Moderator One Armed Boxer Posted January 7, 2011 Moderator Share Posted January 7, 2011 In what's becoming an increasing trend these days, another of Japans run of the mill TV dramas, 'SP - Security Police', has been turned into a cinematic outing. Although personally I haven't seen it, and probably won't until it reaches TV screens, I thought the trailer was interesting enough to post. It looks like the director is clearly a fan of the Donnie Yen / Wilson Yip collaborations 'Sha Po Lang' and 'Flash Point', as there are almost shot for shot takes of the police baton scene from 'SPL', and the scene where Yen free runs up a wall to avoid the obstactles in his path from 'Flash Point'. I really long for the days when there actually was a Japan action cinema worth talking about, with the likes of Chiba, Kurata, and Shihomi ripping up the screens with their kicks and equally ferocious battle crys. These days it's all so tame that it makes Hong Kong action cinema look alive and well in comparison, oh well at least we have 'KG - Karate Girl' to look forward to in February! EeszCnYjuWs Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Takuma Posted January 7, 2011 Member Share Posted January 7, 2011 Can't say this looks very interesting to me. The only Japanese action and genre cinema worth following nowadays comes from the mini-budget / gaijin-interest corner. Yoshihiro Nishimura, Takanori Tsujimoto etc. Tsujimoto's Hard Revenge Milly: Bloody Battle is probably the best Japanese action movie from the last 15 years. Totally awesome. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator One Armed Boxer Posted January 7, 2011 Author Moderator Share Posted January 7, 2011 I doubt it would be very interesting for anyone beyond the housewives that make up such a huge portion of the audience that watches these TV shows. It's sad to say but the majority of Japanese movies that go onto the big screen in any other country would be classed at Hallmark channel TV movies. They're usually just snail paced domestic dramas but always go down fairly well with the local audiences, which once again mostly consist of women....there is even a "womens day" every month at cinemas in Japan where tickets are sold cheaper than normal. You're completely right that the only movies of any real interest to a wider audience are the low budget splatter fests that have become somewhat of a slowly wearing thin trend since 'Machine Girl' kicked it all off. I haven't seen 'Hard Revenge Milly: Bloody Battle', but from the trailer it looks like fun. I have the first on DVD, but wasn't particularly impressed by it, in particular I thought the whole setting the baby on fire and throwing it around scene was done in bad taste. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Takuma Posted January 7, 2011 Member Share Posted January 7, 2011 haha, I could have written that post. And parly did, actually. The baby scene in HRM is bad taste indeed. However, the sequel is a whole different beast. The best action rush I've got since SPL (Killzone). Worth a topic of it's own, I think: http://www.kungfucinema.com/forums/showthread.php?t=13183 The problem with Japanese mainstream cinema nowadays is just like you said, it's aimed for housewives and school girls. Romance and melodrama galore. The dear brother is dying of cancer, the grandfather is dying of cancer, hell, even the dog is dying of cancer. Deaths usually preceded by a romance or a 60 minute memories flashback of the good old times. Sometimes no death, just romance. The trailers are all made after this model, too. Big emotions, theme song popping up around the 45 second mark... even good films, like some Ryuichi Hiroki* films are given this kind of terrible trailers, making it very difficult to indentify movies worth watching. * Hiroki seems to be losing it, though. I haven't seen his last few films... for a reason. April Bride... and now some jidai geki drama with Yu Aoi (I do love her, but...). If you want to find good Japanese dramas, you basically have to rule out everything that has received advertising campaign, is shot on 35 mm, or is receiving overseas dvd release. It's very difficult... The splatter and "cult" films are hugely unpopular in Japan, too. They're made for foreign audiences mainly. Hardly anyone in Japan goes to see them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator One Armed Boxer Posted January 8, 2011 Author Moderator Share Posted January 8, 2011 The splatter and "cult" films are hugely unpopular in Japan, too. They're made for foreign audiences mainly. Hardly anyone in Japan goes to see them. Ha ha....so true. A couple of years ago a Japanese friend of mine asked me what I wanted for my birthday, the Japan special edition of 'Machine Girl' has just been released, so I asked for that, and told them it was cool if they wanted to watch it beforehand. When they eventually gave it to me their exact words where "I can't believe this movie is Japanese, they must be Chinese actors speaking Japanese, Japan wouldn't make a movie like this". Unbelieveable hey, but that's how deeply instilled into the culture these snore-a-thon domestic dramas are, anything even remotely different is practically dis-owned. The fact that it actually took the movies popularity on DVD in the States for it to even get a release in the country where it was made is probably the biggest tell-tale sign of all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Takuma Posted January 8, 2011 Member Share Posted January 8, 2011 It hasn't been always like that (even with splatter films). Back in the 80's it was the opposite. The Italians were making cannibal and zombie films for the Japanese market. Many European platter films got their finance by selling distribution rights to Japan before the production had even been started. Japan loved ultra-violent horror. Cannibal Holocaust even beat E.T. in the video rental lists. In the mid 90's everything changed. It was around the release of Scream. The press discovered they can make top news by blaming movies on some crimes that had took place in Japan. Suddenly, everyone despised these filthy ultra-violent horror movies. It's even contradictional. At the same time pg-12 rating allows unbeliavable amount of violence. RoboGeisha, Shutter Island, District 9... all pg-12. It's as hyppocritical as USA. But I guess it's because of the samurai film tradition. When half of your film industry is built around katana-genre, you can't avoid some semi-graphic violence. But splatter, that's a no-no. I watched Tetsuo 3 in Sapporo at the end of the first week, with 5 or 6 other viewers. All my friends had seen it 6 months earlier in Finland. The whole world has seen Alien vs Ninja by now. The Japanese opening is sometime in 2011. Mutant Girls Squad never played in Sapporo (a city of almost 2 million people)... or anywhere else in Hokkaido. No wonder since Robo-Geisha played for for about 40 viewers in it's Sapporo opening, even with Iguchi, Nishimura, Asami, Izumi and the Hokkaido born girl whose name I forgot putting up a great show. A Snake of June got 4 viewers in it's Sapporo Tsukamoto retro screening last summer. In Tokyo Fist I was sitting alone with my friend. You show these films in any European country and you have a sold out festival screening. Tokyo is a bit better. And I hear Osaka is quite healthy, too. Fukuoka gets some nice movies too. In the north people prefer to go skiing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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