International Eye Candy
May 13, 2008
Ah, the glamour of the international film festival world. I type this sitting in a plane bound for Zurich, where I will hopefully meet with a second plane to take my sorry self to the Cannes Film Festival wherein I shall partake of many strange films from around the globe and admire the topless beaches. Or, at least, the people at the topless beaches. It’s a good life and so I feel a little petty complaining about the fact that I am squished into the middle seat in the very last row, directly in front of the shitters but hey … if you can’t be petty from time to time then what’s the point of living? But I digress from the main point, which is the latest edition of International Eye Candy – our regular fortnightly column featuring the best and / or strangest bits of celluloid from around the globe as culled from the pages of Twitch. And what have we got today? Fresh goodies from splatter fest TOKYO GORE POLICE, old school Japanese action in CHAMELEON, a zero budget – and utterly brilliant – spin on Japanese kaiju monsters in ZERO TROOPER F, the return of an actual man-in-suit kaiju monster with GUILALA and more, more, more … here we go!
Let’s kick things off giant-monster style, shall we? In the last column we featured a trailer for GREENSIDE, a forty minute short film shot by a group of Wisconsin college students for no money but with lots of style, style drawn from a shared love of Japanese super heroes. Well, GREENSIDE was actually their second film, and the first was the kaiju and ULTRAMAN themed ZERO TROOPER F. There’s no trailer for this one but the director was good enough to pass along a copy of the film and when I went nuts for it went and gave me the go ahead to rip the opening three minutes and make them available online. This thing is zero budget gold … cardboard jet fighters have never looked so good …
You’ll find more details and the complete opening sequence here
From the land of cheese we head over the ocean to the land of fjords, salt fish and hockey players – aka Finland – where upcoming horror picture SAUNA has just gotten itself a brand new trailer. Now, I can think of all sorts of goofy tag lines to go with a horror film revolving around a sauna – most of them involving overweight German tourists, more than a few of whom I am directly related to – but director AJ Annila is playing this one totally straight, putting together a period piece involving the rape and murder of a young girl and the subsequent breakdown of the men responsible. This one could well be the international horror title of the year … very tasty.
You’ll find details and the trailer here.
Yes, yes … you’re making snide comments about Fujiwara Tatsuya’s hair right now and, frankly, the young star of BATTLE ROYALE and DEATH NOTE totally deserves it for what the stylists did to his head in this one. But put that aside for a moment. Because CHAMELEON is noteworthy for much more than Fujiwara’s horrible hair.
Japan used to be a major powerhouse in the international action film genre but, other than the occasional martial arts fantasy or samurai flick, doesn’t really dip into that particular pool very much these days. Which is a shame, because back in the day they made a bunch of really damn good ones. So what’s a producer longing for the good old days to do? Simple enough: find a young star willing to do his own stunts and dig up an unproduced script from the seventies. Yep. That’s CHAMELEON and it’s looking mighty good.
You’ll find more details and the trailer here
Now, what’s the best way to follow up a bit about Japanese action films? Danish puppets, of course! Heh … sorry, I just couldn’t resist. Puppets make me giggle. And these particular puppets – they go by the names of CARSTEN AND GITTE - are notable because they come from Danish production outfit Copenhaen Bombay, a company co-owned by Anders Morgenthaler. Morgenthaler, for his part, earned some well deserved international notoriety a couple of years back when his vicious anti-porn revenge picture PRINCESS tore through the festival circuit. This one is much more family friendly – just about anything would be – and features a collection of short films in different styles from a collection of Copenhagen Bombay talents, Morgenthaler included. The trailer’s all puppet, though, and like I said – puppets make me giggle.
Have a chuckle here.
Okay, Harry, here’s one to get your man-in-suit freak on with. Those cheesehead kids may have had a good time messing around with ZERO TROOPER F but this one’s the real thing, the revival of GUILALA, the kaiju monster featured in cult hit THE X FROM OUTER SPACE.
The director on this is Minoru Kawasaki, a man who has built up a sizable cult following with films like THE CALAMARI WRESTLER, EXECUTIVE KOALA, BEETLE THE HORN KING and a slew of other animal themed zero budget cult comedies. The man’s even had a surprise box office hit in his native land with the goofy apocalypse spoof EVERYTHING BUT JAPAN SINKS and anyone who’s ever seen a Kawasaki film will tell you there’s no chance this thing will be anything but old school – no chance in hell Guilala will be CG enhanced, it’s man in suit all the way. One added perk to this one is that the iconic Takeshi Kitano has signed on to play a key role in the film’s final battle, suiting up himself to play a hero blatantly ripped off from the old DAIMAJIN films.
The first teaser doesn’t show much but you’ll find it here
From Japanese director turned superhero we head to Russia where we find a heavyweight boxer turned … uh … boxer. I am a big, big fan of Russian super hero flick THE SWORD BEARER – it screened at Fantastic Fest last year – and its director Philip Yankovsky. Russia’s big these days and for my money Yankovsky is the absolute top of the heap – a smart and technically astounding director who makes smart and technically astounding films. His latest is titled ROCK HEAD and it features real life Russian heavyweight boxer Nikolay Valuev in the lead as an amnesiac fighter trying to piece his life back together while also pursuing vengeance against the people who did him wrong.
