Somewhat
ironically, two of Japan’s most adventurous directors—Sion Sono and Takeshi
Miike—are also the two most likely to get international distribution. While
Miike’s films come in a variety of speeds, including something approximating
accessibility, Sono’s films only vary in their degree of insanity. However, in
recognition of his prolific output and his compulsive urge to document and address
the Fukushima disaster, Sono finally finds himself embraced by the
establishment in 2015. However, Sono remained the same old jaundiced eccentric,
at least judging from Arata Oshima’s documentary profile, The Sion Sono (trailer here), which screens during this year’s Japan Cuts: Festival of New Japanese Film in New York.
Oshima
is indeed the son of controversial auteur Nagisa Oshima, but he doesn’t exactly
give Sono the Sono treatment in The Sion
Sono. Instead, he mostly gives us straight-over-the-plate doc footage of
Sono puttering about his painting studio, chewing the fat with his colleagues,
or peering through the lens as he helms one of the five theatrical films he
released last year.
Considering
how different films like Whispering Star,
Tag, and Love & Peace are
from each other and how distinctive thy all are, it is certainly interesting to
watch Sono work his filmmaking magic—at least up to a point. However, when the
auteur is not defiling canvases, he is rather deceptively mild mannered. After
a while, watching him film leaky faucets starts to drag a little.