While visiting a bookstore in Singapore, I noticed that Ryu Murakami’s short novel, Audition, had finally been published in an English translation (NOTE: it ain’t coming out in the US ’till 2010!). The chilling tale was most famously (infamously?) adapted by Takashi Miike in 1999. You can read my largely positive review here. I can’t say that I cared much for Murakami’s In the Miso Soup or 69, but I liked Miike’s film quite a bit so I thought — what the heck! — I’d give the source text a chance. At a short 200 pages, I was able to read it in the space of a few hours while lounging in Singapore (instead of studying for my Qualifying Exams. Doh!). Here are some thoughts…

I would say that the novel is every bit as gripping as the film is. The movie, of course, has the added advantage of actually terrifying you with disturbing onscreen imagery (which also leads viewers to have a better sense of what might unfold in a way that the book doesn’t). Less influenced by the dream logic that pervades the film adaptation, Murakami’s novel “makes sense” in an intellectual way — everything, bizarre or not, is understandable and explained quite clearly. Admittedly, that doesn’t make it better or worse than the film, but it certainly makes for a very different experience from the more symbolic, nightmarish landscape that envelops the 1999 film.

Here’s the plot description that I gave for the film, minus the actor’s names:

Sparked by his teenage son’s encouragement, middle-aged widower and all-around swell guy Aoyama begins to look for a new wife. Upon the suggestion of his movie industry pal Yoshikawa, our hero agrees to take part in calling an audition for a new film, but with the ulterior motive of finding himself an “ideal woman.” Of the thirty young prospects, only one captures Aoyama’s interest - the beautiful, demure Asami. We’ve all seen enough She’s All That-inspired crap to guess what might happen next: the two lovebirds quickly fall for each other, but when Asami learns that the audition was a ruse, she dumps our protagonist. Naturally, Aoyama then spends the rest of the movie trying to win her back - which he does and the two marry. So in the end, Aoyama has a wife for himself and a mother for his son. Everybody’s happy. The end.Of course, that “educated guess” isn’t what happens AT ALL.

The first 168-pages detail the budding romance between middle-aged Aoyama and the younger Asami, and the remaining 32-pages deal with the ghoulish conclusion of said relationship. I have to say that I did prefer the film’s inclusion of a “detective story” plot that does much to energize the last act, an element which is sadly not present at all in the novel.

Still, the writing is great. Murakami’s characterization of the introspective Aoyama and his charming, all-too-wise teenage son, Shige, is reason enough to pick up the novel, that is– if you’re not too squeamish about horror. Further, the novel’s implicit commentary on patriarchy, sexism, and misogyny, not to mention it’s vivid exploration of the psychological toll of childhood trauma and abuse make this much more substantive than your average (Read: crappy) horror novel.

And so, a word or warning: the 32-page finale, which begins with a character reminiscing about a sexual liaison in a way that may be WAAAAAY too explicit for casual readers, quickly turns into a dizzying, Grand Guignol-style ordeal that was almost as difficult to read as it was to watch in the chilling film adaptation.

But if you can stomach it, Audition is still a damn good read.

Rating: 8 out of 10

 In tribute to James Cameron’s new film, Sanjuro employs Lee Byung-Hun as his Official LoveHKFilm.com Avatar.

Well, I’ve finally made it to Singapore, so it’s time for a blog update. During my stay I’ve already seen the Laughing Gor prequel, TURNING POINT, and I hope to see OVERHEARD eventually as well as the Singaporean film WHERE GOT GHOST? perhaps as early as today. I also finally got the opportunity to watch Pixar’s UP, which is hands-down the best movie of the summer.

With my first Singapore-based update, I’d like to start with a topic that is actually HK-related — Ma Wing Shing’s STORM RIDERS comics. For those of you who live in Hong Kong or some other East Asian country, this post might not be as interesting to you as I hope it is for HK cinema fans in non-Asian countries. Still, I hope you all get a kick out of it!

But first, a preface of sorts. I have — for the longest time — collected toys. I’ve always taken good care of the toys I played with as a kid, and when I became older, I became one of those fanboy geeks who bought cool toys and either a) displayed them on my desk in funny poses or b) kept them sealed in the package in the belief that they might actually be worth something someday. As to the latter hope, I was somewhat successful. On a related note, I recently dug through my closet at my parents’ house, and I have to admit that the sheer amount of unopened Star Wars merchandice I possess is astounding. My hope is that I can secretly pawn this stuff on eBay so my wonderful girlfriend never sees the true extent of my collector mania.

