Tokyo Jihen - Kyoiku

(I couldn't find a picture of the whole band, so here's my favorite picture of Shiina Ringo, who is basically the mastermind behind the band anyway.)

This one takes a while to grow on you, but boy does it grow. Shiina Ringo's sense of melody is, as always, outstanding, and she must be one of the few truly original songwriters I know of. The album is often frenzied, as even the quieter moments feel dense somehow. One track in particular revs up to a manic hyperactive momentum only to completely surprise you when some beautiful jazz-like melodies on a piano break through the chaos. The album as a whole sticks to a rock template but manages to expand that same template to include elements of pop, jazz (which may be Ringo's true vocation), quiet instrumental interludes, and even, if I'm not mistaken, a touch of cabaret.

The City of Lost Souls


This was my first Takashi Miike film excepting a few chunks of Audition caught on cable that I was too chicken to finish watching, and I'm not sure how to respond. It's kind of a typical yakuza gangster film where everything basically goes batshit crazy from time to time. For example, in this film you will see:
1) chickens using matrix-style martial arts in a cock fight
2) a ping pong match to the death
3) a daring helicopter attack on a deportation bus in the Japanese DESERT
4) brazilian martial arts presented in the most hilariously bewildering way possible
5) a very strange soccer motif
6) a man set on fire with vodka (and some chickens too)
Now I imagine there is some deeper meaning here about expatriate communities in Japan, specifically Brazilians, but I can't imagine what it is at the moment. Nevertheless, it's never boring, and often fascinating in its near surreal non sequiturs.

Music Video: Utada Hikaru, Hikari


This is an immensely charming video. The camera never moves or cuts from the shot you see above; the entire video is done in one take. Utada, who gives a very sweet performance here, washes the dishes and sometimes sings and sometimes doesn't (even at one point taking a drink of water while we still hear her singing). It's as if she is singing along to the radio or TV. The effect is pretty wonderful, a simple and proudly prosaic depiction of the joy of music.

Million Dollar Baby


Emerson on Fate:

...And not less work the laws of repression, the penalties of violated functions. Famine, typhus, frost, war, suicide and effete races must be reckoned calculable parts of the system of the world.

These are the pebbles from the mountain, hints of the terms by which our life is walled up, and which show a kind of mechanical exactness, as of a loom or mill in what we call casual or fortuitous events.

The force of which we resist these torrents of tendency looks so ridiculously inadequate that it amounts to little more than a criticism or protest made by a minority of one, under compulsion of millions. I seemed in the height of a tempest to see men overboard struggling in the waves, and driven about here and there. They glanced intelligently at each other, but 't was little they could do for one another; 't was much if each could keep afloat alone. Well, they had a right to their eye-beams, and all the rest was Fate.

I don't have much to add about this movie that hasn't been said elsewhere. I will say how casually despairing it is, and how because of this the tiny moments of tenderness are all the more affecting. I especially like the implied nature of the love between the two protagonists, how very often it seems as if only not for time and age they could be happy. The moments of hope and connection, taking place in a world bereft of religious or familial comforts, amount to no more than Emerson's eye-beams. But that's something, isn't it?

It's startling to see a film so forcefully depict the ethical limits of religion. "She's not asking for God's help, she's asking for mine." The relationship between the two characters is thus given a significance that trancends even our obligations to God. Yes, he is lost at the end of the film, but that comes as the price for setting her free. And what is God to him without her?

Fallen Angels


What a strange film! Wong Kar Wai made this one (starring, among others, the very striking Michelle Reis--former miss Hong Kong apparently--pictured above) right after making the masterpiece Chungking Express, and it seems to be related to that film in the same way 2046 is related to Days of Being Wild. That is, a lyrical riff on similar themes, almost an echo of events in the previous film.

Narrative is casually ignored in favor of surreal/comic episodes of longing--surely Wong's "great theme" along with the inexorable march of time--but for me the results are strangely hollow, especially considering how strongly Wong's films usually affect me. Nevertheless, this portrait of urban wanderers pursuing quixotic quests for connection and desire has real power in several long shots that are spread throughout the film. My favorite shows two of the protagonists simply sitting in a restaurant, being together, emphasizing that the fight against loneliness can only be won temporalily. Another pair of long shots daringly makes explicit the sexual undercurrent to the longing on display. Happiness is continually linked to fleeting moments of grace that pass as quickly as the images on a flickering tv screen.

