..thanks to Adam. Cursed to Adam.
1. Akira
2. The Face of Another
3. Suspiria
4. Kwaidan
5. Kafka`s A Country Doctor
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1. Akira (1988) - directed by: Katsuhiro Otomo
Trailer:
Plot:
It is the year 2030, Neo-Tokio still lays in the shadows of WWIII. Its nights are brighter than its days and the commercials all over the city seem realer than its inhabitants. Nothing here has any deeper meaning, it is a city full of crime, violence, drugs and misfortune.
But political corruption does not sleep: Even in such a seemingly anarchic place the money-greedy claws of the politicians never rest and therefore anti-government activists terrorize the streets.
They are unaware though of a much bigger threat, cause even after the nuclear explosion 30 years previous, which led to the World War, science does not stop to joggle with the ultimate power and the idea of showing off to the creator by becoming the creator itself, moral doubts being successfully sacrificed for the "higher ideals".
It is this city the maincharacters of the movie are born into and here it is, where they all have to face their destiny.
Rating:
Fantastic pictures. Never seen before images. A created world as huge and complex as the original Manga for the movie with its more than 2.000 pages must be. You can sense the tremendous work and efforts put into this stream. You are steadily aware of the thought: Man - this is all handmade!! Or even voicemade, when it comes to the rather peculiar soundtrack for the movie. It is a sometimes rather brutal vision of our future - which hopefully never will come true.
You can watch the movie in good quality and with german dubbing on youtube, the original version with english subtitles is also available, but in a much worse quality:
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2. The Face of Another (1966) - directed by: Hiroshi Teshigahara
Trailer:
Plot:
Since I haven`t been watching this one to an end yet, I can`t give a plotsummary, but I can say this:
Imagine you were to lose your face in a fire-accident. Imagine you have been reading Rilke`s "Die Aufzeichnungen des Malte Laurids Brigge" or Paul Auster`s "New York Triology" and know about the importance of your face, but also how a mask or masquerade can lead to the loss of yourself. What would you do then, if you`re suddenly given the chance to get a new face, which is kind of, but not and never entirely yours? Think about it: You will feel estranged from yourself. The ones you know will not know you. The life you lead will become the one of somebody else, that somebody else`s who is suddenly looking at you from the other side of the mirror. You would BE, but at the same time NOT-BE. Intriguing. But also scary.
Rating:
Highly philosophical topics in the esthetics of the 60ies, seeming to have influenced David Lynch`s "The Elephant Man" with furthermore a cult german soundtrack (see youtube-link) while being a book-adoption of the homonymous novel by a guy called Kōbō Abe? Hell yes..I am in!!
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3. Suspiria (1977) - directed by: Dario Argento
Trailer: (do not mind the "look, how greatly we remastered the original"-comments)
Plot:
Easy: Danceacademy in Munich, lots of beautiful young teenanger-women, mysterious murders, ankward looking creeps and lots of occult witchcraft!
Rating:
Isn`t it great to have your own dark imagination as the maintranslator of the horrid things happening there on the screen again? Isn`t it fun to get scared by your own anxieties instead of being only shocked and outraged by all the blood, splatter and rudness being shown blankly to you? Well, I think it is.
After watching this movie alone in a dark apartment I got not only scared of the curtains, but also of my own reflection in the mirror and for the first time in years I started thinking about the dark creatures who could be there lurking in the shadows underneath my bed again. Was great to welcome them back after such a long time.
And Goblin doing the soundtrack..well, that is just wonderful. I think I knew it from a thousand BM-albums before already. Which kind of makes this entry also meaningless. Guess you all experienced Suspiria yourself already.
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4. Kwaidan (1964) - directed by: Masaki Kobayashi
Trailer:
Plot:
Kwaidan means translated Ghost Stories and tells four japanese folktales from Lafcadio Hearn`s collection, who is probably to compare with the german Grimm-brothers.
The first story, The Black Hair, is the story of a young man, who leaves his first wife in favour of another, who`s family is very wealthy and rich. It takes him only months to discover though that love has a higher value than money, but unfortunately years before he finally returns back home to his first wife. Where he finds her not be quite in the same estate as when he left her, even though it first seems so.
The second story, The Woman of the Snow, tells about a young woodcutter, who has an unpleasant encounter with a rather beautiful, light woman one night out in the woods, which leads to his comrad`s death. Ten years later he has to regret that he did`t listen more closely to what she had been telling him that night.
The third story, Hoichi the Earless, tells about a blind young monch, who can play the biwa so beautifully, that it does not only attract the living.
The fourth story at last, In a Cup of Tea, tells about what can happen, if you swallow a soul or, if you are a writor, get swallowed by your own tellings.
Rating:
This portmanteau film won at Cannés back then. I can´t believe neither that Cannés is that old already, nor that a movie from ´64 can have the looks Kwaidan actually has. The dreamlike scenery with its ghostly layers is incredibly intense and simply beautiful.
I watch it and I think of modern movies as von Trier`s Antichrist or of course The Ring. The fact that the japanese female spirits correspond furthermore with the european wicca-cult and have the same vampiristic touch to them with their pale skin, their supernatural beauty and their immense hunger for life, once again makes me thoughtful about how it is possible, that the dark side of feminin power is portraited in such similar patterns all over the world ever since Lilith, Isis or Kali (Diamond Head would put these wonderings into two sentences: Am I Evil? - Yes, I am).
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5. Kafka`s A Country Doctor
Just watch it. Nothing more to say.
Endnote:
Listing those movies makes it quite apparent now, doesn`t it, how I could actually have a nightmare, which made my guts turn around (= puke!).
This is how I recollect the dream (and not a Luther King-parody):
"I had a dream..I was dreaming that people had to finally see that moral is no longer dwelling on this planet.
I was dreaming of a bright light dominated by the idea of flesh, the postmodern thought of a white, gleaming, supermechanical and ultracomplex city being absorbed by the pure biology of flesh and the weakness of our bodies. Everyhing collapsed, but then again didn`t. It was more like...a fusion.
And people were despairing..but without being afraid of it. I was dreaming, that people weren`t anxious about anxiety anymore, but surrendered to it instead. Noone was willing to hold on to love..or let it even be money..anymore. Noone was willing to hold on to anything..and then..everyone..was all alone by himself.
Arms reaching for heaven into nothing everywhere. I see this picture all the time. They were there. Everywhere.
And I was caught in the middle. And it felt...as if I was falling, deep. And my guts were at a sudden above me, outside of my body, while I still kept on falling and being sucked right into this fusion until I finally woke up at last."
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