Underwater
plastic surgery is a dirty job, but somebody has to do it. Fortunately,
eccentric elderly vagabonds Tarugani and Papajo have more reputable side jobs
staging chain plays that incorporate stagecraft, film, and traditional Okinawan
music. The underlying mythology is rich, but narrative logic isn’t much of a
priority for Go Takamine’s Hengyoro
(Queer Fish Lane)
(trailer here),
which screens during the 2017 Japan Cuts Festival of New Japanese Film in New
York.
Something
happened long ago that wiped out most of the population of Patai Village, but
Tarugani and Papjo still shuffle around like ghosts. Frankly, things make more
sense when they are mounting their chain plays, featuring eerie looking Super8
footage Takamine shot on Okinawa in the 1970s.
Episodic
in nature, we watch the strange misadventures of a bag of an illegal aphrodisiac
purchased instead of flour. Wrongly blamed for inappropriately acquiring the
potent powder, Tarugani goes about his professional practice editing film and
faces, while trying to elude the Bibiju, the three supernaturally damp wives of
the aphrodisiac-peddling shopkeeper, who are dead set on cutting his ears.
Whatever.
Don’t try to make sense of Hengyoro.
While bits and pieces make sense in isolation, it is baffling as a whole. This
is self-consciously experimental cinema that makes no concessions. Yet, it is
easier to watch than you might expect, because Takamine is constantly pulling
off wild in-camera visual tricks. Even if you have no patience for the
avant-garde, it is strangely compelling to watch him top himself. In fact, it
is no hyperbole to say cinematographer Mamoru Hirata’s work is frequently
stunning. The traditional Okinawan soundtrack is also starkly powerful.