Posting at three on a Monday morning

[petronia]

Finished the Renault novel. Now how am I supposed to get to sleep? ;_; (I only got up at 2PM, and drank quite a bit of tea. But never mind that, it's the book's fault.) I don't want to dream about it - and I've been dreaming about it quite a lot, endless cities of white and gold and pink marble, fountains and winding staircases and carved balustrades. All mixed up with Prince of Tennis. ^^;;; But at least they were happy dreams.

Before that I watched Jisatsu Circle. Good going with the happy and non-depressing, haha. I've been told it was sobering, gory, hard to watch; but pretty much everyone neglected to mention that it takes several turns for the weird. I don't think I quite got it, and not because I was watching it raw. ^^; (The subtitle file wouldn't play... Actually that in itself says something, that I pretty much feel like I understood it all. The last Japanese film I watched raw was Neko no Ongaeshi, a few months back, and I was sure of missing bits of interest here and there.) Or scratch that, I probably did grasp the moral of the story, just that I don't think it was worth all the gore and trauma one literally had to wade through to arrive there. And it fails the police-procedural aspect utterly. If nothing else it's a good lesson in why Miike Takashi's films aren't gratuitous.

And I liked the music. Isn't that sad? Same thing happened with Perfect Blue. I swear if they really manage to pull off subliminal messages of destruction via sparkly trash idoru jpop I'll be the first lemming off the cliff. *peers suspiciously at gig-plus stash of Prince of Tennis mp3s*

Before that I watched Matantei Loki Ragnarok, up to episode 17. Past the introductory period it grew both interesting and amusing, by turns (interesting is wondering what Loki's sin is, and analysing Mayura's meta-role in the story; amusing is Heimdall pretending to be Sadako. The series does parody well, of a surety).

Comments

"Mail me!"

[kickinpants.livejournal.com]

I caught that film raw too, which led to my WTF confusion part-way through big time. I think whatever message this movie wanted to send, whether it was about real suicide clubs or the control of media or what-not, was lost in all the over-the-top that took over. The one scene when the mom cuts so gleefully into her hand as she's chopping daikon? Or the puppy-stomping, raping-people-in-bags, breaking-into-song gang? It was like time-warping into Rocky Horror Picture show in the middle of the movie, but not in that "Yay, Tim Curry!" way. After this, I felt like if I was going to recommend a Japanese film that's about social issues, and music and the people wrapped up in both, I'll go with Lilly Chou Chou. And the songs are better there as well.

I still think Miike is the king of gratuity (sex, violence, musicals...) He makes so many movies a year not to keep that award on his mantle. Sono can be in the running for making this movie though.

Re: "Mail me!"

[petronia.livejournal.com]

What I meant about Miike (YMMV) was that every shot of his feels like it's there for a reason, thus not "gratuitous" in the strict sense of the word. When I'm watching his films I never find myself thinking "Why the hell did we have to see that?", not even through Ichi The Killer - and I got that in Jisatsu Circle a lot. >_> Like yes, daikon mom. One shot would have been fine, we didn't need ten. And I don't know that there was a point to that whole puppy-stomping pleasure-dome evil jrock star thing at all, except possibly Mr. Director was trying to be Miike and not quite succeeding. What he did was mess up the sober sense of realism the film had going for it up to that point.

The songs in Lily Chou-Chou are so good that Quentin Tarentino gacked one. XD

[smurfmatic.livejournal.com]

Err no, I said Jisatsu Club was funny, obviously you forgot my comment. (Or did I ever make that comment to *you*, at least I know I said it to some of the other people I lend that movie to - I mean whoever watches that stuff back-to-back is fucked up in the head).

-Ced

[petronia.livejournal.com]

You never said that to me. :P

I know I watch (and read) some schtuff that's pretty horrific back-to-back. I'm short on time, and building up resistance to WTF is always good. *g*

[rondaview.livejournal.com]

Hallo! Friended you and sincerely hope you don't mind.
(And posting at three on a Monday morning is never good for the soul, assuming you have to get up at 6 am the next day. Boo. Hiss.)