DVD Review: Atsushi Ogata's "Cast Me If You Can"

Cast Me If You Can (Wakiyaku monogatari). 2010. Directed by Atsushi Ogata. Written by Atsushi Ogata and Akane Shiratori. Produced by Atsushi Ogata, Eric Nyari and Eriko Miyagawa. Cinematography by Yuichi Nagata. Edited by Masahiro Onaga. Music by Jessica de Rooij. Art direction by Kazumi Kobayashi. Sound design by Yasushi Eguchi.

Cast: Toru Masuoka (Hiroshi Matsuzaki), Hiromi Nagasaku (Aya), Masahiko Tsugawa (Kenta Matsuzaki), Keiko Matsuzaka (Toshiko Kuroiwa), Tasuku Emoto (Masaru), Edith Hanson (Jane), Ai Maeda (Sakura), Atsushi Ogata (Convenience Store Manager), Akira Emoto (Homeless).

(Note: this review has been cross-posted on Twitch.)

The Japanese title of Atsushi Ogata’s romantic comedy Cast Me If you Can is “Wakiyaku Monogatari,” which translates as “Tale of the Supporting Actor.” The supporting actor in this particular tale, and the main character in this story, is Hiroshi Matsuzaki (Toru Masuoka), a long-time bit player currently playing a cop on a TV drama.  He harbors dreams of finally becoming a leading man, and seems close to that opportunity, having been cast as the lead in a Woody Allen remake.  He is very good at disappearing into his roles; in fact, he is so good at this that this ability bleeds into his real life, to the point that he is continually mistaken for other people, a running gag that this film makes potent and funny use of.  His struggle to assert his own identity is made even more difficult by having to live under the shadow of his father Kenta (Masahiko Tsugawa), a famous playwright.  One case of mistaken identity gets Hiroshi embroiled in a tabloid scandal that threatens his big role, and with the help his friend and wannabe spy Masaru (Tasuku Emoto), he sets out to clear his name.  In the midst of this chaos, Hiroshi meets Aya (Hiromi Nagasaku), an aspiring actress; while they begin a tentative courtship, Hiroshi’s identity issues and many other distractions threaten their budding relationship.

With Cast Me If You Can, Ogata attempts a mode of filmmaking which is quite unusual in a Japanese context: an American-style romantic comedy.  He employs much more subtle humor than the typical zany, variety-show style slapstick which is more common in Japanese comedies.  Instead, Ogata grounds his humor in dialog and situations in which he both honors and tweaks romantic comedy formula, which make the humor that much more potent.  One great example is late in the film, in which Hiroshi delivers his passionate confession to Aya in the convenience store where she works; while fulfilling its normal function in this sort of film, the location of the scene, as well as its priceless punchline, also cleverly parodies this often clichéd convention.  The films of Woody Allen are an explicitly acknowledged influence, not only in the narrative but in several walk-and-talk camera setups.  But similarly to the way Ogata handles the romantic comedy genre, this doesn’t at all feel derivative, but is instead nicely woven into the rich fabric of this film.  Also remarkable is how exportable and cross-cultural the comedy is here (consciously so; Ogata originally wrote his script in English and translated it to Japanese), and the generosity with which all the characters are treated, which filters down into the smallest roles.  The main characters are all surrounded with vivid supporting ones, all of whom make memorable impressions, from Hiroshi’s dwarf-like agent and a flirtatious female arresting officer, to a parallel romance involving a café waitress that plays out in pantomime in the background. 

As with any romantic comedy, the success of such an endeavor rises and falls on the chemistry between its leads, and Cast Me If You Can certainly scores here.  Toru Masuoka is nicely understated as the hapless victim of mistaken identity, and effectively renders his character’s transformation as love is introduced into his life.  But the major standout is Hiromi Nagasaku, who is terrific as a plucky and energetic young woman who is relentless in the pursuit of her dreams, and who lights up every scene she is in with her warm, and irresistibly sunny persona.

Cast Me If You Can is now available on DVD from Seminal Films, and can be purchased at Amazon.

Also, if you're in the L.A. area, there will be a screening and Q&A with director Atsushi Ogata and producer Eriko Miyagawa on March 1, hosted by USC and the Japan Film Society. Click here for screening info.

