NYAFF ‘17: Traces of Sin

It is considered tacky to speak ill of the dead, but Tanaka is a journalist, so all bets are off. Still, you would expect him to write a traditional innocent victimhood narrative when investigating the cold case murder of an affluent couple and their young daughter. However, what he uncovers regarding their arrogance and abuse of privilege completely upends established movie conventions in Kei Ishikawa’s Traces of Sin (trailer here), which screens during the 2017 New York Asian Film Festival.

Things are not going well for Tanaka. His sister Mitsuko is in prison facing child endangerment charges, while her emaciated three-year-old daughter slowly slips away on life-support. It is easy to hate Mitsuko, but Tanaka understands only too well how much abuse she suffered at their parents’ hands. That is why the backstories of Hiruki and Yukie Takou will trouble him so deeply.

Initially, he started re-investigating the Takou murders as a Quixotic distraction from his family issues. However, he soon learns how Takou and his boorish company mates would deliberately toy with new female recruits. Digging a little deeper, he finds he and his future wife were even crueler and more manipulative during their college years. Junko Miyamura is particularly eager to dish, because she yearned for acceptance among the unofficial “Insiders,” but never quite made it.

Traces is very definitely a murder mystery, but it is also an exploration of the dark side of human nature and the psychological triggers that cause the abused to become abusers. It is murky, pessimistic stuff, but absolutely riveting to watch unfold. Kosuke Mukai’s adapted screenplay gives us a sense Tokuro Nukui’s source novel shares some affinities with Gone Girl and the like. For one thing, there certainly seems to space for some unreliable narration.

Hikari Mitsushima might be one of the most accomplished but under-rated thesps in the world based on her knock-out work in Love Exposure and the thoroughly charming Hello! Junichi. As Mitsuko, she is frightfully vulnerable and pitiable yet simultaneously chilling to the bone. It is a quiet, tightly coiled performance that profoundly surprises many times over. Satoshi Tsumabuki is even more reserved, but he still conveys all the emotions roiling within Tanaka’s chest and the wheels turning inside his head. Asami Usuda’s Miyamura also makes a spectacular ice queen, to use a polite term.

Without question, Traces is a withering critique of peer pressure, corporate sexism, and rigid class structure. It also delivers a heck of a shock, when it starts revealing the ultimate truth (a peeling away process that starts relatively early in the third act). It is a feel-bad film in general, but at least it should give viewers the sense they are relatively together, in comparison. It is also an excellent work of cinema. Highly recommended for viewers in a healthy frame of mind, [Gukoroku]: Traces of Sin screens Monday (7/10) at the Walter Reade, as part of this year’s NYAFF.

NYAFF ’17: Soul on a String

The talk of karma and resurrection might have been unfamiliar to an Irish Catholic like John Ford, but he could relate to the mountains and deserts of Tibet. Indeed, this Buddhist spiritual “western” often looks like it could be transplanted into Monument Valley without anyone losing a step. Of course, the subplot involving two grown sons out to avenge their father would be even more in his wheelhouse. The surprisingly compatible marriage of Western genre elements and Eastern mysticism truly distinguishes Zhang Yang’s Soul on a String (trailer here), which screens during the 2017 New York Asian Film Festival.

Taibei is a stone-killer, but you could also call him the man who killed the deer. In this case, it is quite the fateful deer, because there is a sacred holy stone lodged in its mouth. However, before Taibei can fully process this discovery, he is felled by a bolt of lightning. Coincidentally, he is not the only Taibei who will be killed today. In his thirst for vengeance, impulsive Guo Ri kills the wrong Taibei, which earns his family a whole new batch of enemies, compounding their woes exponentially.

Ironically, it is Taibei the killer whom the lama will pull back from the Bardo. He has a mission for the drifter that might just save his soul. He will deliver the sacred stone to the Holy valley known as “The Buddha’s Palm.” Taibei will accept his mission, but he is not exactly reformed yet. In fact, he might just need a bit of ruthlessness, because he will pursued by vengeance-seekers (including but not limited to Guo Ri) as well as a gang of cutthroats out to steal the priceless gemstone he carries around his neck. However, he will have some help (whether he wants it or not) from Chung, a smitten herder, and Pu, a mute little boy who appears to have some degree of second sight.

Visually, Soul might be the most arresting film since maybe Fantasia or Citizen Kane. The Tibetan vistas are genuinely breathtaking, but Zhang often uses them in ways that are pure Sergio Leone. It is like a masterclass in widescreen composition. As an added bonus, the narrative is also quite engrossing. After a strange prologue that only makes sense after the very final scenes, Zhang settles into some old school spaghetti western business. However, his narrative steadily deepens, as the characters’ karmic destinies are revealed. Frankly, it builds to some pretty amazing revelations.

As Taibei, Kimba slow-burns like a champion hardboiled noir anti-hero. He is all kinds of steely and bad, but it is Quni Ciren who truly lights up the screen as the vulnerably needy but admirably resilient Chung. Yixi Danzeng is an utter natural as the quiet but tough Pu. Siano Dudiom Zahi is also appropriately sly and morally ambiguous as Gedan, the mystery man shadowing Taibei and company. It is almost a cliché to say, but in this case, it is true Tibet and Tibetan Buddhism are also stars of Soul, up-staging many of the nonprofessional human cast-members, but not Gedan’s German Shepherd, General.

Soul is a heady film that addresses karma and justice on a cosmic level and also in nitty-gritty human terms. One mistake can lead to generations of woe for an entire family, but that is nothing compared to what it can do to the responsible party’s next reincarnation. Yet, it is also a very emotionally engaging film. Easily one of the year’s best films, Soul on a String screens this Sunday (7/9) at the Walter Reade, as part of this year’s NYAFF.

