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Author Topic: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts  (Read 561657 times)

roujin

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #890 on: December 19, 2009, 02:56:51 PM »
I pick out my movies based on the wackiness of the titles.

facedad

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #891 on: December 19, 2009, 11:13:17 PM »
License to Live (Kiyoshi Kurosawa, 1998, Japan)
It's Kurosawa, so I don't even have to watch five minutes to know that it's going to make a really good first impression with its style and atmosphere, even if the story fails to meet expectations in the end.  But I'll watch a little, just in case.  Eh, nevermind, my subtitles are messed up anyway.  But the film looks fine.  I think it's even faceboy-approved!
That it is.
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smirnoff

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #892 on: December 20, 2009, 01:17:38 AM »
It's been a good day for this bracket.  Nice write up Melvil.  I have to say the premise for Orchard sounds more interesting, but since you liked Minbo so much, I'm interested to see how it does in the next round.

My thoughts exactly. Reading your Orchard review I thought it would win. Very interesting.

roujin

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #893 on: December 22, 2009, 09:29:18 AM »
a sleeping beast awakens: roujin's 10th verdict

Red Rose White Rose vs. Red Firecracker, Green Firecracker


Red Rose White Rose (Stanley Kwan, 1994)

This is an adaptation of an Eileen Chang short story. I found this out after I watched the film although I had an inkling that it was based on a book of some sort about 5 minutes into the film. How did I know that? Well, the film uses direct text from the story for its voice-over and for these extremely annoying intertitles that as Tony Rayns puts it "Chang's tone of irony is essential to the story." He then goes on to compare the film to The Age of Innocence (link). Frankly, the first thing that came to my head when I watched the film was that I was watching a really low-rent version of either In The Mood For Love or 2046. Surprise, Doyle shot this film. The story follows a young man coming back from Edinburgh who wants to be an upright citizen and be successful and all that stuff. He's emblematic of what I guess Chinese men should want to strive for. Problem is: he's kind of a douche. He gets back from Edinburgh and stays with a pal and his wife. He notices that the wife likes to CINECAST! around and through intertitles we are informed that he does not want to get involved in the affairs of husband and wife. What does he do? He CINECAST!s her. Only logical, right? Apparently, Chinese men are allowed two women in their lives. One is the red rose, a woman who is passionate and fun and gets the men all worked up. Joan Chen plays that woman and she does pretty well, I guess. But then she gets all serious on the dude (played with increasing coldness by Winston Chao, a cheap Tony Leung) and he's like "nah, that ain't me" and bails out. So, after the man has had his share of illicit fun, he settles down with a prim and proper "white rose." The next half of the film is basically about showing the emptiness and the coldness in that marriage. It's the half that worked the most for me as it basically was about the slow decaying of this dude's soul as it physically manifests itself through his wife. It's solid stuff and the douche factor of Winston Chao really pays off here. But, anyway, it's still not that great. And the "irony" of the text that Kwan was adapting probably could've been shown in a way that's less annoying. And, whatever, it's basically a Doyle jizzfest and it was as good as that can be with a subpar story.

Another thing: pix mentioned that these had the worst credits ever. pix is right. I assume this is how Avatar is like.



Red Firecracker, Green Firecracker (Ping He, 1994)

