March 29, 2004

• Spring Break is over :(

  Click here for entry 2004.03.20 Spring Break: the last day...

  Note: The magic number is approaching faster than I have any legitimate reason to expect. Let me know if its you, even the Vixen--even though she called me cocky... how'd you know? And if you don't know what the "magic number" is, well, read some of the comments...

  Spring Break is over

  Another DVD I rented was a Japanese science fiction flick that got a lot of play in Japan. Returner
  turned out to be much better than I had anticipated. It was supposedly
  produced in an attempt to avoid the serious, artistic films such as
  Maboroshi or AfterLife, and create something that resembles the US
  blockbuster, action flick, so popular in Japan. It's not great by any
  means, but my expectations were so low that it turned out to be quite
  entertaining. The movie is influenced by films that should be familiar
  to most of us. *Warning! Warning! Possible spoilers dectected* It is the future and the world being destoyed by aliens in fast photon-shooting ships (reminiscent of Independence Day).
  For good measure, some ships are disguised as regular planes to
  infiltrate humans holed up in Tibet, then transform into shrimp-bent
  baddies (remember The Transformers?). They decide that the
  only way to save themselves is to travel to the past and prevent the
  war from happening in the first place (Terminator). The time
  machine is incomplete but someone has to go, and a ragamuffin young
  girl is the last chance as the aliens enter the cave where humanity
  makes its last stand. She travels into the past and falls right in the
  middle of a fight between a Miyamoto (Kaneshiro) who is seeking revenge
  on a Chinese/Japanese mobster-connection thug named Mizoguchi
  (Kishitani). Miyamoto kicks but in regular and slow motion, and
  Mizoguchi escapes. In the process, however, Miyamoto accidentally
  shoots the girl, Milly, and they hook up. She tries to explain to him
  that she's from the future, but he'll have none of it, so she proves it
  with her slow-time-down-watch that makes her rund in super speed while
  everything else seem to be stopped (Matrix). After Miyamoto
  becomes a believer, they go to the reserach center where the first
  alien is being kept, the alien suspecte of starting this whole war in
  the future. But when they finally get to this small creature with huge
  eyes, all he (it?) want to do is "go home" and tries to connect with
  these kind humans (E.T.). Get the picture?

  This
  movie has gotten a load of bad press, and because of its derivative
  nature, it is perhaps understandable. But there are two big things that
  they do not understand. Yeah, right, the O-man's the only one who can see the light, hahaha, I'm so full of it.
  The Japanese--first in classical poetry, then in others genres from
  drama to narratives--make an art of "borrowing" from other sources.
  This is not meant to plagerize but to celebrate the past and to expand
  the meaning of present. In Returner, the connection is obvious to E.T.,
  so while we have this warm and fuzzy image of ET in our mind, we are
  watching another alien being kept away from its mothership, and
  understand the wrath that could befall mankind if a Mizoguchi finds an
  alien rather than Elliott. This makes for a more complex viewing of the
  film, one that should make us think about different possibilities
  rather than deride the copying. And indeed, copying from an obvious
  source is crucial, as Fujiwara Teika once wrote. If the reference was
  obscure, what effect would it have? In the West, this technique is
  usually reserved for spoofs such as MAD Magazine or The Simpsons. But
  in Japan, it is an artistic technique.

  The other thing these
  critics are missing is the comic book aspect. Many of them made
  reference to anime, but this is definitely a comic book movie. Many of
  the scenes are "frozen" as if they were a cell straight out of a manga
  (J comic books). There is one scene in which Miyamoto is shot in the
  street and the rain is falling down on him. The shot is taken from
  above with streams of rain falling down at an angle for a 3D effect
  toward the prone figure on the ground. And what is a movie but a 2D
  photograph in motion. This is classic comic book technique to provide
  depth perception--a technique begun by Tezuka Osamu in the 50s and
  adopted by US comic book artists much later.

  Anyway, I'm not
  trying to sell the movie. It wasn't THAT good. But it can be better
  appreciated than the critics would lead you to believe. If you have a
  lazy weekend someday, it might be fun to watch.

  • 2:02 PM
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