NYAFF ’17: Love and Other Cults

It is tough being a delinquent in a small town. Once you get tagged with a rep, fairly or unfairly, it is impossible to shake. That definitely happens to poor Ai Shima. All she wants is to be loved and all Ryota Sakuma wants to do is love her, but everything and everyone conspires against them in Eiji Uchida’s Love and Other Cults (trailer here), which screens during the 2017 New York Asian Film Festival.

Shima’s mother never showed her any affection, because her love is always reserved for the various religious cults she compulsively joins. Ironically, when her mother shipped her off to the commune run by the dodgy western con artist Lavi, Shima finally found the love and acceptance she craved. Alas, it would not last. When the cops returned her to her neglectful mother, Shima fell in with a loose knit group of punks. That is how she met Sakuma. He looks like a studious, blazer-wearing high schooler, but he is as jaded as they come.

Nevertheless, he desperately wants to save Shima from her demeaning life, but she is stuck running scams for the likes of aspiring yakuza Yuji Mieno, who is determined to impress the local boss, Kida. However, when his imposing right-hand man Kenta Kitagawa shows signs of disillusionment, perhaps envisioning a more stable life with Reika Kojima, the beautiful marine biologist, Mieno will start lashing out to shore up his position.

Tonally, LAOC covers the waterfront. Think of it as one part Sion Sono’s Love Exposure, one part Tetsuya Nakashima’s Memories of Matsuko, and one part The Breakfast Club. Although it is billed as something of a transgressive comedy, the overriding emotion it inspires is one of profound sadness for the frequently rejected and abandoned Shima. Sairi Itô plays her with such earnestness and a vulnerability, it often hurts to watch her.

Frankly, Kenta Suga’s Sakuma is a bit of a cold fish cypher opposite her. In contrast, Kaito Yoshimura is so flamboyantly and erratically nuts as Mieno, he is like watching a fireworks show. Old crafty Denden does his thing as sinister old Kida. However, (uni-named) Antony and Hanae Kan unexpectedly steal the show as Kitagawa and Kojima, developing to our shock and dismay, a healthy, appealing romantic relationship.

Uchida demands a lot and gives maybe just enough. For a supposed comedy, LAOC is often uncomfortable and mean-spirited. Yet, most of the characters are so sharply drawn, they will start to feel real to you. It is a close call, but the work of Itô, Antony, and Kan really deserves to be seen when Love and Other Cults screens this Saturday (7/8) at the Walter Reade, as part of this year’s NYAFF.

NYAFF ’17: Destruction Babies

The world did Ashihara wrong, so he will make the world pay. He is not too particularly about whom. Anyone handy will do. When the entitled rage of the Occupy movement is combined with the voyeurism of social media-saturated, bad things are sure to happen in Tetsuya Mariko’s Destruction Babies (trailer here), which screens during the 2017 New York Asian Film Festival.

Eighteen-year-old Taira Ashihara and his twelvish-year-old brother Shota drew a sad lot in life. After their mother abandoned them and their father died at an early age, the Brothers Ashihara have lived above the garage where Taira used to work. The owner, Kazuo Kondo, fancies himself their benefactor, but he is really just another exploiter. Finally, the elder brother snaps and lights off on a brawling bender, attacking nearly everyone he comes across.

Taira will take innumerable beatings, but he always dusts himself off and joins the battle again. Two of his favorite foes are the yakuza running a downtown hostess club and group of loutish high school students. Unlike his mates, Yuya Kitahara is initially careful to avoid direct fighting, but when he sees what an internet sensation Kaira has become, he decides to switch sides and facilitate his rampage. Something about Taira’s recklessness appeals to sociopathic misogyny. This is especially true when they kidnap Nana, a hostess at the yakuza club.

The first half of the film is weirdly effective portraying Taira’s impotent rage. He definitely has grievances, he just can’t explain them, per se. Essentially, it is a lot like watching Michael Douglas’s Dfens character from Falling Down, on a nasty meth jag. Sadly, the second half down-shifts into a sadistic abduction thriller, executed in such neutral terms, any possible takeaway remains elusive.

Still, it is not for a lack of trying on Nana Komatsu’s part. She makes her namesake’s big shocking moment almost believable. Likewise, Masaki Suda is profoundly disturbing as Kitahara, an utterly rotten kid, thoroughly desensitized by social media. In contrast, Yûya Yaguira is cold, cruel, and clammy as Taira.

Even at its best, Destruction is a grubby, abrasive film. However, there is something brutally effective about its early primal simplicity. Ironically, by broadening the focus, Mariko and co-screenwriter Kôhei Kiyasu turn it into a rather unsavory morality play. Recommended in a strictly limited context for those with a taste for extreme cinema, Destruction Babies screens this Sunday (7/9) at the Walter Reade, as part of this year’s NYAFF.

George T. Nierenberg’s No Maps on My Taps & About Tap

Lionel Hampton was the perfect bandleader to play for a late 1970s summit meeting of three highly accomplished tap dancers, who were still hanging on and actively performing. After all, he was a showman above all, who happened to marry a dancer (his beloved Gladys). Their show wasn’t merely well received. It helped spark a renewed interest in tap, thanks to the wider audience it reached through George T. Nierenberg’s documentary. Freshly restored, Nierenberg’s hour-long No Maps on My Taps (trailer here) and his half-hour follow-up, About Tap open together this Friday for a special week-long run, right in time for Tap City: the New York City Tap Festival.

Chuck Green was the senior member of the No Maps trio and he would be the only dancer appearing in both films. As the dancing half of Chuck and Chuckles, he toured the world, but he was also a survivor, who returned to active performance after a long period of institutionalization. He didn’t just have the steps and the seniority—his colleagues clearly were inspired by his dignity and gravitas.