But I digress. The point of this post is to highlight one particulair strain of this deranged mentality – my propensity to collect figures based on Chinese comic books like Storm Riders and A Man Called Hero (aka Zhonghua Ying Hung). Let’s just say that I have a lot of these figures, and on any visit to Hong Kong (sorry Kozo, for constantly playing Virgil to my Dante in my personal descent into HK’s collectible underworld) or Singapore, I will actively search for these things. However, I’m getting a little older and really starting to see the folly of collecting all this stuff (aka: useless clutter). So on this trip abroad, I told myself that I would not go out and seek this stuff, but if it somehow appeared before me while browsing stores, well…

Anyway, when I arrived at my family’s flat in Choa Chu Kang, I was surprised to see this box waiting for me:

I’m not sure you can tell the size from these photos, but it’s a pretty big box. I could tell it was some some kind of official Storm Riders merchandise, and from the size of the package, I was guessing it was a big-ass statue. Luckily, my worries about how I’d bring this back to the US evaporated when I learned that the box simply contained two small figures of Wind and Cloud. Here’s what they look like:

Wind

Cloud

Pretty cool, huh? The only downside is that Wind’s sword and Cloud’s base have pegs with no corresponding holes on the figures themselves, which makes wielding a blade (Wind) or simply standing up correctly (in the case of Cloud) simply impossible. Oh well.

While out shopping later that day, I did pick up this volume of Storm Riders, complete with a crazy holo-foil/chromium(?) cover and a snazzy mousepad:

I bought it at a store called Comics Connection, which has branches in just about every shopping complex in Singapore I’ve visited. I guess small business owners who want to have a comic store of their own have to go the franchise route here (I’m not sure). Each time I’ve visited, however, I’ve noticed that I see less and less Chinese product (aside from the comics themselves) and more and more Japanese manga, toys, and games (most of which is available in the US now). Anyway, despite the burgeoning Japanophilia apparent in these stores, I thought this branch was pretty cool thanks to a familiar figure they had busting out of the wall:

Kinda nifty, but take a closer look at Wind’s hand:

Perhaps Wind is well-aware that this is a vulgar hand gesture.

In other Storm Riders-related news, I’m planning on going to see the Wind and Cloud swords on display at Vivo City, so stayed tuned for that. Apparently, Ekin Cheng actually hand-delivered them about a month ago, but unfortunately, I was still in Oklahoma at the time.

So until next time, I’ll leave you with some avatar shenanigans…

I’ll get you for MURDERER and PARA PARA SAKURA!

AAARGH!!!!!!!!!!!

Recently, Kozo weighed in on his thoughts on Lee Byung-Hun’s (LBH!) appearance in the new GI:JOE movie, as well as other Asian actors like Rain playing ninjas in Hollywood productions. With that in mind, I thought I’d share my two cents about the movie and LBH’s performance, among other things. 

 At least I get to show my face, take that Ray Park!

First of all, I cannot emphasize enough that GI:JOE is a ridiculous, cheesy, and over-the-top movie. I thought it was okay, and for the most part, I could suppress my skepticism and “just go with it,” that is until the Joes decided to storm Destro’s unbelievably intricate and impossible-to-exist underwater base. At that moment, I couldn’t help but roll my eyes. Even if I were ten, I’m pretty sure I would think it looked lame (BTW: District 9 was made with probably a quarter of the money this movie was made, and it’s effects look photo-real. Go see it. It’s great).

Much better than the Speed Racer Rain figure.

 What really captured my attention was the Snake-Eyes/Storm Shadow subplot (complete with pint-sized versions of the characters beating the snot out of each other in a flashback) and LBH’s performance, in particular. I mean, Ray Park, was fine — but it’s hard to screw up a mute dressed in black with badass martial arts ability. No, it was LBH who stole the show — he’s actually the only actor who had one interesting acting moment — a misty-eyed meditation that segued into his flashback. Anyway, the guy is cool as a cucumber and looks snazzy in his perpetually white duds (I’m not sure how this guy eats spaghetti without ruining his clothes, but I digress). I liked his performance so much, I would be tempted to call this a “star-making role,” if not for the fact that a) he’s already a star in Asia and b) he didn’t appear in the other Hasbro toy commercial, Transformers 2, which played to an exponentially larger audience globally despite it’s inability to contain a credible storyline or believable performances (save Optimus Prime, he was the only good actor in that one!).

