A movie about a martial arts murderer who has kills with nunchucks, a samurai sword, and circles his prey while looking like a highschool nerd copying his favourite kung fu flicks, should not still feel this serious. Yet somehow Abel Ferrara makes it work, and to the film’s benefit.
Its sleazy, grimy and packed with shining light and colour like a crumpled off-brand soda can. Every one looks like they could be posing on a 70s Playboy/Playgirl while also found…
Charles Bronson bookends this with some great one-liners to lead us into the opening and end credits, respectively. But its Andrew Stevens’ dead-eyed naked killer on edge that leaves the biggest impression.
Bronson may be the hero, but Stevens is the lead, and this isn’t the action picture usually associated with Bronson. I think he only fires his gun once. This is about the nastiness of the institute of Crime & Punishment; a killer in plain sight but the evidence ties…
An action film without a climactic action sequence. There may not even be a third act. I did not know this was going to be “The Expendables on a Boat” for 80% of its runtime.
I did know this was going to be rough from the opening sequence with green screen work on the close-ups that could be edited into Kung Fury without difficulty. It only gets worse too, with everything but the hand-to-hand being either ugly or so rudimentary…
I might have seen this before but every Miyazaki film is packed with so much beauty, depth, feeling and wonder; that every viewing is practically anew anyway.
Film #134 in Summer of the Red Sun- Celebrating 125 Years of Japanese Cinema
I also feel that assessing my thoughts on a Miyazaki film has got to the point where I just reiterate things felt/thought previously about other masterpieces and almost-masterpieces in his oeuvre. Characters like Sophie deeply engage and thrill my…