Probably, the unofficial spokesman for No Maps is Bunny Briggs. He would be the one enjoying a cold beer before their performance. He was a charismatic performer, who always seems to be having great fun on-stage, but he is literally moved to tears when family members recall how much his earnings as a child performer helped them make ends meet.

George “Sandman” Sims is the teacher—and apparently also a bit of a trash talker. In No Maps, we see him teaching his little boy in the park, whereas On Tap opens with Gregory Hines (then the tap sensation as a Tony nominee for Eubie!) discussing all the impromptu lessons he received from Sims as a young boy working at the Apollo Theater.

Green, the constant for both films, maybe even tops himself with the sly elegance of his performance in About Tap. Hampton’s band was either on tour or otherwise unavailable for the second film, but the music is still suitably swinging thanks to the ensemble led by Broadway veteran Danny Holgate, featuring Seldon Powell on tenor and Grady Tate on drums.  Rather ironically, Steve Condos is the only About Tap hoofer not shown performing with the band, which also includes bassist Arvell Shaw, a former sideman with Louis Armstrong, whom Condos credits as one of his pivotal artistic influences.

In About Tap, the focus is more on technique than biography, but viewers still get some tap history from Jimmy Slyde, who was by then already considered a living legend. Then in his late fifties, his energy and style were undiminished. Indeed, you could say none of the tap artists featured in Nierenberg’s films had yet to lose a step.

Both films are just a lot of swinging fun. It is easy to see how the national broadcast of No Maps, coupled with the hit Broadway run for Eubie! rekindled national interest in tap. Hampton’s efforts toward that end were also rewarded with an Emmy Award for best musical direction (from the considerably less searchable news & documentary branch). These are culturally significant films that every jazz and dance fan will be delighted to see pristinely restored, courtesy of Milestone Film. Enthusiastically recommended, No Maps on My Taps and About Tap open together this Friday (7/7) in New York, at the Quad Cinema.

NYAFF ’17: Birdshot

It is empowering for young girls to learn how to shoot and hunt, like Aisholpan, the Eagle Huntress. Maya’s father Diego should have just spent a little more time on the rules of the road. When she unknowingly bullseyes an endangered Philippine “monkey-eating” eagle, they become a convenient distraction from a politically-charged mass murder in Mikhail Red’s Birdshot (trailer here), which screens during the 2017 New York Asian Film Festival.

Conscious of his advanced years, Diego is training his daughter Maya to be self-sufficient. Unfortunately, she took too much initiative venturing over to the wilderness preserve. When he sees her game, Diego immediately understands the potential trouble. He does his best to dispose of the evidence, but as the only home within miles of the preserve, it is inevitable the police will come calling.

Initially, veteran officer Mendoza and his idealistic rookie partner Domingo were working a different, more pressing case. An entire bus loaded with passengers disappeared on route to Manila. They found the bus, but not the people. However, it turns out a number of the presumed victims were a party to a land rights case pending against a major plantation. Just as they start to make some headway, they are yanked from the case and assigned the ornithocide. Hey, any Green voter would agree one dead bird is way more important than a dozen or so murdered people.

Red’s set-up is highly compelling, but his execution is more than heavy-handed. Slowly but surely, Domingo becomes exactly the sort of monster he once held in contempt (a process that takes less than a week, as Mendoza wryly observes) and Diego is sacrificed on a cross of eagle feathers in a third act that feels more like a class-conscious passion play than a climax to a gritty thriller.

Still, Mary Joy Apostol is absolutely mesmerizing as the semi-wild Maya. She is naturally intense and totally unaffected. She also works well with dogs (the remarkably well-trained Mala) and Ku Aquino, whose turn as Diego is quiet and reserved, but acutely powerful. John Arcilla does his thing as the corrupt-in-a-give-a-toss-sort-of-way Mendoza, much as he did in Metro Manila, but with less flair. Arnold Reyes is sufficiently tightly wound as Domingo, but his accelerated arc of disillusionment makes things a bit too pat.

Birdshot has its flaws, but it makes a valid point contrasting our exaggerated concern for one animal versus society’s disinterest in the well-being of our fellow men. It is a strong cast, working amid a potent atmosphere of paranoia, but it just doesn’t sustain itself. It is a mixed bag, but not one that ultimately merits a recommendation. For those still intrigued, Birdshot screens tomorrow (7/6) at the Walter Reade, as part of this year’s NYAFF.

NYAFF ’17: Election

Big D is the Al Gore of the Triads. He assumed he was next in line for the two-year chairmanship of the Wo Shing Society, but the Uncles elected Lok instead. So, does he accept the results of the voting and concentrate on his own business? No, of course not. The resulting power struggle escalates into full-scale street violence in Johnnie To’s modern classic Election (trailer here), which screens during the 2017 New York Asian Film Festival.

Frankly, Lok appears to be the more forward-thinking of the two candidates, whereas Big D can fly off the handle a wee bit. Slightly disappointed by the election results, Big D lashes out at two swing-voters he holds responsible. In response, the outgoing chairman dispatches his lieutenants to China with the Dagon Baton, which is ceremoniously handed down to each new chairman. Thus, begins a mad scramble between the two factions for strategic possession of the baton. However, most of the plotting will be done within prison after Chief Superintendent Hui has both candidates and several senior uncles arrested, in hopes of preventing open war.

This is the film that will probably always come up first when you google Johnnie To—and for good reason. For many, it was also their gateway drug into a full-on Hong Kong cinema addiction. It is a lean, mean, snarling machine of a film, but there is also something strangely beautiful about its savage austerity.

Both Simon Yam and “Big” Tony Leung Ka-fai give classic, career-defining performances as the diametrically-opposed Lok and Big D, respectively. There scenes together are pure movie magic—those who have seen it will instantly know what I mean.