Yes, it’s impossible to talk about any amnesiac revenge film without giving a nod to MEMENTO but this looks like a fairly different animal. It’s a period piece for one thing, set in the late seventies, and Valuev could rip Guy Pearce’s head clean off his shoulders without breaking a sweat, for another. There’s no proper trailer yet but a good amount of footage has been screened on Russian TV in interviews with the director and it looks every bit as potent as did THE SWORD BEARER so expectations are very high on this one.
You’ll find that footage here
We’ll stick with Russia for just a bit longer, pointing the way to a trailer for a short film titled THE COLLECTOR, by Russian film student Egor Abramenko. Why do we point the way to a trailer by a short film that most of you will never be able to see by a director who’s still in school? Because if he wants to be Abramenko could be a Russian answer to Park Chan Wook, that’s why.
Check the trailer here before telling me I’m crazy. Or absolutely correct. It’s up to you, really.
I write from time to time about countries that I believe are on the cusp of becoming major international players. Chile’s clearly one. I think Turkey’s another. And in Asia? The emerging power is definitely Malaysia. Malaysian arthouse films are already storming the international festival circuit and taking home awards by the handful and it looks as though they’ve got an up and coming slate of genre pictures due to arrive any day as well.
Up first, period set martial arts flick KINTA. This thing boasts some very strong camera work, a cast loaded with international grade martial arts champions and a fight choreography crew imported from Hong Kong, where they clearly know a thing or two about how to do these things right. The first trailer has just released and it’s looking good.
You’ll find that trailer right here
Talking about martial arts in Hong Kong, how about the trailer for THE MOSS, a gritty cop thriller that marks the return of RIKI-OH’s Louis Fan Siu-Wong. RIKI-OH – or THE STORY OF RICKY – has become a huge cult hit around the world but was a major financial disaster when it released back in the day, so much so that Fan, once considered one of the bright up and comers of the industry, basically just disappeared after the film released. He’s worked sporadically since then but never very much and never in very prominent roles but that seems to be changing. Fan’s got a part in the upcoming Donnie Yen-starring bio-pic about Yip Man – Bruce Lee’s sifu – and though they didn’t bother to put him in the trailer he’s also got a key role in this picture.
Shawn Yue takes the lead – as he does in seemingly every film currently being made in Hong Kong – as a dirty cop playing both sides while working undercover while Fan plays some sort of homeless fighting master. This one’s been running mostly under the radar but the footage looks great.
You can check the trailer here
And while we’re on the martial arts tip it just wouldn’t be an IED column without a mention of upcoming Kauffman-esque French action comedy JCVD – the film that stars Van Damme as Van Damme with key plot points lifted directly from the life of the Belgian star. We’ve linked to promo spots, industry sales reels and an extended scene from the picture in the past and with the commercial release date drawing near in France the first proper teaser has finally arrived. Looking like the best thing in Van Damme’s career? Damn straight, though I’ll agree that’s not necessarily saying a whole lot. Looking like one of the absolute must-see film events of the year? Hell, yeah. Van Damme or no Van Damme this thing looks flat out brilliant.
Click here for the new teaser and earlier promo spots.
Chances are that the name Leos Carax won’t mean much to most of you but if you’re up on your giant monster films Bong Joon-Ho’s certainly will – he directed Korean smash hit THE HOST – and Michel Gondry is certainly a household name by now. What do the three have in common? Upcoming anthology film TOKYO, to which each of the three has contributed a segment set in the titular city. The producers have been playing coy with details and imagery so far but the first official trailer for this has arrived online. It’s a production reel, basically, and so loaded up mostly with shots of the three directors at work, but the simple fact that it exists makes Todd a happy boy and having caught a major promo spot based on Bong’s segment during the film market in Berlin I can quite happily advise you all to keep an eye out for this one. ‘Twill be a good time.
You’ll find plot details and the teaser here.
Japanese maverick Takashi Miike should need no introduction around here but expectations may need to be adjusted slightly when approaching his latest, the scifi romance GOD’S PUZZLE. And yes, I just said that Miike has directed a romance. A teen romance, no less. One with rock and roll and a cute girl. Here’s the thing: Miike has a very well deserved reputation as a splatter and extreme film director, one based on the huge international success of ICHI THE KILLER and AUDITION. But the extreme stuff has never been the sole focus of his work and though I’ve never counted but I doubt it even makes up the majority of his work. Heck, this is a man who once made a film as a star vehicle for a teen pop band. So don’t go looking for severed nipples in this one because you won’t find them – or nipples of any sort. This is Miike at his most mainstream, putting together a film about a slacker would-be rock star thrust into a relationship with a genius, over achieving college girl.
Teaser and trailer right here.
Okay, all of you disappointed by the lack of splatter in the Miike film, we close with something to put a smile on your face: the new trailer for TOKYO GORE POLICE. There’s no new footage in this one but it is a leaner, meaner version of the original promo spot and – most importantly – has actually been through the post production process so it gives a better idea of what the finished film will actually look like. Which is insanely bloody. And filled with bizarre creatures. I’m partial to the severed-limb cannon, myself.
You’ll find the new trailer and the original, longer promo spot here
| 
