Cam Bert

I apologize for my tardiness. March is end of the school year/start of the school year here so not so much down time and wastefully I used my free time tonight to get caught up on HDTGM movies (when your time comes, I will destroy you Lake House!) My Mom's review will have to wait a few days until I talk to her next. Considering my father was bearded as was Ted Neeley I don't think she'll have a problem with the mustache but the blondness is a wild card. I'm trying to think if I have anything new to add that hasn't already been said. I will say I did greatly enjoy the movie but I do have issues with it. The thing that annoyed me most is a pet peeve I have with a kind of trope movies set in the past and that is when characters speak from a modern perspective. Classic example is in The Patriot when Heath Ledger sits down with the black slave and gives a speech about how one day he dreams black people and white people will live in harmony and their children will play together. Not saying that a person in that time couldn't think that, but it does seem more coming from a modern perceptive than being true to the people of the time. In this movie Brian more than a few times expresses his distrust and doomsaying when it comes to the Nazi party. Now again I'm sure there were people in Germany at the time that had similar feelings and did voice them, however every time he said something it was too direct or took away from the indirect nature of it. For example, the scene with the young boy singing. You slowly get hints of him being part of the Hitler Youth and all the people except the one old man join in. It is a fantastic scene and really subtly sells the message. Then you have Brian come in and say "You think you can still control them?" to Hans but you don't need that. It just feels forced on to the end to be like "Did you get the message?" As CakeBug mentioned before there are so many little scenes through out that show events and the rise of the Nazi party so effectively that you don't need the voice of reason from the future saying "Nazi are bad" or "They could have been stopped." Ultimately did any of Brian's protest to the rise of the Nazis lead anywhere? No. He doesn't leave because of it. He's not driven from the country. Rather, as Cameron said the whole movie is about characters in denial about their true nature and it is the realization of this that causes him to leave. If anything you could argue that the country as a character is in denial about the rise and ways of the Nazi Party but nothing Brian says adds anything more to that message than what the film was doing already. As for the issue of Brian and his sexuality it's a tricky issue because I feel that sexuality is more of a fluid thing than a definable thing. I don't think people should have to choose a label for their sexuality. That said, I think that the character is gay or would identify that way upon his return to England (though he wouldn't be allowed to at the time) but that doesn't nullify his feelings for Sally. I think the Max thing explains this as it is a metaphor for him accepting his sexuality. You have Max tempting Brian with the cigarette case and then the sweaters. Brian refuses these gifts, however we eventually see him give in an accept. We can assume this also around the time that they too started sleeping together. His refusal of the gifts was him denying his feelings. We see he wants to accept these gifts, embrace his sexuality, the way Sally so freely has. Like mentioned before I too believe this film is all about denying the truth of who and what we are, that's why I think I side on the side of Sally's finale song being a sad embrace of her denial. I think this is clearly stated by the MC who after he song basically says "See, haven't you forgotten your problems. I knew you would." Which sells the message that the cabaret is a place where people go and hide from their true selves. It's only when the people realize who they are that they leave. Brian accepts his sexuality and goes back to England. Max accepts his Jewish heritage and gets married and moves on. However, Sally while aware of who she is, would rather try to forget it and go back to living in denial and thus goes back to singing in the cabaret.

And with that I think I know what side of the fence you fall onto. I shall play my cards closer to the vest...

HA! So according to Letterboxd three of us watched this movie at the same time!* *well at least recorded watching it

Sorry I clicked quote instead of edit and ended up with a double post. Have a gif instead!

Now that is worth the cost.

Seriously congratulations!!!

I don't know if anybody here is a Screen Junkies fan, but they're the people that do Honest Trailers and they also do a show called Movie Fights which is a weekly movie debate show. Anyway, Paul was on the show today with Kumail Nanjiani and it'll be up on their Youtube page this weekend. Sorry if he announced this on twitter, I don't have it so I wouldn't know.

I don't think everybody understands the awesomeness that is Kit Kats in Japan. They do regular seasonal flavours that come out for a short time and then are just gone for ever! Some are glorious like apple pie and sweet potato. Others are just weird like soy sauce and miso soup. Even better are the seasonal Pepsi flavours that come out. Cucumber Pepsi... mmmmm....

I agree about him seeming like a cool dude, but I do not agree about The Last Dragon. That movie is flawless! They'd have nothing to talk about!

It wouldn't feel right not to return the favor somehow. Anyway, my birthday is coming up soon so in a month I'll have my fix.

Every year for my birthday and Christmas my mom will send me licorice allsorts because I love them so much and Japan in general hates licorice and the taste of anise so I can never get them here. Whenever I know a person who's going overseas I always ask for a bag. If anybody every wants Japanese snacks I am more than willing to trade some for licorice.

I love licorice

If they're the ones I'm thinking of they have an Iron Man and Spider-Man ones too http://www.tamashii.jp/item/11578/ http://www.tamashii.jp/item/11359/

Yes, this exactly. I had set my expectations really high when I first saw it. The second time I saw it I liked it more, but haven't rewatched it since.

Don't worry I'm in the same boat too. For the record I really wanted to like World's End but I think by sticking to the formula and conventions of Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz (ie explain the story in a seemingly unrelated monologue up top) kinda did them in. Also part of what made the first two great were how they deconstructed the genre while embracing it at the same time and this one didn't really achieve that goal as well as the others did. EDIT:Wrong Shaun, damn you names with multiple spellings!

