Topic: Hara-Kiri

[Hulot]

Ichimei / Hara-Kiri
Year 2011
Director Takashi Miike
With Koji Yakusho, Munetaka Aoki, Naoto Takenaka
Genre Drama

In Japanese
DVD New Video NNVG280810


Overview

Seeking an honorable end, poverty-stricken samurai Hanshiro requests to commit hara-kiri in the courtyard of a feudal lord’s estate. Trying to dismiss Hanshiro’s wish to save face, the lord recounts the tragic story of a similar plea years ago from a young ronin.



Takashi Miike, is one of the most interesting of modern Japanese directors, and this film is lovely to look at from beginning to end. Not quite the perfection of Kobayashi's 1962 original...when Miike steps away from his trademark flamboyance he is in essence a conservative filmmaker; whereas Kobayashi's film was about the rewriting of history by authority, Miike's is simply a plaintive cry against injustice.
Some great moments. Really powerful.

Rating 4/5

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

For me Miike is to cinema what McDonald's is to cooking.
He is the master of industrialised film making, delivering us up to 8 (!!) productions per year.

I like the occasional Big Mac though, so my all-time favourite Miike is one of his 2001 productions.



It is so bad it's good, just from the other side.