huh, I don't really know what to say about this one other than it kept me more engaged than the Roses movie. It's about this girl who inherits the family's firecracker business. Now, she runs the whole business, dresses like a man and is called "Young Master" or "Boss" by everyone. Due to some retarded family rules, the business can only be run by family, but, apparently, the girl can't marry according to the rules. Those are some dumb ancestors. Anyway, this one "itinerant" artist guy shows up and he's charged with painting the doors of the huge fortress where the firecracker lady lives. What will happen? She falls in love with him, duh, and starts dressing like a woman and things happen, terrible things, like fires and whippings and tortures, all because the firecracker lady wants to be seen as a woman. The film is kind of confusing sometimes. I think this may be due to the subtitles which aren't perfect although you can generally get the point. But also the narrative is just confusing: sometimes the artist seems to leave but then he's still there the next scene? And I don't think the subtitles convey what's really supposed to have happened between firecracker lady and the artist that well. There's gotta be some lost nuance going on here. Anyway, the firecrackers are some sort of sexual metaphor because no firecrackers are allowed to go off in the fortress where the firecracker lady lives (sexual repression!) and if you set one off, you get beaten the CINECAST! up by a bunch of the people who work there. the whole thing is made even clearer when there's a firecracker handling competition (whut?) to see who can marry the firecracker lady and there's an apparent castration. It's some weird stuff, not all of it made sense to me. Largely, I think the appeal of the film is in the firecracker lady herself. Early on in the film, she's all distant and cold and upholding the family rules, but as the film goes on, she becomes more human and her performance shows that really well or something. Whatever. Doesn't matter. roujin's seeing red again.

pix, I gotta submit you to Red Rose White Rose. I'm sorry. I'm sure Doyle can keep it interesting enough for you though. Maybe enough for you to find the gay subtext that I'm sure is there.

Red Firecracker, Green Firecracker moves on.
« Last Edit: December 22, 2009, 09:33:47 AM by roujin »

pixote

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #894 on: December 22, 2009, 09:42:17 AM »
a sleeping beast awakens: roujin's 10th verdict

This is good, roujin.  Very good.  You should watch better films next time, though.  Did I sell you on that Rosenbaum-approved matchup of Blush and Mr. Zhao yet?  Actually, that might just be a exact arthouse parallel to the matchup you just completed.  Which is scary.  You should probably watch The Days, The Making of Steel, Midori, Okoge, or Pom Poko (Junior's busy and stuff) and some other film.  I guess those those animated films could pair off alright.

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Melvil

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #895 on: December 22, 2009, 04:15:58 PM »
Frankly, the first thing that came to my head when I watched the film was that I was watching a really low-rent version of either In The Mood For Love or 2046.

That sounds horrible. If it was just bad that would be okay, but that makes it so much worse. At least there's pretty Doyleness. But I don't know what you're talking about, those credits are epic.

The firecracker movie sounds like it has more to offer, although it doesn't sound especially great.

Nice writeup, roujin. Welcome back to the FEB!

'Noke

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #896 on: December 25, 2009, 08:52:32 PM »
Kagero Vs.12 Storeys

Kagero














I was once reading somewhere about the famous Cropduster scene in North by Northwest where they mentioned that it’s the perfect scene because it “Adds nothing to the narrative but does not ruin the flow of the movie” I guess that’s the best way to describe the opening moment of Kagero. We open on a woman, with clothes off(Just cause) at sunset, a beautiful sunset. She is pouring water over herself. But what strikes us is that Tattoo. What is it? Why is it there? What does it mean? All questions plaguing modern man symbolised in a Tattoo.

The rest of the film, unfortunately, doesn’t reach the transcendence of that moment, which I argue would be very hard to do (someone get PTA on the phone). However, it does have some really nice moments in it, there’s a great scene with a (unfortunately explicit) great shot of the same woman carrying a bowl of water, mainly as a balancing act. It’s a pretty shot, and a pretty sequence, but it’s diminished by the fact that we know who this is and what she’s doing. By contrast, the opening shot is a wonderful enigma.

The bad news is that the film doesn’t go near those heights again. The good news is that it doesn’t try to.
 
It’s more of a kick-ass/emotional journey, and it works really well. Our protagonist is A lone woman who, after meeting her brother and learning that the house she grew up in with foster parents has been taken over by samourai, proceeds to enter the DARK AND DANGEROUS WORLD OFFF umm..gambling.

The movie’s trick is to slyly change styles on the fly, like Tarantino does in IB, though much more deliberately in Tarantino’s picture. It goes from some sort of relationship drama to win against all odds to revenge tale until she gets fireworks and BLOWS EVERYTHING UP!! (I’m loving the caps lock key today).

