GOZU (or Cow Head)
"A friend in need is a friend indeed."
Despite being ditched by the "group" of bloggers that planned to catch this matinee on Saturday, I bussed it down to Granville 7 and lined up behind 70 people to get in and find out what makes this Yakuza ghost story a nominee for the most popular foreign film in the festival (read: it was a BIG hit at Toronto). From the director and screenwriter of Ichi the Killer, comes a Japanese version of U-turn, only far more bizarre and twisted than the depths of Oliver Stone's imagination.
I was relieved that this one wasn't a gorefest, I'm far more interested in Takashi's sharp characters and senseless plots that paint a very surreal and depraived portrait of yakuza life. This one involves a yakuza henchman, Ozaki (Sho Aikawa), who becomes mentally unstable with paranoia, to the point of accusing everyone and everything of being part of an assassination attempt on him or his superiors. As a result, the boss selects Minami (Hideki Stone) to dispose of him at a junkyard in Nagoya. However, things go horribly wrong when Minami believes that Ozaki has been accidently killed in a mishap enroute to the city, but finds the body missing after visiting a rather bizarre coffee house. Hence begins the epic search...
"It was much hotter yesterday, you're crazy! It was T-shirt weather, ask anybody."
Takashi invites you to immerse your senses in a surreal journey through a side of Nagoya that Jon never mentioned to me on his trip there in 1998. He has a definite love for the juxtaposition of beauty and disgust, as he lulls you with the former and sneaks up on you with the latter. He also tantalizes the senses with all forms of liquid (a British interviewer commented on Takashi's films making him extremely thirsty), despite lacking the gallons of blood that Ichi bombarded audiences with. Needless to say I have no further interest in drinking milk and may never look at another ladle the same way again...but I do want to find a shirt like the woman's brother's at the hotel.
Anyhow I recommend it, it was fun to view it alone and completely immerse myself in the mindset of Takashi Miike, but don't get too comfortable. I don't think Coquitlam is too far off from Nagoya though, yet again I see two 12 year old kids in the pool playing a game where one of them pretends to be a seal while the other one clubs him with a tennis ball, after which the seal screams "PARAMEDIC!" then they switch roles and repeat...this lasts three hours.
-Duke
***1/2
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