They are indeed the bosses of bosses, but Election is fully loaded with first-rate supporting turns. Lam Suet and Gordon Lam are terrific as Big Head and Kun, two henchmen initially on opposite sides of the factional divide, who meet rather awkwardly. It is amazing to see superstars like Louis Koo and Nick Cheung getting relatively limited screen-time (at least in the initial film), but they burn up the joint with their hardboiled intensity. It is also cool to see Shaw Brothers mainstay David Chiang as the commanding Chief Superintendent. Yet, perhaps the late, great Wong Tin-lam’s quietly droll turn as Uncle Teng, the Uncle of Uncles, best personifies the crafty film.

Election would be followed by two sequels that would continue and deepen the story, reaching Shakespearean levels of tragedy. Hubris: it’s a killer. Yet, Election ends on a perfect note that certainly does not lack for closure. There is no question it is a contemporary classic. Very highly recommended, Election screens Friday (7/7) at the Walter Reade, as part of this year’s NYAFF.

NYAFF ’17: Town in a Lake

How can you have a mystery in a small town, where everyone knows everything about everybody? Those are the sentiments of many Matangtubig residents, who are alarmed and confused by the sensational crime garnering the sleepy burg unwanted national media attention. There are unusually weird things afoot in the surrounding woods, but everyone can relate to the crass and craven behavior of politicians and the media in Jet Leyco’s Town in a Lake (trailer here), which screens during the 2017 New York Asian Film Festival.

Someone knows something, but they are not talking—probably for good reason. On the night in question, teen Nathalie is raped and murdered, while her friend Melody flees into the rainforest and has yet to be seen since. It is a shocking crime for a hamlet, whose regional mayor boasts of a “zero percent crime rate.” Of course, those claims look rather dubious in light of the violent crimes under investigation. There is also a rather disturbing subsequent incident of cattle mutilation. It is understandable why a father like Homil would be concerned, but he has other reasons to be fearful. Melody’s snooping brother may have gotten an eyeful of the sinister going’s on as well.

Wisely, NYAFF is premiering the slightly longer Philippine cut of Town, rather than the international version that played down the uncanny business in the woods. Frankly, Town needs more of that supernatural strangeness, because without it is mostly an unremarkable small-town mystery without it. Granted, the portrayal of Mayor Tessie and Benny Ricarte, a scandal-chasing TV reporter from Manila are sharp enough to draw blood. Ricardo also has a terrific exit that perhaps didn’t make the international cut, given its nature.

Amante Pulido is a compelling, salt-of-the-earth presence as Homil and Joel Saracho brings unexpected dimensions to the film as the dedicated but previously scandal-tarred police chief Wilfredo Tamayo. Lance Raymundo also deserves his due as the flamboyantly sleazy Ricarte. However, the dark, humid environment of Matangtubig largely upstages everyone.

Leyco has a lot of talent for milking tension out of isolated settings. It is an impressive accomplishment in eerie, tropical mise-en-scene, but the narrative is overly familiar. Most of the lurid scandals we can predict early in the first act. Still, the otherworldly stuff definitely adds something distinctive, so if you are ever going to see Town in a Lake, see it when it screens Thursday night (7/6) at the Walter Reade, as part of this year’s NYAFF.

NYAFF ’17: Journey to the West—The Demons Strike Back

The good thing about pilgrimages is they are long and can thus accommodate sequels. Of course, epics never got any more epic than Wu Cheng’en’s Journey to the West. Slivers and segments of the classical tome have been endlessly adapted by Chinese-language film and television, so it is not so surprising Stephen Chow came back for seconds. This time around, he serves as screenwriter and producer, but Tsui Hark replaces him at the helm of Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back (trailer here), which screens during this year’s New York Asian Film Festival.

Frankly, Tang Sanzang (a.k.a. Xuan Zang, a.k.. Tang Seng, a.k.a. Tripitaka) should not be having dreams of glory, but he will soon be brought back down to earth. At the end of Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons, the mischievous demigods Pigsy, Sandy (who is now unexpectedly fishy), and Sun Wukong, better known as the Monkey King, were redeemed and subsequently pledged themselves as Tang’s disciples. Tang is firm in his purpose, but his heart still grieves for Miss Duan, his demon-busting colleague and true love.

However, life on the road has weakened their solidarity. The Monkey King is erratic at the best of times, but lately he has practically been at Tang’s throat, with Pigsy and Sandy quietly egging him on. They are no longer a cohesive unit, even when they blunder into country lodge filled with demons. Sun Wukong always senses them first. Partly it is probably due to his nose and partly due to Tang’s supernatural lack of intuition. However, their internal fissures threaten to violently cleave apart when they enter the kingdom of a mad, child-like prince worthy of Lewis Carroll. It is only thanks to his elegant minister Guanyin that his realm continues to function at all. Fortunately, she takes a bit of a shine to Tang or he would probably be executed for being a party-pooper. However, the slave-girl songstress Felicity really complicates matters.

Visually, Strike Back is an utter marvel of set-piece lunacy. Never intimidated by a little spectacle, Tsui’s strategy is clearly to go big, then bigger, and then bigger still. Who needs acid when we have Tsui’s candy-colored surreal wuxia fantasyscapes? He has the macro and then some, but the micro level of character development is a little thin. In all honesty, the film misses Shu Qi’s Miss Duan for reasons beyond the obvious. Perhaps recognizing the charisma gap, Hark and Chow periodically bring her back like Ben Kenobi in the later Star Wars films, but it is not enough.

Still, Kenny Lin holds up his end as the Monkey King. He does not go as completely feral-creature nuts as Aaron Kwok rocking out in The Monkey King 2, but he definitely came to play. In contrast, Kris Wu mostly comes across like a petulant jerk as Tang. However, Yao Chen is wonderfully regal as Guanyin and Jelly Lin is quite poignant (and arguably helps bail out Wu) as Felicity.