New on DVD: Hitoshi Matsumoto's "Big Man Japan"

Big Man Japan (Dai-Nipponjin). 2007. Directed by Hitoshi Matsumoto. Written by Mitsuyoshi Yakasu and Hitoshi Matsumoto. Produced by Akihiko Okamoto. Cinematography by Hideo Yamamoto. Edited by Soichi Ueno. Music by Towa Tei. Production design by Yuji Hayashida and Etsuko Aiko. Visual effects direction by Hiroyuki Seshita. Sound by Mitsugi Shiratori.

Cast: Hitoshi Matsumoto (Masaru Dai-Sato/Dai-Nipponjin), Riki Takeuchi (Haneru-no-ju), Ua (Manager Kobori), Ryunosuke Kamiki (Warabe-no-ju), Haruka Unabara (Shimeru-no-ju), Tomoji Hasegawa (Interviewer/Director), Itsuji Itao (Female Niou-no-ju), Takayuki Haranishi (Male Niou-no-ju), Hiroyuki Miyasako (Stay With Me), Daisuke Miyagawa (Super Justice), Takuya Hashimoto (Midon), Taichi Yazaki (Dai-Sato's Grandfather), Shion Machida (Dai-Sato's Ex-wife).

Hitoshi Matsumoto's wonderfully weird monster mockumentary Big Man Japan is out today on DVD. Below is what I wrote on this film when it screened at last year's New York Asian and Japan Cuts film festivals.

A hilarious and inventive kaiju eiga repurposed for the modern media landscape, Big Man Japan showcases the considerable talents of its writer-director-star Hitoshi Matsumoto. It begins as a rather odd mock-documentary about 40-ish loner misfit Dai-Sato (Matsumoto), whom a camera crew follows as he goes on ordinary, quotidian tasks. There are little hints of something stranger going on, such as the sign outside his door that reads “Office of Monster Prevention” and the obscene graffiti spray-painted on his wall directed toward Dai-Sato. A brick is thrown through his window as he is interviewed by the crew. Eventually these odd details are explained when he goes to an electrical plant, where he is juiced by massive amounts of electricity and blown up to literally monstrous proportions.

Now a towering figure dressed in purple shorts and sporting an Eraserhead-meets-Kid ‘n’ Play haircut and product-placement tattoos, he fights a series of monsters in epic televised battles, bashing them with a stick. Alas, his fights are quite unpopular; the late-night home-shopping show regularly trounces him in the ratings. His opponents are perhaps the strangest motley crew ever assembled in the annals of monster movies: the Leaping Monster (a head – that of popular actor Riki Takeuchi – and a single leg); the Stink Monster, which emits a stench equivalent to 10,000 piles of human feces; the Evil Stare Monster, with a single eye hurled as a weapon. “Dai-Nipponjin” (“Big Man Japan”), as he is known in his battles with the monsters, is victorious at first – until a mysterious unidentified foe with red skin kicks the crap out of him, causing him to run away and making him even more of an object of public ridicule. Dai-Sato’s problems don’t end there: he frequently clashes with his manager (pop star Ua) over her indifference to him as a person, and who seems to regard him as little more than a money machine to keep her in expensive cars and clothes. He is divorced and estranged from his daughter, and his grandfather (who was also a monster fighter) languishes in an assisted-living facility. In contrast to the love the public showered on his fighter forebears, Dai-Sato is treated with contempt and derision by his audience, who sees him as an irrelevant and outdated nuisance.

Big Man Japan has a remarkably controlled tone that treats its outlandish premise with a hilariously deadpan seriousness, creating a rounded character that has a level of poignancy. Matsumoto, a popular comedian in Japan, spent six years writing and directing his feature debut, and it is mostly a successful one. The film is marred only by the fact that the pace sags a bit in the midsection as the premise becomes repetitious and begins to wear a bit thin. However, it redeems itself with its deliriously absurd denouement, a last-minute rescue that is the cherry on top of the madness.

Big Man Japan can be purchased from Amazon.