 Even my beautiful, but ever-skeptical girlfriend was impressed with LBH, despite thinking he was a total goober back in his cheesy K-Drama days. But in all honesty, it was Cobra Commander that she really liked, albeit only when he a) wasn’t wearing his stupid mask, b) not chewing up the scenery with bad overacting, and c) wooing Zooey Deschanel in a totally different movie.

 After Summer dumps him, Cobra Commander institutes 500 DAYS OF COBRA.

Setting aside my seemingly burgeoning man crush on LBH aside, I have to admit I’ve been watching a lot of Korean stuff lately — in particular, The Good, The Bad, The Weird,  and the Daniel Henney flick My Father (it’s just okay, I guess. Really, the brief footage of the actual people that this film’s story is based on that runs over the end credits is infinitely more moving than the entire film).

I should also mention that I spent the last few days watching a Korean drama entitled Someday. A massive review is forthcoming, but take this moment to announce that I may never watch a Korean drama again. And not because I hated the show. Sure, I have Coffee Prince on my DVD shelf in California, and my mom has Something Happened in Bali, Women of the Sun, Damo, and Ilchimae, but I don’t think I’ll be watching any of them. I use to harbor the idea that if I owned a DVD produced in Asia that I was obligated to write a review for the site. I no longer work under this self-imposed delusion. 

In any event, the last time I reviewed a K-drama, I’m pretty sure I swore I would’t do it again and I liked My Lovely Sam Soon. To tell the truth, K-Dramas are too much of a time commitment, they usually don’t payoff in the way you’d hope, they’re littered with annoying cliches, and they’re harder than hell to write reviews for. So no more K-Dramas! But then again, I heard that Storm Shadow himself is starring in a K-Drama called IRIS. Oh crap.

Stay tuned for the adventures of Storm Shadow and Sanjuro in Singapore!

During my summer holiday in Hawai’i, I finally had some Asian cinema-related experiences, so voila! Here’s a new blog post! Enjoy!

Blast from the Past

Hong Kong cinema fans might be amused to know that, while visiting my girlfriend’s parents’ house, I saw Maggie Q’s 11th grade photo in an old Mililani High School Yearbook. To be fair to Ms. Quigley, I won’t reproduce the image here, but let’s just say that even one of the prettiest actresses around can look a little dorky in her yearbook photo. To be fair, she actually looks pretty cute, but there’s absolutely no hint of the sex symbol/Maxim covergirl/male fantasy she was to become. There’s no hint of that in my yearbook photo either.

“If you publish that yearbook pic, I’ll make you watch Gen Y Cops…”

“…LIKE THIS!”

But this isn’t going to be a post about embarrassing yearbook photos. No, this entry is actually about “translation,” although I doubt I’ll get too deep about it. It’s more like, “Hey, isn’t that an interesting coincidence?” To explain, I should say that I recently saw three films, all of which deal with translation in varying degrees.

DETROIT METAL CITY

“Thank you, Rocklahoma!”

First up is Detroit Metal City,a 2008 Japanese film that translates the popular (and utterly profane) death metal manga to the big screen…with mixed results. Smartly, the film adapts the first volume of the manga (with elements from later stories) and turns what essentially played out in a purely episodic fashion into a clearly structured, easy-to-understand character arc. So far so good.

Since Kevin has already reviewed the film, I won’t go into too much detail about the plot. But basically, the premise of the film involves Negishi, a young kid from the Japanese countryside who leads a dual life — by day, he’s a dork with a mushroom haircut and aspirations to sing saccharine sweet love songs, but by night, he’s Krauser II — the lead singer of the death metal band, Detroit Metal City (or Detoroito Metaru Shiti for you Japanese folks. Yes, I said, “shiti.”). Not only does Krauser wears KISS-style makeup and body armor, but he also sings about such heartwarming subjects as rape and murder. As is, that dichotomy within a single character is tough to pull off, but somehow the manga succeeds in allowing you to believe that a geek like Negishi could actually channel his repressed demons into such a charismatic frontman.

On film, however, such a transformation would require a Christopher Reeve-level performance to get audiences to believe that one guy could really be these two different characters — and not just because it says so in the script. I have to say that Kenichi Matsuyama isn’t up to the task. Don’t get me wrong, he’s masterful as Krauser II — especially in the character’s silly, unguarded moments.