Even if you think you dig bombast and over-the-top special effects, Strike Back still might wear you out. One has to admire its inventiveness, but too often the human element is overshadowed by the maelstroms on screen. Ticketholders should also be advised there is a stinger worth sitting through the credits for. Recommended mostly for the oh’s and ah’s of its surface razzle-dazzle, Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back screens this Saturday (7/8) at the Walter Reade, as part of the 2017 NYAFF.

NYAFF ’17: Kfc

It turns out the media has lied to us. They have portrayed Vietnam as an island of tranquility, but it turns out the streets of Hanoi are worse than back-alley Manila, without the free speech and press freedoms Filipinos enjoy (still). If you doubt it, brace yourself for the carnal, charnel spectacle of Lê Binh Giang’s Kfc (trailer here), which screens during this year’s New York Asian Film Festival.

Supposedly, all the film’s cast of characters regularly pass through a fateful KFC in downtown Hanoi. Frankly, Lê is not excessively fastidious when it comes to establishing those connections, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. One thing is clear. Hanoi is a predatory city, teeming with violence. Justice is dubious, but when payback comes, it is swift and harsh. Take for instance the first five minutes of the film.

Eventually, Lê sets into a pattern of heinous act begetting a violent act of vengeance-taking, which in turn begets more retribution. The various players include a cannibalistic doctor who mows down his victims in an ambulance, his chubby kid who has a taste for both fried chicken and human flesh, the two pickpocket street urchins he befriends, two sadistic rival street gangs, and assorted thieves and prostitutes.

It should be conceded many of Lê’s sequences are undeniably powerful and veritably reek with sinister atmosphere. However, the effect dissipates when it is repeated over and over. Eventually, the Kfc viewing experience becomes akin to watching somebody you don’t know play the most brutal Grand Theft Auto game ever. However, you can’t fault the large ensemble, given the way they all so fully commit to this shocking world.

Throughout Kfc there are obvious references to large Western brands, like the titular chicken franchise, as well as Coke and Pepsi. Clearly, these were meant as an ironic commentary on globalization, but the corporate consumables actually supply the few small pleasures available to its inevitable victims. You could almost consider Kfc a Vietnamese A Serbian Movie, with a taste for fried chicken. If Jane Fonda watched it, she might start demonstrating to renew the Vietnam War. It is impossible to recommended, but it is certainly a bold auterist work, perhaps bordering on outright madness. For those who have to see it for themselves, Kfc screens this Thursday (7/6) at the Walter Reade, as part of the 2017 NYAFF.

Ann Hui’s Our Time Will Come

Fong Lan is a schoolteacher and Blackie Lau is an outlaw, but they work well together on missions for the Dongjiang resistance to Imperial Japanese occupation. However, those are only short-term assignments. Over the long-term, Fong will endure the occupation and the stress of her clandestine work thanks to the support of her caustic mother. Ann Hui takes viewers behind enemy lines, but she is even more interested in life on the home front. She is admittedly not one to wave the bloody shirt, which is why some speculate her film was precipitously replaced as the opening night film of this Shanghai International Film Festival. Regardless, Ann’s Our Time Will Come released in Chinese-language markets just in time for the official Handover anniversary celebrations and opens this Friday in New York, soon after our own Independence Day (trailer here).

Poet and future PRC Minister of Culture is renting a room from Fong’s mother (she will be called Mrs. Fong, period), but they can sense he is primed to bolt. Fong herself will help facilitate his flight as part of an underground Varian Fry-like operation to smuggle intellectuals out of occupied Hong Kong. Her grace under pressure is definitely noticed by Lau. He is still relatively new to the resistance, but not to living a shadowy underground existence. Soon, Lau returns to recruit her to lead their urban division. There will definitely be sparks passing between them, but they will not have time for that until after victory.

Both Fong and Lau will become very, very good at what they do. Mrs. Fong is troubled by the risks her daughter takes, but she starts to worm her way into low level resistance activities, to maintain a connection with her. Meanwhile, Fong’s ex, Gam-wing accepts a white-collar office position with the Imperial government. However, he is not a collaborator. Instead, he is an independent mole, looking for an opportunity to do some serious damage on his own initiative.

Frankly, the time has come for an Ann Hui career retrospective, considering how consistent and prolific her work has been, especially as she approaches 70. Arguably, the long, almost self-contained Mao Dun sub-plot gives the film a somewhat episodic feel, but it is still a rich cinematic feast. Zhou Xun and Eddie Peng have terrific chemistry together as colleagues-not-lovers, Fong and Lau. Zhou is still one of the most expressive actresses on the planet, while Peng has developed some tremendous action chops that Hui periodically allows him to show-off. Honestly, Peng has become the movie-star Tom Cruise mistakenly thinks he still is.

Wallace Huo (who has back-to-back New York releases, following Reset) is also terrifically suave and intriguing as Gam-wing—a heroically roguish performance in the tradition of George Sanders in B-movies like Appointment in Berlin. However, Deannie Ip truly takes command of the film in the third act as the unlikely and tragically valiant Mrs. Fong.

As cool as it is to see “Big” Tony Leung Kar-fai playing an elderly Dongjiang veteran chronicling the exploits of Fong and Lau to an interviewer (played by Hui), those modern-day segments mostly take us out of the film rather than pulling us in. This film brings out the armchair editor in us, making us want to tighten it up and tweak the structure precisely because the superstar cast is so fantastic in it. The period production details are also spot-on and the action sequences are brief, but muscular and adrenaline-charged. Ultimately, it is a touching film about family and sacrifice. In other words, it is an Ann Hui film. Quite highly recommended overall, Our Time Will Come opens this Friday (7/7) in New York, at the AMC Empire.