DVD Review: Wayne Wang's "A Thousand Years of Good Prayers"

A Thousand Years of Good Prayers. 2007. Directed by Wayne Wang. Written by Yiyun Li, based on her short story. Produced by Yukie Kito, Rich Cowan, and Wayne Wang. Cinematography by Patrick Lindenmaier. Edited by Deirdre Slevin. Production design by Vincent De Felice. Music by Lesley Barber.

Cast: Faye Yu (Yilan), Henry O (Mr. Shi), Vida Ghahremani (Madam), Pasha Lychnikoff (Boris).

A Thousand Years of Good Prayers, based on a short story by Yiyun Li, is one half of a diptych conceived by Wayne Wang as a return to his indie-film roots after a long sojourn making Hollywood studio films. The other film is The Princess of Nebraska, also based on one of Li’s stories. Of the two, Thousand Years is the far more accomplished and satisfying work. Unlike the self-consciously arty strenuousness of Nebraska, Thousand Years derives its affecting quality from its simplicity, economy of storytelling, and a quietly powerful central performance by Henry O as Mr. Shi, an elderly man invited by his daughter Yilan (Faye Yu, also quiet and compelling) for a visit and a tour of the U.S., after twelve years apart from each other. Mr. Shi, a self-described “true believer” in Communism, his posture held aloft by a back brace, comes to live with his daughter in a bland and eerily anonymous suburban community. They have quiet dinners each evening, Mr. Shi clearly wanting more information about how his daughter is doing, and making valiant attempts to reconnect her after his long absence from her life. Yiyun, however, keeps her personal life a firmly closed book, and she seems increasingly annoyed at his intrusiveness. Bored, and with little to do around the home, Mr. Shi wanders around the neighborhood, which leads to a few dryly comic encounters, most notably with a sunbather who eagerly tells him about her passion for forensic science, and an odd visit by a pair of Mormon proselytizers. Mr. Shi tries to reduce the language barrier by jotting down English words and phrases in his book, and in his conversations with others, he freely mixes his native Mandarin with halting English. Mr. Shi soon meets an Iranian woman (Vida Ghahremani), and they begin having daily conversations on a park bench, and even though they speak Mandarin and Farsi with one another, with some English mixed in, they are able to reveal intimate details with their lives that they can with no one else. Mr. Shi eventually confesses to the woman, “I no good father.” As a rocket scientist back in China (a fact he loves to mention to any American he meets), he was wrapped up in his work, and was mostly absent to his own family. The latent resentment of his daughter towards him has clearly never been resolved. In the film’s closing passages, the weight of the secrets and lies told on both sides finally take their toll on the father and daughter, resulting in a cascading rush of revealed (and painful) truth.

This film is a model of elegant simplicity, both in its narrative and visual design. The soullessness and emptiness of the environment depicted in the film, where Mr. Shi, with the weight of personal and national history evident in every gesture and line on his face, is so clearly out of place, is paralleled by the years of silence between father and daughter. The silence and secrets are intertwined with the legacy of the Cultural Revolution in China, a major theme of Yiyun Li’s fiction. The sharp cinematography (by Patrick Lindenmaier) and editing (by Deirdre Slevin) serve to highlight the appealing concision with which Li’s story is rendered (she also penned the screenplay). Henry O, a veteran actor in China and the U.S. whose lengthy resume includes Bernardo Bertolucci’s The Last Emperor, is a remarkable presence, adept at both deadpan comedy and poignant, rueful reflection. (The DVD contains a fascinating interview with Henry O in which he relates his personal experiences and early struggles as an actor during the Cultural Revolution.) Faye Yu (who previously worked with Wang in The Joy Luck Club) is also excellent, conveying Yilan’s sadness in a role that often requires her to express this without dialogue, a task at which she succeeds enormously.

A Thousand Years of Good Prayers can be purchased from Amazon. Yiyun Li's original short story can be found in the collection of the same name, also available from Amazon.

Happiness in Slavery

New Tokyo Decadence - The Slave (Dorei). 2007. Directed by Osamu Sato. Written and produced by Akira Fukuhara. Cinematography by Takuya Hasegawa. Edited by Shoji Sakai. Music by Kazumi Oba.

