of Eko Eko Azarak is the character, Misa, and the performance by Kimika Yoshino (whose photo is currently the header for this blog in Takashi Miike's Gozu (2003)).

The viewer knows virtually nothing about Misa or her background. Sato would draw Misa's history much deeper in his subsequent feature Eko Eko Azarak: Birth of the Wizard (1996), with Yoshino returning as Misa. However, the mystery surrounding Misa adds both to the film's overall sense of mystery and the tragedy within the film, as well. Mizuno learns that at Misa's previous school there were several deaths involving Misa. She tells this to Shindo, and it's why Misa cannot get close to anyone. Shindo doesn't care. He loves her anyway. Kimika Yoshino is strikingly beautiful and has gorgeous sleepy eyes, which she imbues with both sadness and intense focus. Yoshino's fantastic, while the rest of the cast gives stereotypical over-the-top performances in stereotypical roles. Eko Eko Azarak does have it's share of b-movie cheese, especially near the end, and the cheese ranges from slightly annoying to awesomely sublime.

Eko Eko Azarak: Wizard of Darkness is a little film that has stayed with me since the first time that I saw it around its original release date. It's certainly cheesy, but it's comfort-food cheese: fun to see every once and while and not really filling but certainly, deliciously consumable.

Shyam & Tulsi Ramsay's Hotel (1981)

I picked up Shyam & Tulsi Ramsay's early Bollywood horror film Hotel (1981) for a song after becoming hypnotically entranced by six (yes, six) of their later releases, each from Mondo Macabro DVD, in their Bollwood Horror Collections Vols. 1, 2, and 3. Each volume contains, respectively, Bandh Darwaza (1990) & Purana Mandir (1984), Veerana (1988) & Purani Haveli (1989), and Mahakaal (1993) & Tahkhana (1986). I collect all of the Mondo Macabro DVD releases like comic books after having read essential genre tomes, Pete Tombs's Mondo Macabro and Cathal Tohill & Pete Tombs's Immoral Tales: European Sex & Horror Movies 1956-1984. While this ain't a commercial for the Mondo Macabro DVD label, I do believe in supporting the genre labels, especially MM, who put out often obscure unknown flicks for the seriously curious genre fan. But back to Bollywood and this Western white guy's history with them. I read on a film message board a few years ago that there was a Bollywood version of David Fincher's Fight Club (1999) available on dvd. Color me curious, I purchased a copy of Vikram Chopra's Fight Club: Members Only (2006) and was taken aback: although clearly "inspired," it wasn't a complete rip-off of Fincher's very dark comedy but rather a very light one about five friends and their take on a "fight club." I had a true case of culture shock, with the most shocking aspect of the film being its run time, nearly two and a half hours (not uncommon with Bollywood films, as I later would learn). I also noticed that at least thirty of those minutes were devoted to the song-and-dance sequences (a staple of Bollywood cinema which I also later learned), which were catchy and fun pop songs, shot in the style and nearly as slick as a MTV music video. Although Chopra's Fight Club is by no means a very good film, it was enough for me to want to seek out more. Perhaps because of my love for Italian genre rip-of...er...homages, I sought out the Bollywood versions of films that I had already seen and enjoyed, such as the Pang Brothers' The Eye (2002), Chan-wook Park's Oldboy (2003), and Bryan Singer's The Usual Suspects (1994). Subsequently, I would seek out a bunch of original and recent ones (post-2000), as there were myriad available on Netflix. After seeing a baker's dozen or so, without really seeing a Bollywood horror film (save the mediocre redux of The Eye), I put Bollywood cinema behind me, since none of the films (mostly action and adventure) really blew me away. Also with the average run time of nearly two and half to three hours, I could watch a couple flicks from nearly any country while I was watching only a mediocre one from India. It wasn't until over a year or so later when I viewed the Ramsays' Bandh Darwaza in the very first MM Bollywood Horror Collection that I realized I had been both unfair and quite misguided towards Bollywood Cinema. I was blown away by Bandh Darwaza's b-movie comedy, horror, and cheesiness; loved its romantic love songs as a break in the action; and relished its length, at approximately two hours and twenty minutes. To digress a little further (all this rambling will seem appropriate shortly, I promise), I have a terrible habit of having to watch a film (or read a book) before bed time. Depending on how well the day has kicked my ass, I'll watch somewhere from five minutes to an hour of a film before nodding off. Over the course of five or six nights for each volume, I watched all of MM's Bollywood Horror Collections, never having to worry about catching up with one of its rambling yet simple plot lines, as each were often episodic and quite enchanting. There's a real energy and vibrancy to the cinema, and I can't imagine not having Bollywood cinema in my immediate future. So, after exhausting the current Ramsay releases from MM (all of which I loved, each for different reasons), I had to look elsewhere, and I found it cheaply on Indian dvd in Hotel (1981).
Suraj (Navin Nischol) is a wealthy, yet single, businessman, who desires to build a hotel in the region where his long-lost love, Sushma (Nellam Mehra), currently resides. Suraj's buddy, Vijay (Rakesh Roshan), thinks he should let his past love go but encourages his business endeavor, while Vijay has his hands full with layabout and wandering brother, Sanjay (Prem Krishan). Suraj hires Chhaganlal Patel (Ranjeet), a charismatic yet, as is later shown, crooked land sales contractor and developer to find a piece of land to build the hotel. Chhaganlal Patel finds only one piece of suitable land, which is unfortunately the site of a cemetery, owned by a local church. So, in due course, Chhaganlal Patel greases the palms of a government official and a big-time lawyer, and along with his sexy secretary, Shabho (Prema Narayan), Chhaganlal Patel dupes the priest who owns the land into selling, by telling the priest that an orphanage is going to be built on the site. Suraj is happy that Chhaganlal Patel found a piece of suitable land and Suraj paid handsomely for it. He also agreed to let Chhaganlal Patel helm the construction of the hotel. When the old priest sees that a hotel is going up on the land, Chhaganlal Patel laughs him off and the old priest dies. Later, layabout Sanjay comes snooping around when the hotel is complete and he learns of the nefarious goings-on. When he gets killed, Chhaganlal Patel and his cohorts hide the evidence, while Suraj and Vijay arrive at the hotel to host a grand gala. Let the hijinx ensue.
While I attempted to give a succinct preview of the plot for Hotel, at nearly two hours and twenty minutes, the viewer is going to get to see every iota of this hotel's construction, from inception to completion, in, primarily, a rambling and comedic fashion. At times the film feels unfocused, as if the Ramsays are attempting to fill the run time and are making the film up as they go. No matter, because along the way, I was treated to quite a few comedic sequences, especially with Chhaganlal Patel, who, although the villain, isn't mean-spirited but ridiculously greedy. Ranjeet's performance is appropriately subdued and over-the-top at times. The song and dance sequences, especially the love songs, are really cute and well-done. Shabho does a great number at the hotel's opening-night party, and I had a complete smile on my face the whole time. While there is a bunch of comedy, a martial-arts finale, romance, and a little drama, there is little in Hotel in the way of horror. The six subsequent features of the Ramsays included in the MM Bollywood Horror Collections, all have horror as the main theme. In Hotel, horror is just another theme thrown in the mix, although there are some creepy cemetery scenes towards the end (zombies, too). It would have been nice to have more horror elements throughout the film, but I enjoyed Hotel very much for its overall sense of fun and camp silliness. So like Hotel, this review has a little bit of everything. Now, isn't that just damn clever on my part?