NYAFF ’17: Rage

It’s all about the red herrings. Three young men happen to bear a resemblance to the vague descriptions of a notorious killer following his plastic surgery. In one case, it is because he is indeed Yamaguchi, the murderer of a suburban couple. The other two have the misfortune of being socially awkward and having the wrong kind of look. Those who had just started to trust the three mystery loners will begin to suspect they might be the killer in Lee Sang-il’s Rage (trailer here), which screens during this year’s New York Asian Film Festival.

You do not have to explain the evil men are capable of to Yohei Maki. He has just rescued his runaway daughter from enslavement in a sex club, where she was horribly abused. He is trying to provide a low stress environment that resembles normalcy for Aiko, so he doesn’t object when she commences a relationship with his quiet, new part-timer, Tetsuya Tashiro. Frankly, he is probably the only young man in their provincial seaside town who will look past her notorious past.

Meanwhile, in Tokyo, Yuma Fujita has a decidedly unromantic meeting with the sort-of-willing Naoto Onishi is a gay bath house. Despite staying resolutely in the closet as far as his business associates and college friends are concerned, Fujita takes the unsophisticated Onishi home with him. While he successfully grooms the young outsider into the sort of companion he desires, he never fully trusts him.

Our third suspect will be Shingo Tanaka, a backpacker squatting in an abandoned bunker on a small, deserted isle in the Okinawas. Izumi Komiya and Tatsuya Chinen happen upon him when they arrive one day for a picnic. Unfortunately, their story will take terrible detour when Komiya is assaulted by two G.I.s late one night on the streets of Naha.

It is remarkable how convincingly Lee’s adaptation of Shuichi Yoshida’s novel casts suspicion on each of the three lone wolves. Lee never really gives us the clues to unmask the killer on our own, because the whole point is to experience the uncertainty and paranoia. Tsuyoshi Imai’s editing rather brilliantly serves that purpose.

Ken Watanabe also once again proves he is one of the best in the business when not making massive Hollywood tent-poles. There is a poignant simplicity to his performance as Maki, the desperately concerned father that will hit viewers on a deep level. Likewise, the deceptive power of Aoi Miyzaki portrayal of Aiko Maki make the coastal Chiba segments the most emotionally involving. Still, Suzu Hirose is heartbreakingly innocent and vulnerable as Komiya.

Ironically, Go Ayano and Kenichi Matsuyama are largely forced into one-note performances Onishi and Tashiro to maintain suspicions, whereas Mirai Moriyama is allowed more flamboyance as Tanaka. Poor Pierre Taki is admirably salty and world weary as Kunihisa Nanjo, the senior detective working the original double-homicide, but he is largely crowded out of his screen time by the three suspects and their story arcs. It really is tough to be a public servant, isn’t it?

Frankly, Lee drags out the three moments of truth far longer than necessary. Still, it is a smart, bracing film that manages to be both forgiving of human weakness and grimly cautionary regarding human nature’s capacity for sin and violence. Very highly recommended, Rage screens this Wednesday (7/5) at the Walter Reade, as part of the 2017 NYAFF.

NYAFF ’17: The Long Excuse

Sachio Kinugasa writes under a pen-name, because he is the namesake of a famous Japanese baseball player, but most viewers will simply think of him as the cheating jackass. When his long-suffering wife dies in a bus accident, it hardly phases him at all. However, he might finally start feeling something remotely human when (to his own surprise) he befriends the grieving family of his wife’s best friend, who died alongside her, in Miwa Nishikawa’s The Long Excuse (trailer here), which screens during this year’s New York Asian Film Festival.

Kinugasa is rather put out that he now has to cook and clean for himself, but that is about as far as it goes. On the other hand, Yoichi Omiya is utterly destroyed by the loss of his wife. Assuming they share a kinship in their grief, Omiya reaches out to Kinugasa, who goes through the motions, lest the world find out what cold-hearted jerk he is. However, a minor emergency will force him to briefly mind sixth-grade Shinpei Omiya.

It turns out Shinpei is a smart kid, who starts to bond with Kinugasa. Pre-school-age Akari also takes to him as well. Soon, he is regularly tending to the kids, while their father, a long-haul trucker, is away on a run. It is exactly the sort of TV-movie-style arrangement the celebrity-media he previously courted is eager to exploit, but Kinugasa is of two-minds regarding their offers. Of course, that is not a hard and fast no.

Excuse is the kind of film that just lays a beatdown on viewers, yet there is absolutely, positively no cheap, unearned sentiment to be found within it. Frankly, it is debatable just how much Kinugasa evolves over the course of the narrative, but nobody could say he emerges unscathed. Excuse is probably the messiest emotional tangle you might ever see on film, but it is all bitterly realistic, just like life.

This is Masahiro Motoki’s most prominent film role since the Oscar-winning Departures, which is fitting, because Excuse could almost serve as a thematic sequel. Both are all about grief and regret, but Nishikawa (adapting her own novel) is too honest to wrap it up with a big pay-off. Regardless, Motoki serves up his performance from the depth of his soul as the self-centered, self-loathing Kinugasa. It is not pretty, but it is truly devastating.

Despite their youth, both Kenshin Fujita and Tamaki Shiratori are absolutely extraordinary as Shinpei and Akari. Pistol Takehara arrestingly conveys Omiya’s overwhelming grief, while Maho Yamada is sweetly vulnerable as the woman he eventually meets. Yet, Eri Fukatsu literally haunts the film as the smart, pretty, mature, and ever so unappreciated Natsuko Kinugasa, only really seen and heard from early in act one.