Nietzsche hits awfully close to home sometimes, too close for comfort:

The man who is guided by concepts and abstractions only succeeds by such means in warding off misfortune, without ever gaining any happiness for himself from these abstractions. And while he aims for the greatest possible freedom from pain, the intuitive man, standing in the midst of a culture, already reaps from his intuition a harvest of continually inflowing illumination, cheer, and redemption—in addition to obtaining a defense against misfortune. To be sure, he suffers more intensely, when he suffers; he even suffers more frequently, since he does not understand how to learn from experience and keeps falling over and over again into the same ditch. He is then just as irrational in sorrow as he is in happiness: he cries aloud and will not be consoled. How differently the stoical man who learns from experience and governs himself by concepts is affected by the same misfortunes! This man, who at other times seeks nothing but sincerity, truth, freedom from deception, and protection against ensnaring surprise attacks, now executes a masterpiece of deception: he executes his masterpiece of deception in misfortune, as the other type of man executes his in times of happiness. He wears no quivering and changeable human face, but, as it were, a mask with dignified, symmetrical features. He does not cry; he does not even alter his voice. When a real storm cloud thunders above him, he wraps himself in his cloak, and with slow steps he walks from beneath it.

Take Care of My Cat


Yet another example of the strength of Korean cinema, this film about the weakening bonds of friendship among a group of classmates making the transition to adulthood has a slowness and looseness that perfectly serves its story depicting the onset of general adult ennui. Time empties old friendships and obligations of their meaning, leaving them hollow and oppressive, and the motif of electronic communication somehow serves to emphasize the lonely melancholy of adult urban life as well as the miracles of connection that can still happen. Adult friendship is redefined as reciprocal generosity (see the title) and giving witness to one another; that is, simply put, being there, waiting for and responding to the call of friendship, even if it contradicts the the explicit desires of the friend in question, and eventually offering the chance at, if not redemption, then a kind of freedom that allows starting over. The girl who turns her back on the friendship, who lets her best friend walk out the door without a word, is eventually left alone and trapped in a dead end corporate job, while her friends are last seen examining the departures board at the airport.

Coming soon: my write up of 2004 movies. Here's a hint to what number 1 will be:

Music 2004

Since it's a new year finally I figured it was time to clear off the sidebars. I'll leave the films up for a little while longer, at least until I see a few more movies; mainly Million Dollar Baby, House of Flying Daggers, and Time of the Wolf, and probably a few others. (I have a deep suspicion that Goodbye Dragon Inn will eventually be my favorite movie of the year, but I haven't seen it yet and probably won't for some time.)

But I can at least write a little about my music choices. I am a complete amateur with music so expect some malapropism, errors in judgment, and just plain ignorance.

I ventured pretty deeply into psychedelic music this year (as I did last year), finding much satisfaction in impossibly dense soundscapes, blistering electric guitar solos, and long form meditative mantras. So it seems pretty obvious that The Neck's Drive-by and Houston natives Charalambides' Joy Shapes both deserve to be album of the year for me.

Describing Drive-by is easily beyond my musical vocabulary, but I'll try. Much like previous albums by this jazz group, it's one long piece, about 63 minutes (and also like their other albums the last ten minutes are a bit of a snore--they seem to feel the same need to wind down as they do to wind up). An absolutely gorgeous series of chords from a piano pop up every now and then, but the real attraction here is the drums and bass, which combine to create what is a truly trance inducing effect, a rhythm that never ceases to be seductively beautiful and addictive. Best part occurs late in the game, where everything drops out but the drums, casting the listener into a primal relationship with the reverberations, movement, space, and even a physical sense of pleasure. Give it time and space.

Joy Shapes, is fittingly 180 degrees away from Drive-by. There is no rhythm to speak of, just airy (and often spooky) guitar jangling that melts and melds dissonance into some beautiful forms of harmony. The singing will put you off at first, but learn to treat it as an intstrument and it fits perfectly. Seemingly celestial, it offers a great counterpart to the earthy sensuality of The Necks.