But when he’s Negishi, it’s as if neither Matsuyama, nor the director ever read the manga. Even worse, it’s as if neither of them have any idea how real dorks act in public. In the manga, Negishi is a meek guy, but he’s an everyman. Of course, any manga that’s based on dual identities, embarrassing misunderstandings, and increasingly awkward situations requires a bit of mugging, doubletakes, etc. But in the comic, no one is ever really privy to Negishi’s Looney Tunes-style facial contortions, which — now that I’ve taken a second look at the manga — are actually pretty rare. Yet Matsuyama insists on playing Negishi as if he were a) socially retarded, b) a quasi-gay stereotype, and c) a manic weirdo who would freak out just about anybody if you actually had to carry on a conversation with him. Just look at these pictures:

“Why did they have to kill off L?”

“Look, I’m acting!”

In real life, Rosa Kato’s character (and the rest of the supporting cast) would say, “What the $%^& is wrong with you?” Or walk away. Or run. I couldn’t for one minute believe that Rosa Kato’s character would actually fall for this guy. He’s supposed to be an everyman, but the identification-level here is practically nonexistent. You can only feel sorry for the guy.  In that sense, Matsuyama’s performance is a terrible translation of the manga. On the bright side, it does include the funniest part of the original manga, too, which unfortunately isn’t on Youtube. Here’s a preview:

“Thank God, I’m a Country Boy!”

Still, it’s a funny movie, with half a brilliant performance, half a grating one, and a kind of lackluster ending. The woman playing Negishi’s mom is pretty funny though.

 THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE WEIRD

 ”So we meet again, Snake Eyes”

The second film I watched was The Good, the Bad, the Weird, which translates the Western — specifically the Sergio Leone-style Spaghetti Western — to a Korean (actually Manchurian) locale. I’m planning to write a full-length review of the film (I’m surprised no one has, although Kozo’s alter-ego Koh So seems to have done so. I’m not sure what to make of an alter ego has an alter ego!), so I’ll keep my comments short. First off, it’s a great film, effectively mimicking the style of Sergio Leone, while bringing something new to the table at each turn. Bravura cinema at its finest. My only complaints involve the lack of emphasis on “The Good” and a lackluster final standoff that only looks like Leone, but feels kind of hollow, as does the film’s ultimate outcome.
RAMEN GIRL

How does this movie exist?

Sometimes a film slips through the cracks — like, say a Matthew McConaughey/Kate Beckinsdale/Gary Oldman film about dwarfism — and Ramen Girl is just such a film. The kind you never heard of, never saw any previews of, and are surprised as hell when you see it at Blockbuster.

Ramen Girl deals with an entirely different kind of translation than the previous films. A US-Japan co-production featuring an American star, an American director, Japanese cast and crew, and a Korean leading man who was raised in Japan. Brittany Murphy stars as an American stranded in Japan who befriends a ramen chef (Toshiyuki Nishida), who begrudgingly becomes her mentor — even though they don’t speak each others language. That fact requires a HUGE suspension of disbelief regarding pretty much everything that happens in the film. On the bright side, I have to give kudos to the filmmakers for including a Korean male character (Park Sohee), who is intelligent, handsome, and actually sexual, which makes him the rare exception when it comes to the decidedly non-sexual Asian male/white female romantic pairings in mainstream Hollywood cinema (I’m looking at you, Jackie Chan). Ultimately, I have acknowledge that this isn’t some magnificent film about cross-cultural understanding, but the Japanese actors are pretty amusing and the film is innocuously cute.

Perhaps to secure a PG-13 rating for Blockbuster, the American DVD contains a significant amount of looping to edit out all the “shits,” fucks,” and what have you, which does a lot to undermine the emotion in these scenes. In fact, if you watch the deleted scenes on the DVD, you’ll find that most of the good parts of the movie were left on the cutting room floor. Granted, some of the footage feels a bit like outtakes of an ad for Japanese tourism, but ultimately, a lot of the excised bits involve some really nice character stuff, important exposition (How the hell does she afford that apartment?), and various little touches that would have given the film more depth and texture. As is, it’s just a cute, but wholly forgettable date movie.

Oh, and what is up with this American packaging?

Next time: Daniel Henney in My Father…and, um, other stuff.

