A single mother’s ex-husband refuses to pay for their son’s schooling. While working in hospice care, a dying patient offers to kill her ex-husband psychically so their son will collect life insurance. When her ex-husband turns up dead, she becomes the prime suspect.Read More »
Seijun Suzuki
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Seijun Suzuki – Kazoku no sentaku AKA A Family’s Choice (1983)
1981-1990JapanMysterySeijun SuzukiTV -
Seijun Suzuki – Haru-Sakura AKA Seijun’s Different Stages of Cherry Blossoms (1983)
1981-1990AsianJapanSeijun SuzukiTVA man looking to transplant cherry blossoms along the countryside encounters a blind woman who accompanies him for the journey.Read More »
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Seijun Suzuki – “Kyôfu gekijô umbalance” Miira no koi AKA A Mummy’s Love (1973)
1971-1980HorrorJapanSeijun SuzukiTVAn editor goes to visit her lecherous old professor to discuss a new publication of Akinari Ueda’s Tales of Spring Rain, and he recounts the story of a revived mummified Buddhist monk who ran amok in a village in pre-modern Japan. In the present, he tells her that her late husband has been spotted roaming nearby lately…Read More »
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Seijun Suzuki – Kawachi Karumen AKA Carmen from Kawachi (1966)
1961-1970ComedyDramaJapanSeijun SuzukiSynopsis:
‘Carmen from Kawachi brings the nihilist Suzuki universe to a woman’s life in the decidedly unsentimental education of a provincial factory worker, Tsuyuko, whose rape by two fellow villagers starts her on the road to sexual awareness and finally, independence. It is a long, picaresque road indeed, meandering from Osaka’s Club Dada, through liaisons with a millionaire, a dominatrix, and an action painter–all the while cohabiting with a degenerate if loving roué. The determining encounter is with a corrupt monk, whose sordid affair with her mother had been for Tsuyuko a primal introduction to sexual hypocrisy and male brutality.’
– James QuandtRead More » -
Seijun Suzuki – Ukigusa no yado AKA Inn Of The Floating Weeds (1957)
1951-1960AsianCrimeJapanSeijun SuzukiAnother Kayo-eiga (Pop Song Film), inspired by the hit Ukikusa No Yado sung by Hachiro Kasuga. Although the singer has a co-starring role, the movie was designed as a star vehicle for the new Nikkatsu hunk, Hiseaki Nitani. He plays a young gangster wanna-be, framed for a murder and sent to prison. Upon release, he gets revenge against the yakuza boss who set him up.Read More »
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Seijun Suzuki – Oretachi no chi ga yurusanai aka Our Blood Will Not Forgive (1964)
1961-1970AsianClassicsJapanSeijun SuzukiThough Suzuki created it in the midst of his stylistic breakthrough, «Our Blood Will Not Forgive» has never received the same amount of attention as other films he made around the same time. Nikkatsu icons Hideki Takahashi and Akira Kobayashi star as brothers — one a gangster, the other an ad man — who unite to avenge their yakuza father’s death eighteen years before. The film features a bold use of colour; an absurdist concluding gunfight; and, in one memorable scene, an impressively illogical use of rear projection as the brothers argue in a car while ocean waves rage around them.Read More »
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Seijun Suzuki – Yumeji (1991)
1991-2000DramaFantasyJapanSeijun SuzukiSynopsis:
Yumeji is the final film in youth-gone-berserk auteur Seijun Suzuki’s acclaimed Taisho Trilogy. Sensual and absurdist, it spins a ghost story around the character and work of real-life painter and poet Yumeji Takehisa (1884-1934). The eponymous character — conjured by Suzuki as a chronic philanderer and dreamer played by former rock star Kenji Sawada — is plagued with ideals of perfect beauty and the terror of his own demise. He falls in love with women, but can never capture their hearts. He is constantly escaping his rivals, but can never face them down.Read More » -
Seijun Suzuki – Jûsangô taihi-sen ori: Sono gôshô o nerae aka Take Aim At The Police Van (1960)
1951-1960Film NoirJapanMysterySeijun SuzukiA sharpshooter kills two prisoners in a police van at night. The guard on the van is suspended for six months; he’s Tamon, an upright, modest man. He begins his own investigation into the murders. Who were the victims, who are their relatives and girlfriends, who else was on the van that night? As he doggedly investigates, others die, coincidences occur, and several leads take him to the Hamaju Agency, which may be supplying call girls. Its owner is in jail, his daughter, the enigmatic Yuko, keeps turning up where Tamon goes. Tamon believes he can awaken good in people, but has he met his match? Will he solve the murders or be the next victim? And who is Akiba?Read More »
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Seijun Suzuki – Yajû no seishun AKA Youth of the Beast (1963)
1961-1970ActionCrimeJapanSeijun SuzukiQuote:
When a mysterious stranger muscles into two rival yakuza gangs, Tokyo’s underworld explodes with violence. Youth of the Beast (Yaju no Seishun) was a breakthrough for director Seijun Suzuki, introducing the flamboyant colors, hallucinatory images, and striking compositions that would become his trademark.Read More »