But it works! Unlike a movie which tried to do the same thing, Thirst, what Hideo Gosha gets right much more then that film is two fold. The first is subtlety. Instead of grand changes he keeps the basic idea the same and twists certains aspects of the films style. Second, his character is very relatable. She’s hnot hell bent on a mission, she’s just kind of a person. Not a normal dude kind of person, just a person, she’s not got a lot of emotional depth or intensity, though she is very professional and shows herself as one who plays with the men. (Quote this out of context)
 
Plus, he gets very nice moments. One of my new favourite romantic pairings must now be the lead and her opponent cause, not only is he her opponent, but he also killed her father when she was little!! And you expect the movie to go all Kill Bill on him but instead it twists with our expectations and becomes a very touching love story. With two people. Who kick amazing amounts of ass at the end.
 
12 Storeys













12 Storeys is one of those twisting tales of multiple people, all of whom live in a flat. The movie starts out on a man, who having had his soul been somewhat crushed by alcohol and cigarettes, goes up to the 12th floor following an elderly woman. While up there, she puts her foot over the ledge, considers jumping, then pulls it back. The man then looks out across the planes for a bit, and does the same. Except he actually jumps. There’s a great moment where he’s lying on the ground and six people are just staring at him and someone comes up to them and says “Who called the ambulance? Didn’t anyone call an ambulance??”

The movie is actually about three plotlines. My favourite, and the one given the least amount of screen time, is about the woman mentioned earlier. In a very Jeanne Dielman-esque way she mainly spends the day doing house chores, clearing up the flat. However, in the back ground we hear the constant berating of her by her mother, how is talking about how she is a pig, lazy, and much worse then her surrogate sister. Of course, the mother is actually dead; this is just the woman thinking to the past/berating herself. It’s a great segment, as we get the sister coming over later on and she’s not really the person she’s hyped up to be. She’s the stereotypical upper class socialite. And the woman is a better daughter. But that’s just my opinion.

The second story is about a couple. One is the doting husband, the other is the gold digging wife who has been duped into the marriage thinking he was a millionaire. At first, we hate the wife, always mad, always hating against him for things that just seem stupid, like the allowance she gets and all that. She’s really a despicable character. But the Eric Khoo, by the end, allows you to feel sympathy for her. The husband is not a great guy either, he’s a doormat and he’s quite the sad sack. And you get to feel the crushing weight that the wife feels, stuck in this marriage for the rest of her life. But that’s just my opinion.

The third strand, given the most time I think and probably the worst of the three, Is about a brother looking after his two siblings. It’s mainly about him trying to get the older sister to study, and not stay out too late, and to stay a virgin. (STAY IN SCHOOL KIDS!! DON’T DO DRUGS!!!) There’s no plot, and you know the films of Miss Reichardt and Mr Bahrani, the ones with barely any plot but achingly beautiful moments. Well, Khoo can’t really achieve that. First of all, he tries to invent conflict through performances and style that isn’t really there at all, and he doesn’t know how to use the plot at all. Also, I stopped caring about either side by the end, although we do get that insane reaction shot as seen up above. But that’s just my opinion.

Two side attractions were also great. The people talking at the table outside were fun, but my favourite part of the movie was the spirit of the man who committed suicide. He doesn’t play a role, he just sort of appears in scenes with the Lady in the first story, as a spectre looming over everything. He’s the character I latched onto the most even though he’s barely on screen and he also got some of the best moments.

It’s a really nice looking movie too, there are some great shots.

Also:


Verdict: I liked both of these movies a lot, but I have to go with Kagero. Resurrect 12 Storeys!!
I actually consider a lot of movies to be life-changing! I take them to my heart and they melt into my personality.