Cast: Rinako Hirasawa, Kikujiro Honda, Yui, Komari Awashima, Naoyuki Chiba, Taro Araki, Shinji Kubo, Toshihide Akama, Saburo Isurugi, Tetsuya Kobayashi, Takutoshi Naoi.

Osamu Sato’s 2007 pink film New Tokyo Decadence – The Slave, billed as the autobiographical tale of its lead actress, Rinako Hirasawa, is a quintessential example of this genre’s concision and its penchant for subtly surreal imagery depicting the stark contrasts between the façade of polite, public society, and the perversions that lie underneath. Hirasawa is a well-known (within the genre) pink and hardcore film actress who, as the DVD bio informs us, has proudly said of herself, “I’m a pervert.” The character she plays in this film, Rina (a shortened version of her own name), adheres to this same credo. The film begins and ends with Rina strung up, naked, hanging from a tall tree:

Rina’s voiceover guides us through her story, telling us who she is and how she got there. She is introduced to BDSM by a math teacher –

who, ever the diligent instructor, continues their school lessons during their love hotel bondage sessions.

Rina eventually becomes a professional dominatrix, although, as she repeatedly tells us, she is a masochist at heart.

She moves from the dominatrix world to the corporate world, where she finds the master she seeks in her boss (Kikujiro Honda), who spots her immediately as a masochist in search of a master:

They repair to love hotels for sessions of rope bondage and dripping hot candle wax, and their master-slave relationship crosses over into the work realm, which leads to an artfully staged scene where, under her boss’ instructions, Rina flashes her boss in front of her unsuspecting co-workers. This scene is a mini-master class in editing and staging. Pay particular attention to what is happening in the background, which ends Rina and her boss’ voyeuristic pas de deux:

This (relatively) happy state of affairs is upended when Rina receives a love letter from another co-worker. Her boss makes her have sex with the coworker while he watches from inside a closet, but Rina commits the cardinal sin of having an orgasm with another man, whereupon her jealous boss dumps and fires her. She decides to become respectable and leave the S&M life behind, marrying her coworker. In this section of the film, Sato makes the interesting visual choice of degrading the film quality here during their wedding and marriage montage (peppered, of course, with vigorous sex), underlining Rina’s feelings of dissatisfaction with her new life:

She soon meets up with her former boss/master again, but the way this meeting is introduced is very unusual: she turns on the TV and an image of herself appears on the screen, leading into the reunion with her former boss.

This raises the intriguing possibility that the rest of the film is an elaborate fantasy, representing her wish to return to her old life. The open-ended nature of the film (at the film’s conclusion, Rina is left hanging on the tree as her boss drives away) serves to support this reading. To cement the break with her old life, Rina tosses away her wedding ring –

and travels through her closet back to her old life:

Significantly, the film returns from its blown-up video look back to 35mm in the last section, when Rina returns to the S&M life, replaying her private sex sessions with the boss in public, at a club the boss now owns, having been run out of his old business.

Rina’s husband completely disappears in this latter section, never to be seen again, effectively dead as far as the rest of the film’s narrative is concerned. The boss now has a new girlfriend, who he has sex with as Rina masturbates next to them in the same room.

The boss’ jealous girlfriend spits on Rina after she has sex with her boss in the empty club. Rina receives this spit as gratefully as she does her boss’ semen. “You may think I’m crazy,” she says, but ever the committed masochist, she receives this humiliation as a badge of honor.

Sato caps it all by enlisting the iconic Mount Fuji as a backdrop to his unique tableau, in a slyly subversive take on classic Japanese landscape painting:

New Tokyo Decadence – The Slave, besides being a surprisingly personal work, also functions brilliantly as a satire of the working world. After all, in many cases the demands of corporate bosses on their workers, especially in Japan, differs from what goes on in this film only in degree. And while doctrinaire feminists will blanch at most of what is on display here, there is a very sensitive and respectful quality to the way Rina is portrayed in this film. Hirasawa’s impressively committed performance (she is obviously intimately familiar with this terrain) meshes seamlessly with the film’s acrobatic perversity, and within this context becomes something rather touching and beautiful.

New Tokyo Decadence - The Slave can be purchased from Pink Eiga, and you can see the full, uncensored trailer here.