Nope, pretty spot on. Maybe a few word choice issues but otherwise good job. I find it funny that on the page under the product description there is a part featuring "reviews" which just tell the plot and the people involved and no actual review. I looked around on some other Japanese pages and that's the only customer review I could find. Well, I found one or two blog posts of people reviewing the movie, but they are too long to post here. Does this mean we'll have to start searching international Amazons to get some more second opinions?

I would say the vast majority of famous and well known critics here cover both Japanese and American films. However, Japan is a bit behind when it comes to online things so finding their reviews from years ago is difficult. There might be some smaller people on youtube or Niconico Douga but none that have hit any sort of mainstream attention. I remember after Dragon Ball Evolution came out there was a story that went viral about it. TSUTAYA is like the blockbuster of Japan, and every so often they'd have things written about a movie and put below it on the shelves by employees. Often it's talking about how a film is worth renting because it was overlooked or like a staff pick sort of deal. When Dragon Ball Evolution came out an employee basically wrote a giant tirade against the film and put it on the shelf and it went viral. It even made a few film magazines worst of the year lists. So yes it is universally hated.

Not to mention that Darth Vader's look was based on Samurai armor and Colonel Chi wears Samurai armor. The number of similarities are astounding. Who knows what evil lurks in the heart of the forums? The Sheer-dow knows!

Also speaking of packaged disappointment, this was the DVD rerelease:

You did. It is tricky because two parts of it don't really work in English. 我輩 is an arrogant or pompous way or referring to your self which is hard because there really isn't an equivalent word in English. Simply using I is not wrong but you lose the tone in which it is intended. てか is a shortening of というか and is here used like a punchline. So personally I would go with a more indirect approach and go with "Did you say nobody can defeat you?" opposed to a direct approach of "You say I have no enemies"

Now it's time for a very special How Did This Get Named? Leslie Nielsen Edition! Marketing movies overseas can sometimes be very hard. How do you get people in to see a movie with stars they don't know, based on books or characters they don't know, and dealing with subject matters they aren't familiar with? Well as I talked about with Vampire's Kiss one strategy is to completely repackage the movie as something else using something in the zeitgeist. However, Surf Ninjas repackaging of the movie reveals another interesting trend. The movie has one well known star, Leslie Nielsen, and thanks to the popularity of the Naked Gun movies he was well known in Japan. So rework the film so you think it's another Leslie Nielsen spoof movie. Thus Surf Ninjas becomes... 鉄の顔を持つ男 Tetsu no Kao wo Motsu Otoko - The Man with an Iron Face Leslie Nielsen not only gets top billing but as you can see from this VHS packaging he is the movie! Oddly for a film called "The Man with an Iron Face" you think they would put the cyborg version of Chi on the front rather than the back. Why this name for the film though? Well, for that we have to take a step back. As I said the Naked Gun franchise was popular and made Leslie Nielsen well known in Japan. That movie was call 裸の銃を持つ男(Hadaka no Gan wo Motsu Otoko) The Man with a Naked Gun (Japanese side note: 銃 is read juu in Japanese and means gun but they chose to go with the Katakana-ized version of gun instead) and this sparked a whole trend of naming of his movies for years to come. The Exorcist parody film Repossessed became 裸の十字架を持つ男(Hadaka no Juujika wo Motsu Otoko) The Man with a Naked Cross, The Fugitive parody film Wrongfully Accused became 裸の銃を持つ逃亡者(Hadako no Gan wo Motsu Toubousha) The Fugitive with a Naked Gun, heck even the Harry Anderson starring TV movie version of Harvey was repackaged as 裸のウサギを持つ男(Hadaka no Usagi wo Motsu Otoko) The Man with a Naked Rabbit. At least 4 other movies he appeared in followed a similar naming pattern. So why did this film not get named "The Man with the Naked Face"? I can only assume because they wanted to avoid any mention of him being a samurai and the only thing left to talk about was his cyborg parts.

First off, very well written piece! Second I agree 100% with you and that line just nails it. When I heard the cast and then that line popped up in the first 30 seconds of the trailer I was like "Oh, they want 'youths' to see this and therefore are dumbing it down." Then I read your piece and see that quote from Fellowes about making it for the uneducated just rubs me so wrong and it confirmed my thoughts. This is all backwards thinking. Romeo and Juliet is easily one of if not the most known Shakespeare play. People that have never seen it or read it still know the basic story. The themes are pretty universal too. I think this just speaks to the bigger problem of underestimating the intelligence of a teenage audience. True while Mercutio's speech may leave them scratching their heads, it wouldn't effect their overall understanding of the story. I dread to think how that was handled in this version. I remember being made to read Romeo and Juliet in the 9th grade. We were all 14 and not one person didn't get the material at a basic level. There are layers of subtext and meaning that naturally goes over you head, but that doesn't or won't stop teenagers enjoying the story. Sorry to ramble but that trailer did upset me.

I am very familiar with Tromeo and Juliet. James Gunn's film debut. EDIT: For writing. Troma founder Lloyd Kaufman directed it. I watched that first trailer and boy... I never felt like drinking to forget before now. Everything about it just makes me unhappy to my core.

I have never heard of this version of the film until now. What part did Damian Lewis play?

Could we pick interpretations of Shakespeare like West Side Story, Forbidden Planet or Throne of Blood?