On some level, I knew this would happen. And by “this” I’m specifically referring to my steadily declining output for this wonderful website. Every time I check the main page for updates, I find the blogroll mocking me on a daily basis, reminding me that I haven’t updated this blog in close to two months. And so, I sincerely apologize to you few, you happy few who actually take the time out of your day to read my stuff. Thanks a million for your support. But I have to tell you, my hiatus from blogging was not without good reason.

To make up for Sanjuro’s two month blogging hiatus, Singapore’s very own Stefanie Sun wishes LoveHKFilm.com readers in the U.S. a belated Happy 4th of July!

For one, I’m in a PhD program. My areas of interest are 20th century American literature, Asian American literature and film, hard-boiled detective fiction, and American film noir. I’m taking my qualifying exam in the fall, so that basically means I’ve been spending the last several months of my life and will be spending the next several months studying my ass off for what I am certain will be the hardest final exam I have ever taken in my life — which, by the way, has a timed written component as well as an oral one in front of a wizened council of elders. In my worst nightmares, I imagine it looks something like this:

 GUILTY!

So to make a long story short, the last few months and the next few months for me means reading a lot of fiction and a lot of critical theory, as well as watching a lot of films that don’t have anything remotely to do with Hong Kong cinema.

When I do have free time, this is what tends to happen. I’m in a happy relationship, so that’s my number one priority. But aside from trying to be a good boyfriend, I — as some of you might remember — am also trying to be a good writer, and so whenever I get a sliver of time to myself, I work on my writing in the hopes that someday I’ll have another story, collection of stories, or novel to submit for publication. I’m actually pretty close to finishing a first draft of some new work, so I’ve got my fingers crossed that everything will turn out for the best.

Anyway, I guess I just wish I could split myself into three people — a movie reviewer, a would-be professor, and a writer of fiction. I guess I’m too ambitious for my own damn good.

Another thing that caused the hiatus is the simple fact that there are too many short-term distractions that I find myself succumbing to — I mean, when you can play Rock Band with friends, read the ever-addictive 20th Century Boys, or watch the latest episode of Supernatural for free, one feels less inclined to blog about one’s silly little opinions on Hong Kong cinema.

On the bright side, I’m going to be taking a short trip to Singapore, which I’m hoping will put me right smack dab in the Asian cinema loop. Last time I went, I saw Jay Chou’s Initial D car on display. Bam! That’s a blog post right there. I’m a little pissed that I won’t get to see/meet unofficial LoveHKFilm.com mascot, Ekin Cheng, as he’s set to kick off a 150-day countdown to the release of Storm Warriors. He’ll be there July 20-21, and unfortunately, I don’t get there ’till late August. Still, when I see the life-sized replicas of the two Wind and Cloud swords at VivoCity, you can bet your ass I’ll take pictures and blog about it. That’s a promise!

 I really wanna see you! I really wanna be with you!

Of course, I will watch any Asian film in Singapore theaters — even Murderer, despite Kevin’s warnings, simply because I think I might get a kick out of seeing that outrageous twist ending that he so graciously spoiled for me and all his Facebook friends. One thing I really love about Singapore theaters is you get the Asian equivalent of Kettle Corn popcorn . Another great thing is that every film has English subtitles. Thanks to that, I’ve gotten to watch everything from Hideo Nakata’s Dark Water to Jay Chou’s Secret during my intermittent trips to the Lion City.

Also, a trip overseas means my Asian DVD collection is sure to expand, despite the fact that I still haven’t completely whittled down my unseen DVD pile just yet. I’ll catch up with Singaporean cinema, which has a small enough movie industry that one could actually watch every film made in the last ten years if one were so inclined. Singapore is also a great place to get affordable Japanese and Korean films and television dramas. Last time, I picked up Nodame Cantabile and Sailor Suit and Machine Gun (review forthcoming!?) for a very small sum. Buying Hong Kong films is a little trickier, though, because sometimes the Singaporean distributors don’t include the original Cantonese track. For instance, my copy of Invisible Target only has a Mandarin dub. So…new DVDs means new blog posts.

I will be drinking a lot of this in Singapore. Admittedly, Coke tastes a bit better, but this is somehow more addictive. I think they may put crack in it. No wonder it’s not available in the United States.

Anyway, I guess I the whole point of this blog post was to say 1) I haven’t abandoned the blog, 2) I’m really sorry for the hiatus, 3) I had my reasons, which I’m sure you’ll understand, and 4) things are looking up.

So, in the words of our illustrious governor, I’ll be back.