The Golden Buddha (Hong Kong, 1966) – 2,5/5
Spy esque Thailand adventure (with recycled Bond music) from Lo Wei. A good amount of fun, including femme fatales and fight sequences where every punch misses by 15 cm, but the running time is too long. 15 minutes away would make the film notably more compact, and not really any less logical than it is now. There’s a tattoo scene in the film that reveals a pair of breats, not something you’d necessarily expect from a 1966 Shaw film.
- dvd / IVL
OL Nikki: Mesuneko No Joji (Japan, 1972) – 1/5
Rie Nakagawa plays a woman who goes crazy and locks herself into an appartment with her boss. There’s some nice images and an attempt to reach a psychological level, but director Akira Kato doesn’t manage to put the bits together successfully enough to create a solid package.
- dvd / R2J
Black Magic (Hong Kong, 1975) – 2/5
Death magic, lightning magic, and love magic… that requires breast milk to work. It’s a fun first half, but unfortunately later the film starts repeating itself and doesn’t manage to raise the stakes. When the final confrontation comes you can hardly even keep tracks who’s under whose spell. No match for the brutally powerful 80’s black magic thrillers.
- dvd / IVL
Love Letter (Japan, 1981) – 1/5
Nikkatsu celebrates their 10 years of Meisaku Roman with a serious melodrama. It’s no more exploitation than the films directors like Shohei Imamura were churning out at the same time. Soundtrack, writing and cinematography aren’t especially bad, but don’t have any notable attributes either. The same can be said about the entire film. Just another routine drama among others. The Japanese Academy honored Katsuo Nakamura’s performance with the Best Actor award.
- dvd / Uplink
Hell Has no Boundary (Hong Kong, 1982) – 1/5
A possessed girl uses her supernatural powers to take revenge on everyone who has done her wrong. Promising first 30 seconds, followed by uneffective next 30 minutes, and then nothing worth seeing at all. Surprisingly, the same director was able to come up with a very solid thriller next year with Seeding of a Ghost.
- dvd / IVL
Mischievous Lolita: Attacking The Virgin From Behind (Japan, 1986) – 1/5
Future mainstream / arthouse director Shusuke Kaneko’s talent is nowhere to be seen in this dull pink fare. It’s the classic fantasy tale of a man who discovers a plastic doll… that later turns into a real girl. As for the film’s defense it must be said that the lead girl Yuko Mizushima is exceptionally cute for a genre film actress. It’s a shame she isn’t nearly as much of an actress as she’s a looker. Part blame goes to the screenplay that effectively eliminates all potentially cute elements from the storyline. Some random great laughs are on offer, but stupid side plots that are only there to satisfy the raincoat men neutralize the positive effect. Oh, and in case you didn’t figure out already, the title is yet another lottery drawing by the studio. There is no connection whatsoever between the title and content.
- dvd / R2J
Porco Rosso (Japan, 1992) – 3,5/5
A pig’s gotta fly. Terrific first half, followed by some softening during the last 40 minutes. The title character is excellent.
- dvd / UK
Full Alert (Hong Kong, 1997) – 4/5
Ringo Lam’s hard hitting cop thriller surprises with its realism. There’s a couple of small flaws (those damned flashbacks) but the atmosphere and good acting by Lau Ching Wan and Francis Ng make up for it. Also included is an excellent car chase sequence.
- dvd / FI
Suicide Club (Japan, 2002) – 4,5/5
As over-rated as Japanese horror may be, this is truly one of the best and most original horror movies of the last few decades. Sion Sono delivers a gut wrenchingly graphic, completely original and even beautiful film. The opening scene alone is exceptionally memorable. The film that follows, however, is much more than just a gore ride. But, perhaps the most describing single proof of the director’s talent is how he doesn’t use classical music in the suicide scenes. Almost any other director would’ve done that, and ruined some of the uniqueness in the process.
- dvd / TLA remaster
Bokusatsu tenshi Dokuro-chan (Japan, 2005) (Season 1) – 2,5/5
Cuteness anime with blood pressure. Sakura is a schoolboy who lives with a recless angel. She can bring people back to life, which is a very useful skill because due to her bad temper she ends up killing Sakura 5-7 times every day. The ultra-violence is endlessly funny, but half of the jokes try too hard to work. But it’s a machine gun show that hits the target at least once a minute, so not bad way to spend 12 or 24 minutes (the episodes are actually double episodes). Works when served in small portions.
- dvd / R1
Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani? (Japan, 2005) – 3,5/5
- A virus causing depression and despair, and ultimately leading to suicide, has taken the lives of 3 million Japanese. Two new age musicians (Tadanobu Asano and Masaya Nakahara) have been able to fight the symptoms through noice. Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani differs from most other apocalyptic visions in its minimalism; there’s no doomsday imagery, and the seashore setting looks almost normal, only people have become even fewer than before. Appart from a couple of short scenes in the beginning and a few flashbacks only 6 actors appear in the film. The slow pace is welcome, and the lengthy noice creation sessions will test the audience’s patience. Unfortunately the director has also felt the need to add childish sci-fi content and â€