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Takashi Miike is
arguably the hardest working man in cinema. Since
1991, he’s directed over 60 features in his native Japan, often releasing five films
a year during periods of (for him) only modest output. With
the international release of 2000’s critically acclaimed Audition, Miike’s burgeoning cult status
in the west exploded. Thanks to the success
of that film, which hinged on a meticulously calibrated tonal shift from a Vertigo-esque study of male voyeurism to one of
sadistic female empowerment, Miike’s work has become more palatable for distributors. Of course, that might not mean much for a director who
makes seven films in one year, but it at least ensures a few of them a proper stateside
theatrical release. The last two years have seen
several of Miike’s recent films, such as The Happiness of the Katakuris, Dead or Alive, and Ichi the Killer, meet their demand in the
U.S.
Working in a straight-to-video industry that caters to the perversely
violent instincts of its hungry fanbase, Miike has become notorious for conjuring up
schlock imagery to blanch even the most prurient audience-member. Not for the faint of stomach, his films are easily
recognizable for their kinetic brio, arterial spree and otherwise inventive uses of human
bodily functions. Die-hard Miike fans argue
over which scene – the hooker drowning in a kiddie-pool of her own excrement, say, or
the gangster strung up on meat hooks – remains the most outrageous. Gozu,
fans will happily note, checks off a number of the director’s signature tropes, from
lactating women to undead yakuza.
A gangster film crossed with a ghost story – or perhaps a yakuza
acid-trip flick – Gozu follows two
mid-level crewmembers, Minami (Hideki Sone) and his older, world-weary associate Ozaki
(Miike-regular Sho Aikawa). Ozaki has been
suffering hallucinatory outbursts of late, much to the consternation of their boss (Renji
Ishibashi). In short order Minami is
dispatched to take Ozaki out to a remote gangland garbage dump in Nagoya and leave him to
sleep with the rusted-out Datsuns. But before
he is able to finish the job, Ozaki’s body disappears, leading Minami on a surreal
journey to recover it and placate his irate boss back in Tokyo.
Gozu is pretty tame,
violence-wise, in comparison to most of Miike’s output. In place of the normal bloodletting, he opts for a
wild surrealism that brings to mind both the rigorous weirdness of David Lynch and the
twisted dark comedy of Luis Bunuel. Minami’s
attempts to find Ozaki’s body are repeatedly thwarted by the discourteous locals he
encounters. One hilarious subplot finds him dodging the advances of the innkeeper he
lodges with, whose house is nearly flooded by her relentlessly lactating breasts. To make matters worse, Minami begins suffering from
his own brand of phantasmagoric delusions. He
is visited by the half-cow, half-man – a figure from Buddhist mythology – that
gives the film its title. And when it seems
that Ozaki has returned to the land of the living in the form of a beautiful young woman,
Minami must decide between loyalty to his boss and affection for his partner.
In addition to being one of Miike’s funnier films, Gozu is frequently one of his most beautiful. Digital video has enabled the director to work
constantly on the cheap, but he makes the most of shooting on film here, emphasizing his
hero’s fish-out-of-water plight in a number of gorgeous establishing shots of
Nagoya’s low-slung factory skyline. The
director’s trademark low-angle shots in cramped spaces make the film’s climactic
scene, shot in a spare, claustrophobic white room with a single amber floor lamp, an
unforgettable comic-horror set-piece. As far
as gonzo head-trips go, this one’s certainly worth the ride.
- Jesse Paddock