Melvil

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #897 on: December 25, 2009, 09:03:46 PM »
Great writeup, 'Noke! Kagero really sounds pretty awesome. I also really like the concept of 12 Storeys, but it sounds like the realization didn't quite live up to it. Sounds like a great first matchup for the bracket though!

sdedalus

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket
« Reply #898 on: December 25, 2009, 09:16:28 PM »
Royal Tramp vs. A Chinese Odyssey 2 & A Chinese Odyssey vs. Royal Tramp 2
 
I remember my verdict, but it's been so long since I watched the films that I don't know how coherently I could write about them.  :(  I think it basically came down to: all four are crazy, but two of them are a little bit too crazy, to the point that one doesn't really care much about the story or characters (or know what/who they are anymore).  The Chinese Odysseys are a bit more visually adventurous, but these are all actor-driven films.



The Royal Tramps are a loose adaptation of a Louis Cha novel (he also wrote the basis for Ashes of Time, IIRC), of which I've read the first volume.  Stephen Chow is a crazy kid who joins a revolutionary gang, becomes apprenticed to a eunuch, befriends the Emperor and uncovers various conspiracies.  In Part 2, Brigitte Lin shows up as "as the leader of an all female martial arts sect whose power is based soley on remaining celibate. Knowing this, the ill-intentioned Prince instructs his goons to poison her with one of the few substances she is not immune to; a poison that can only be remedied by having sex. Luckily, Wilson Bond (Stephen Crow) is up to the task. Once 80% of Lin's mysterious power is transferred to him post-sexual encounter, Wilson becomes a martial artist extraordinaire."  (allmovie).  There's funny stuff in the second one, but it tends more towards movie parodies (there's a funny Wong Kar-wai sequence, referencing Days of Being Wild) whereas the first was mostly physical comedy and puns.



A Chinese Odyssey is essentially a modernization parody of the Monkey King story, with Chow as the leader of an incompetent gang of criminals who through a variety of machinations by immortals gets reincarnated as the Monkey King.  Part 2 has "Joker (Stephen Chow) stranded five centuries in the past and falling for a Spider Web immortal called Lin Zixia (Athena Chu Yun), who is actually part of Buddha's lampwick-given flesh. The other part of the wick is Zixia's evil sister, Lin Qingxia (Ada Choi), who is just one of many enemies whom Joker must face and defeat in his efforts to change the past and save the dying Pak Jing-jing (Karen Mok), who was poisoned by the 30th Madam (Lam Kit Ying) in the first film. The film's most spectacular invention, other than its zombies, giant spiders, and so forth, is King Bull, who has an army of animal-headed mutant warriors and his own personal cadre of oversized bloodsucking fleas."  allmovie again.  The whole thing apparently has something to do with the introduction of Buddhism to China, but I don't remember much about that.

All the movie's are fun and worth seeing, especially if you like Chow.  But really only the first halves were comprehensible enough for me to remember them.  So Royal Tramp and A Chinese Odyssey move on.
« Last Edit: December 26, 2009, 05:07:36 AM by pixote »
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pixote

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #899 on: December 26, 2009, 05:34:11 AM »
omg, so cool.  Love the screenshots, 'Noke.  Kagerô wins on them alone.  It sounds like the ghost of the suicidal guy isn't as big a part of 12 Storeys as I hoped.  That's too bad; when I was reading up on the film, he's the character that intrigued me the most — the one I hoped would elevate the movie above the ordinary.  Glad it was still pretty good, though.

Sounds like a great first matchup for the bracket though!

Second matchup!  And the first was even better, I imagine, seeing the winning film was a discovery that later became gman1050's namesake.

Whoo!  Glad to get those two matchups in the books, sdedalus, and theoretically glad to be done with both sequels (though I'll still give them a watch, I imagine).  Just curious, which of the original films did you prefer: the more visually adventurous one or the one where Stephen Chow gains Brigitte Lin's powers through sex?  (Sight unseen, I'm definitely leaning towards the latter.)

So so very very cool.  Merry Christmas, 90s Far East Bracket!

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