Shikoku & Nagasaki Shunichi

[Stephen Cremin]

Hope this helps Stefan.  If you use these credits (or filmography), please 
credit THE ASIAN FILM LIBRARY as the source.

SHIKOKU
Director: NAGASAKI Shunichi; Producers: HARA Masato, TSUGE Yasushi, NAGAI 
Masao; Scriptwriters: MANDA Kunimi, SENTO Takenori; Photography: SHINODA 
Noboru; Production Design: TANEDA Yohei; Composer: KADOKURA Satoshi; Editor: 
OKUHARA Yoshiyuki; Cast: NATSUKAWA Yui (Hinako), TSUTSUI Michitaka (Fumiya), 
KURIYAMA Chiaki (Sayori), NEGISHI Toshie (Teruko), SUWA Taro (Oda), OTAKARA 
Tomoko (Yukari), SATO Makoto, OSUGI Ren.  100 mins.  Domestic release: 
23/1/1999.  Festivals: Montreal, Vancouver, Rotterdam.

VARIETY COMMENT ON SHIKOKU (27/9/1999)
Asian horror buffs will get the most out of SHIKOKU, a bold attempt to 
inject psychodrama into a ghost movie that taps into some of the same 
creepiness as recent Japanese hit THE RING.  The first major B.O. success 
for director Nagasaki Shunichi (ROMANCE), pic fails to achieve the depths of 
real horror that the story promises, but remains an interesting try 
nonetheless.  Specialised fests remain its best arena.  (Derek ELLEY)

NAGASAKI SHUN?ICHI FILMOGRAPHY
1975 25 Hours in a Butoh Dance Group (Nij?go-ji no But?-ha)
1975 Kill the Tapir that Feeds on Dreams (Baku o Bukkorose)
1976 The Season when Artificial Flowers Die (Z?ka no Kareru Kisetsu)
1977 The Cruel Death of Yumeko (Yumeko Zanshi)
1978 The Summer Yuki Gave Up Rock Music (Yuki ga Rock o Suteta Natsu)
1978 Crazy Love (Crazy Love)
1979 Eiko Becomes Evening (Eiko, Yori ni nare)
1982 Heart, Beating in the Dark (Yamiutsu Shinz?)
1982 After That (Sono-g?)
1982 The Lonely Hearts Club Band in September (Kugatsu no J?dan Club Band)
1985 London Calling (London Calling)
1985 Scenario: Betrayed by Yamaguchi Momoe (Scenario: Yamaguchi Momoe no 
Haishin)
1988 Rock in a Minor Key (Rock yo, Shizuka ni Nagareyo)
1988 The Vamp (Y?jo no Jidai)
1989 The Enchantment (Y?wakusha)
1991 Stranger (Yoru no Stranger, Ky?fu!)
1992 The Drive (Saigo no Drive)
1993 Nurses (Nurse Call)
1993 Wild Side (J MOVIE WARS: Wild Side)
1996 Some Kinda Love (Romance)
1999 Shikoku (Shikoku)
1999 Dogs (Dogs)

Note: Dates given are generally release dates, but of course some of this 
work was never officially released and the date geneally refers to first 
screening in Japan.  Nagasaki is just a difficult example with, for example, 
his SCENARIO: BETRAYED BY YAMAGUCHI MOMOE never being completed to my 
knowledge and DOGS, for example, being made for satellite and only later 
released commercially after some festival interest.  I've mangled the 
katakana into English, sorry.

Most famous three films in Nagasaki's filmography are HEART BEATING IN THE 
DARK, THE ENCHANTMENT and SHIKOKU.  Former is truly wonderful 8mm film 
starring Muroi Shigeru which I think is even on VCD in Hong Kong following a 
limited release.  THE ENCHANTMENT won a prize at the Tokyo International 
Film Festival and was commercially released in the UK at the time of the 
YOUNG CINEMA FROM JAPAN season in 1990 which also toured to the States and 
featured a lot of Nagasaki's work.  We all know SHIKOKU, I guess, which has 
been commercially released in Hong Kong also and available with subtitles on 
VCD.  It was released with RING 2 in Japan, giving Nagasaki his first box 
office success.  (Is that correct?)  Released independently of RING 2 in 
Hong Kong, it took about HK$2m compared with RING 2's HK$12m.

Does anybody know what NAGASAKI is up to recently?

Stephen Cremin
The Asian Film Library

PS: Fascinating to hear about SAKAMOTO Junji's new film.  Thanks for posting 
the information, Aaron.  His FACE (Kao) will receive its "international 
premiere" at the American Film Market later this month.
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