Boredoms, Seadrum/House of Sun: my favorite band returns with what is hopefully just a teaster. The second track (out of two) is a very pretty siter vs. guitar showdown, but the first track is pretty unique. Yoshimi keens beautifully for a few minutes before a percussion rises up like the tide all around her (hence the name of the song I guess). Eventually piano keys rain down on your head so fast it's like sensory overload. Absolutely stunning and beautiful, if exhausting.

Otomo Yoshihide's New Jazz Quintet's Tail's Out is probably not a major album for free jazz aficionados, but this dilettante loved it. Yoshihide brings a real rock (almost metal!) sensibility to the louder pieces. Check out the drums at the end of the second track and the hilariously obnoxious rendering of Strawberry Fields Forever that never fails to make me laugh. The final two tracks, a beautiful rendering of a jazz classic complete with ear splitting sine-waves that morphs into a form of music the Japanese call onkyo, which as far as I can tell tries to create shifting sound sensations and colors rather than situating itself around a firm rhythm or melody--it goes for pure sound and it's absolutely hold-your-breath-or-it-will-fly-away gorgeous.

Camera Obscura, Underachievers Please Try Harder: just plain and pretty pop music in the mould of Belle and Sebastian, but a lot better for my money. The singer can be a little to fey and coy, but she often reaches for beautiful intimacy and gets it.

Finaly, Comets on Fire make it for basically creating one of the greatest rock songs of all time on Blue Cathedral--an old school hard rock meets pysch album that isn't nearly long enough for me. Great fun.

Puffy AmyYumi, Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi Show Soundtrack: Basically a greatest hits compilation. Flawless and exhilarating power pop. I just got their album Nice from last year and it's perfect as well. Don't deny yourself something this great! (The cartoon ain't bad either!)

Best of the rest:

The Streets, A Grand Don't Come for Free: Great for it's determined commitment to the mundane.
Bjork, Medulla: a minor work, for sure. Some gorgeous bits though, and deceivingly complex.
Espers, Espers: 60s style haunted folk-psych.
Mara Carlyle, The Lovely: kind of a lovely chamber piece. Fantastic singer.
OOIOO, Kila Kila Kila: wildly underrated. Probably seems a bit sparse and even empty to some, but for lovers of Yoshimi & Yuka's Flower with no Color, it's the next logical step. Yoshimi's penchant for interesting sounds over songcraft may annoy some (and she may never top her masterpiece Green & Gold) but if you have the patience there are a lot of rewards to be found here.
Annie, Anniemal: fantastic europop. If you don't like this you are dead inside.

Lot's of other great stuff out there, of course. (I just remembered Yuka Honda's great new album, for instance.) Not a great year for music overall, however. I spent much of the year in the 70s myself (Popol Vuh, anyone?). Looking forward to a new Kate Bush album next year, as well as The Avalanches and Daft Punk.

2046


I have only seen an unofficial copy of this so far, and I can tell the usual Wong Kar-wai style vibrant colors are washed out a bit. I can picture how it is supposed to look at times, such as when Faye Wong (who, it must be said, looks insanely gorgeous in this movie) stands in a green dress in front of green bottles I imagine the sensuousness of the color is overwhelming. But on my copy at the moment it's just a bit faded. Thus watching the movie is a bit of a strain rather than the swoon I imagine it is supposed to be. So I will only say a few words for now.

Time and love are again the themes, just as in In the Mood for Love. This one is more about memory, time lost rather than time slipping away. The final scenes of In the Mood for Love represent a form of monument building, secrets kept eternally. 2046, then, continues to explore the reverberations of that act which solidifies the past into a personal monument, draining the present of all meaning and satisfaction. The ironic meaning of the science fiction elements show that the pursuit of the future is a displaced longing for the past. 2046 is the place where "nothing ever changes." Key line: "Why can't it be like it was before?" Where In the Mood for Love was romantic, sumptuous, perfect, 2046 wanders in a melancholy haze, imperfect, incomplete, the failure of consummation portrayed at the end of the first film is given its full weight here. Longing turns to hollow pleasures. Time moves on. Quietly devastating.