All Zatoichis look the same...

[M Arnold]

From: "Mark Nornes" <amnornes at umich.edu>

> But what I find of interest has come up here and there in the thread. A
> rhetoric of authenticity swirled around that book when it came out, and
> (at least American) viewers of the adaptation will undoubtedly be
> enjoying what they think is some kind of communion with Old Kyoto. In
> this sense, I find the casting wonderful.

This is what always bothered me about Lost in Translation--the rhetoric of
authenticity and the way people reacted to it. I don't mean to bring up a
dead discussion yet again, but on the weekend I had a couple of beers with
an old college friend who did an exchange program with me several years ago
in Tokyo. I asked him what he thought about LIT and he said the same thing
I've heard many times before, namely that when you watch the film you can
"see" little bits of the reality of life in Tokyo. He thought it was
interesting because it _wasn't_ the usual geisha/temple/sex/zen cliches... I
didn't get a chance to respond to that because, in typical (I guess) Hooters
fashion, the waitress interrupted our chat and tried to pull me from my seat
so she could stand me up on a table and tell all the big football fans in
the bar that I was moving to Japan to study dirty movies (well I didn't let
her).

Kitano's Zatoichi is playing at a smallish theater in Seattle's Univ.
district. I'd already seen most of it on video but I decided to catch it on
the big screen yesterday. With about 50 people it had a good turn out for a
Sunday matinee and much of the audience appeared to have fun, laughing out
loud during the sillier scenes. (It looks like the local press has pegged
the film as a "comedy.") I'll add my vote to those who thought it was dull.
The cinematography was bland, the blood and digital sword effects were
sloppy and the characters were underdeveloped. I wasn't really sure what the
movie was trying to do, but by the time we got to the last 10 minutes my
best guess was that Kitano wanted to deconstruct--or just make fun of--the
"myth" of Zatoichi movies? [Stop reading if you haven't seen it yet.] With
scenes constructed around sound and music, a big tap-dance finale, odd
flashbacks/forwards and comments on eyes in several places, it felt like he
was trying to challenge the "authority" of the visual (there are some things
we can't see even with our eyes open, oh wow) but whether or not an armchair
reading like this is possible, the movie's kick was softened by trying to do
too many things at once. It wasn't a funny comedy, it wasn't a danceable
musical, it wasn't an exciting action film, and it wasn't a convincing
meta-comment on blind swordsmen. Worst of all Kitano isn't nearly as cute as
Katsu was years ago. One thing got me wondering though: Blue (?) eyes and
blonde hair--was he trying to look like Rutger Hauer? Certainly Kitano knows
about "Blind Fury."

At least it was better than "Dolls."

Michael Arnold