Wakamatsu Koji's "United Red Army"

[Rob Schwartz]

I was at the second TIFF screening of United Red Army which was yesterday,
and thought it was an effective, if somewhat overlong, portrayal of the
history of the Japanese Red Army.

Also, to describe Jim O'Rourke as a 'member of Sonic Youth' is wildly
misleading. O'Rourke was a sort of in-house producer for that band in the
late 90s and was a member from 2002-2005. He was NOT with them during their
popular and successful days in the early 90s and was obviously not a
founding member of the band. The iconic members of Sonic Youth are Thurston
Moore, Lee Renaldo and Kim Gordon.

Roughly, Jim O'Rourke is an avant-garde musician/composer/improviser from
Chicago. He has been associated with the "post-rock" scene there, as well as
experimental jazz and other improvised styles of music. He has been a member
of many bands and won  recognition with Gastr Del Sol. Recently O'Rourke has
been doing film soundtracks.

Rob Schwartz


On 10/23/07, M Arnold <ma_iku at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> Thanks for all the comments on the film. I remember the mixed reactions
> people had in Japan a couple of years ago every time Wakamatsu announced
> that he was going to film the "definitive" history of the Red Army, once
> and
> for all, before it's too late, so people can finally know what "really"
> happened. I'm anxious to see it!
>
> And thanks to Justin for the info on the Igarashi article.
>
> >From: "Mark D. Roberts" <mroberts37 at mail-central.com>
> >  scenes, and (2) surprised to hear music of, shall we say, pedestrian
> >sentiment, from a former member of Sonic Youth. To be
>
> I wouldn't really be surprised (or disappointed) to find "pedestrian
> sentiment" in a Wakamatsu Koji film. If we're going to make comparisons to
> earlier work, we might wonder why the director of Simpler Than a Kiss,
> Scrap
> Story, Netorare Sosuke, and pop idol music videos has made a movie so full
> of violence. . . As I understand it SY is just one of many projects
> O'Rourke
> has been involved in over the years, and Wakamatsu personally wanted him
> to
> do the music.
>
> Is it just my imagination or is there some kind of Wakamatsu retrospective
> going on in Paris now?
>
> Michael Arnold
>
>
>
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