Since the 1930s, filmmakers like Yasujiro Ozu and Ysujiro Shimazu have maintained the Japanese film industry’s comparative advantage in domestic dramas. With Excuse, Nishikawa reconfirms it in spades. This is not a Reader’s Digest kind of film, but it is deeply moving. Very highly recommended, The Long Excuse screens on the Fourth of July at the Walter Reade, as part of the 2017 NYAFF.

NYAFF ’17: Dawn of the Felines

Yes, this is another one of those movies from Nikkatsu, but you would hardly know it from watching. Technically, these women are escorts, not prostitutes, but that is only a legal-semantic distinction. Regardless, when they ply their trade it is often unseemly and sometimes downright alarming, but never titillating. Human nature is as grubby as ever in Kazuya Shiraishi’s Dawn of the Felines (trailer here), which screens during this year’s New York Asian Film Festival.

Ironically, Masako frequently lacks a bed to sleep in, because the debt-laden former professional is essentially homeless. She usually sleeps in internet café booths, but Takada, a financial self-sufficient hikikomori client, extends an open invitation to sleep over, with no quid pro quos. It sounds like a good deal, but something about the way he embraces the worst impulses of the internet makes her wary.

Rie is actually the only housewife employed by the agency supposedly offering wayward home-makers. She caught her husband cheating, so she now secretly returns the favor multiple times over, but without any emotional entanglements. At least that was the plan, but instead she draws a grieving widower as a regular client. It is not clear what he wants from her, but it is not sex. That’s just not happening for him anymore.

Yui seems like the perkiest and most upbeat of the focal trio, but the bruises on her little boy Kenta suggest otherwise. She will disappear for days, leaving Kenta in the care of a veritable stranger, but that Craigslist sitter is easily the most redemptive man in the film. Thanks to him, Dawn cannot be accurately characterized as anti-male, but he is mistreated rather badly for his efforts. No good deed.

If any of this turns you on seek professional help immediately. The title deliberately echoes the 1972 naughty Nikkatsu Night of the Felines and Kazuko Shirakawa, the star of the Apartment Wife franchise, appears in a cameo, but the tone of Dawn is much closer to Michael Glawogger’s observational expose, Whores’ Glory. Best known for gritty crime dramas, like Twisted Justice and The Devil’s Path, Shiraishi brings the same sensibilities to bear when portraying the oldest profession.

Furthermore, these are a far cry from the sort of performances you typically find in exploitation films. Juri Ihata’s portrayal of Masako is richly complex and rigorously unsentimental. She plays her tough and smart, but also quite vulnerable. Satsuki Maue effectively brings out the Jekyll and Hyde in Yui, but the one-named Michie probably takes the honors with her mature yet frequently surprising work as Rie.

This is a film that transcends it genre, but not the Nikkatsu formula. It openly invites viewers to sympathize with its characters and bemoan the demeaning nature of their business, but the sex scenes still come along like clockwork. In fact, they rather help reinforce the message. Recommended for those interested in women’s issues and the R-P sub-genre (two sets of viewers who don’t overlap all that often), Dawn of the Felines screens on the Fourth of July at the Walter Reade, as part of the 2017 NYAFF.

NYAFF ’17: Ordinary Person

Andrei Chikatilo, a.k.a. “The Rostov Ripper” or “Citizen X,” murdered at least fifty-two people between 1978 and 1990 in the USSR, before finally facing prosecution in 1992. At least South Korea’s militarist Fifth Republic was more efficient. When they discover a serial killer striking throughout the country they quickly close in on him. They will also provide a spare for public pillory when the real perp dies prematurely. The frame-up job will fall to Kang Sung-jin. He was chosen for his patriotism and righteousness, but he becomes a problem for his co-conspirators for the same reasons in Kim Bong-han’s Ordinary Person (trailer here), which screens during this year’s New York Asian Film Festival.

Kang was wounded fighting in Vietnam so no commie lover is he. Nor is he an ACLU type. When necessary, he is perfectly willing and able to rough up a suspect. Due to a combination of diligent and dirty police work, he collars Kim Tae-sang, who really did commit one murder—one and only one. Conveniently, Kim’s low-I.Q. and marginalized social status make him a perfect patsy to take the fall. Kang even believes it for a while, until his muckraking former classmate Chu Jae-jin starts pointing out obvious inconsistencies. However, at this point Kang has grown used to accepting favors from the intelligence service, including a critical leg operation for his young son.

Of course, Chu is not the sort to back down, so we know what that will get him. However, it will also reawaken Kang’s quixotic passion for truth and justice. Unfortunately, nobody fights dirtier than Choi Gyu-nam, the up-and-coming intelligence planner quarterbacking the operation. He’s simply scum.

So again, South Koreans are just super-happy with the current state of their body politic, as we can glean from the subconscious evidence buried within their films. Be that as it may, the paranoia and cynicism actually makes the first two acts pretty darned tight, tense, and intriguing. The problem comes when Kang starts making really ill-advised decisions, solely to stimulate Choi’s villainy and put the corrupt copper in the mood for payback.

Despite the late innings collapse, Son Hyun-joo is rock-solid throughout as the craggy copper Kang. Likewise, Jang Hyuk will have viewers smelling sulfur whenever he is on-screen as the sinister Choi. The often shticky Kim Sang-ho delivers a career-best (so far), as the crusading Chu. It is also great fun to watch manly Jeong Man-sik do his thing as the more likably corrupt intelligence chief, Shin Yong-soo.

You are never wasting your time watching cats like Son and Jeong in a dark noir. If Ordinary were releasing in theaters during a slow week, it would easily be your best bet, but there is just an embarrassment of riches at NYAFF. By all means, go if you already have a ticket, but if you just want to check out a Korean film, you should first opt for The Truth Beneath, Fabricated City, or Vanishing Time: A Boy Who Returned. Recommended in its proper pecking order, Ordinary Person screens on the Fourth of July at the Walter Reade, as part of the 2017 NYAFF.

