Hikari no Ame and Tampen comments

Stephen Cremin asianfilmlibrary at mac.com
Tue Dec 18 00:02:43 EST 2001


On Saturday, December 8, 2001, at 02:14  pm, M Arnold wrote:

> I've seen a few of Takahashi's movies--"Ai no Shinsekai" left hardly 
> any impression on me, and "Door 2" (Kurosawa Kiyoshi directed part 3) 
> was positively bad.  I think I also watched "Tattoo Ari" but I can't 
> remember a thing about it.  Checking the JMDB, it seems Takahashi has 
> been a prolific director of what look like porno movies, but can anyone 
> explain to me (briefly) what his claim to fame is?  Why did he end up 
> with a project like "Hikari no Ame"?

Takahashi's claim to fame?  You mean apart from marrying Sekine Keiko?  
Well, I guess his original 1988 DOOR, co-scripted by Oikawa Ataru, was a 
landmark horror film.  Hearsay, since I haven't seen it myself.

> I also went to the opening of "Tampen" last Saturday at Box Higashi 
> Nakano.  ?http://www.bitters.co.jp/tampen/index.html?  This is a 
> one-hour film made up of four short stories directed... or I guess not 
> directed by 3 cinematographers and 1 lighting director who have 
> recently been working with directors like Aoyama, Suwa, and Kawase.  
> There was a discussion afterwards with lighting man Sato (part 2, 
> "kyoko"), cameraman Yamazaki (part 4, "share"), the producer (whose 
> name I forgot) and the two main actresses.  Cameraman Imoto (part 1, 
> "short film") showed up before the movie for a few minutes, but Tamura 
> (part 3, "koo-ghe") wasn't able to come.  Overall it was an interesting 
> experiment.  The shorts were very much in the documentary-like style of 
> the recent younger filmmakers, but without a director or solid story 
> per se they were left with a strange sense of vagueness.  In some parts 
> it wasn't really clear if the actors knew what they were doing either.  
> The print was subtitled in English.  Does anyone know if they only have 
> a subbed print for this film, or were they trying to accommodate the 
> one foreign-looking fellow in the audience?

I saw this in Pusan where of course it also played with subtitles.  I 
wouldn't be surprised if that is the only print.  Cameraman Yamazaki and 
actress Watanabe Makiko attended but didn't talk after the screening I 
attended.  Latter also did the English subtitles.  Yes, interesting but 
the experiment largely proved that, yes, one does need a director.  Deal 
was that anybody on the set could call CUT at any time.  But then I 
guess some would argue that films like TIMELESS MELODY are also in need 
of a director too.

Speaking of Watanabe Makiko, Miles asked about Hiroki Ryuichi's FETISH 
on this list months ago.  Anybody see it and come away with a favourable 
impression?

Stephen



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