NYAFF ’17: The Village of No Return

If you have seen Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, you understand our innermost pain is what makes us human. The sinister con man masquerading as a Taoist priest would respond by offering to remove the pain of watching Star Trek V with his “Worry Ridder.” However, once you start letting someone erase the past, it inevitably leads to tyranny in Chen Yu-hsun’s goofy but still on-point satire The Village of No Return (trailer here), which screens during this year’s New York Asian Film Festival.

During the early days of the Chinese Republic, the well-heeled Rock Peeler is hatching an evil scheme to invade and dominate sleepy Desire Village with the help of the outlaw Cloud Clan. Big Pie was supposed to be his plant in the village, but his broken-hearted wife Autumn kind of-sort of poisoned him. It’s complicated, but she has good reason to feel guilty about it. Fortune Tien can fix that.

After his grand entrance, the village’s only slightly corrupt chief has the flamboyant flim flam man imprisoned, which might be his only wise decision in the entire film. Nevertheless, the smooth-talking Tien is administering memory wipes soon enough. Of course, once he starts poking around in villagers’ heads, he gives them full scrubs, leaving them susceptible to his nefarious suggestions that he is their beloved chief and Autumn is his adoring wife.

Ironically, it is Autumn who holds out the longest, because she is reluctant to lose her memories of her long lost true love, the chief’s son, Dean Wang. He went into the city to take the Civil Service exam, but disappeared during the Republican revolution. As fate would have it, he fell in with the Cloud Clan and is now lurking outside Desire Village, waiting for the messenger pigeons Big Pie will not be releasing.

Yes, you can read into Village a subtext regarding those who forget the past and dictators who censor unpleasant history into society’s memory hole. There are also a lot of people hitting each other and falling down. There is indeed plenty of slapstick business, but unlike some shticky Mainland comedies, this Taiwanese import has other things on its mind. For one thing, the steampunky design of the Memory Ridder is undeniably cool and its implications are pretty serious. Chen & Chang Yaosheng’s screenplay goes from bumpkin bumbling to dystopian mind control in record time.

The film is also anchored by the wonderfully subtle and sly Shu Qi, who effortlessly ranges from grandly tragic to radiantly sweet and archly suspicious and then back again. Joseph Chang Hsiao-chuan manages to be both nebbish and darkly brooding as village’s highly trained martial artist, who has never managed to use his skills due to an acute childhood trauma. Wang Qianyuan chews the scenery like mad as Fortune Tien, but he still can’t lay a glove on Eric Tsang, this year’s NYAFF Star Hong Kong Life Achievement Award recipient, who definitely does his thing as Rock Peeler.

There is plenty of broad humor in Village, but there is also some distinctive design work, a cautionary warning against sacrificing freedoms for the sake of comfort, and Shu Qi. What more do you need? Recommended for those who dig a wacky allegory, The Village of No Return screens tomorrow (7/2) at the Walter Reade, as part of the 2017 NYAFF.

NYAFF ’17: Fantasy of the Girls

Why would high schools ever stage a production of Romeo & Juliet? It tells kids their teenage love is eternal and suicide is a valid answer when their parents object. Instead, they should be mounting shows that instill respect for their elders, like A Trip to Bountiful and The Sunshine Boys. Nevertheless, it is Romeo & Juliet the drama club at Sun Wha’s all-girls school will put on and it will definitely not temper their girl-crushes in Ahn Jung-min’s Fantasy of the Girls, which screens during this year’s New York Asian Film Festival.

Underclassman Sun Wha’s best friend has a huge crush on motorcycle-driving school thespian Hanam, so she coaches her to audition for the role of Juliet Capulet opposite her Romeo. However, as things will happen in teen movies, she winds up with the part herself. When she starts to rehearse with the rebellious Hanam, she starts to get her friend’s attraction. Meanwhile, Su-yeon, the student director, finds herself attracted to Sun Wha, giving her a double shot of jealousy, since she was also ambiguously close with Hanam.

And so it goes, with teachers an absolute non-factor and parents being a mostly ineffectual but reasonably pleasant presence in their kids’ lives. Basically, if you read a lot of school-crush yuri and yaoi manga, Fantasy is your cup of tea. In this case, it would be manhwa, but you get the idea. Ahn is also quite restrained and chaste in her approach. A little bit of hand-holding is about as risqué as the film gets.

It is also nice to see all the relevant parties are safely within the same age bracket. Frankly, the universal adulation for Blue is the Warmest Color and the upcoming Call Me By Your Name is quite problematic given their depictions of adults “initiating” not quite of-age teens in the love-that-dared-not-speak-its-name-during-the-times-of-Oscar-Wilde. Didn’t Milo Y. get run out of town on a rail for suggesting such behavior was acceptable? But we digress.

Regardless, No Jeong-ee is indeed quite winning Sun Wha, as is her BFF, but alas online credits are spotty for Fantasy. Nara is sort of stuck in ice queen gear for much of the film, but she certainly exudes coolness. However, the real standout is Cho Soo-hyang, who subtly and smoothly covers quite a wide emotional gamut as Su-yeon.

As a bonus, the periodic interludes depicting Sun Wha’s fantastical daydreaming are cleverly rendered and should appeal to NYAFF regulars. There are some terrific performances throughout the film, but the stakes are relatively low (granted, that is not necessarily a bad thing). In any event, viewers will identify with these characters and care about their very realistic, down-to-earth dramas. Indeed, this film is exponentially healthier than the dysfunctional and predatory Warmest Color. Recommended for fans of light yuri and high school coming of age films, Fantasy of the Girls screens on the Fourth of July at the Walter Reade, as part of the 2017 NYAFF.