Please find a way to see this movie. I’ve watched it like 6 times in the last few months and I’m watching it again now. Please join me on this island of awesome.
OK, point taken: I shouldn’t post drunk and contentless and then be away from my computer for two days.
Anyway. Sukiyaki Western Django is the latest movie by the bewildering genius Takashi Miike. It’s a feverish homage to, chiefly (though there are many other sources folded into the mix), the spaghetti Westerns of Sergios Leone and, especially, Corbucci: you’ll enjoy it even more, if possible, if you’ve seen Corbucci’s masterpieces* Django, The Great Silence,* and Companeros.
The storyline starts at Yojimbo and explodes via Shakespeare into a dizzying tangle of referential plot twists. The color scheme is fever-dream Technocolor. The acting style is, um, self-dubbed English in Japanese mouths; even Quentin Tarantino, in his hilarious cameo, speaks with a heavy Japanese accent.
It’s not, um, technically available on disc in this country, but that’s what Hong Kong is for. It’s opening in US theaters this week, although the runtime of the US release is 20 minutes shorter than the Asian DVD release. Don’t know what that means, exactly. It comes out on Region 1 disc, and BluRay, on Armistice Day. It will be stunning, life-altering on BluRay.
See it if you can, check in here if you have.
I liked The Happiness of the Katakuris quite a bit, so I’m interested, but had to watch Ichi the Killer through the holes in my afghan blanket, and was pretty horrified by Audition. I don’t handle blood well. Is there much blood?
There’s a HUGE amount of cartoonish Western blood. Not as coldly disturbing as Audition, not as straightforwardly violent as Ichi. More in the style of Pulp Fiction, only, like if done by the Coens or something; the blood is almost all presented quite clearly for a comic effect.
Basically, it’s like Django, only post-Tarantino.
Okay, cartoonish is okay. With Ichi it felt like every other bloody scene was cartoonish and silly, but the other every other was grotesque and required me to hide under my blanket.
I’ve never seen Django, but I must confess that I got bored and turned off Fistful of Dollars about 30 minutes in. But I am intrigued by Takashi Miike. (I think it’s a weird spill-over I have because of my love for Takeshi Kitano. I know that they have absolutely nothing to do with each other, but I watched a lot of their movies around the same time.)
Never heard of it - but a kid in my daughter’s daycare is named DJANGO - just had to say.
I saw the trailer a few times at the theater, and found the Engrish pretty unbearable even for that short amount of time. Is it something you get used to, or is cringing part of the intended effect?
Definitely intended; seemed to me to be a joke on the bad dubbing traditional to spaghetti Westerns. In the theater, I saw it with subtitles, for which I was sometimes grateful.
I saw Django a couple months ago, and I like Miike and Tarantino, so this sounds right up my alley. Thanks for the heads-up.
In Japan, the movie was released with Japanese sub-titles. That means that you’re watching Japanese actors, dubbed in English, and sub-titled back to Japanese.
I’ve only seen the trailers but I wonder how much western audiences will get of the Japanese cultural references. For instance, that the two gangs are called Genji and Heike. Incidently, in the Japanese trailer, the stranger is introduced as yojimbo.
Sorry so late on this. I’m behind on LOTS of major recent DVD releases.
But I thought you’d all want to know that the domestic DVD of Sukiyaki Western Django was released on November 11. The domestic is 23 minutes shorter than the, um, import, but I haven’t made a close comparison yet. The shorter version seems to stand on its own OK; I’ve watched the bluray a few times in the last couple weeks, with as much eye-burning giddy joy as the first time I saw it.
Rent it. Buy it. Watch it. Report back.
Just got it in from Netflix today, will let you know what I think as soon as I watch it!
Okay, just gotta say HOLY CRAP, THAT WAS FUCKING AWESOME! I went out of my way to watch Django a while back, waiting for this one to come out and I’m glad I did–the references back are incredibly cool. Visually, this is a stunning movie, a perfect marriage of standard Western, spaghetti Western and the crazier aspects of Tarantino, with a fabulous Miike gloss overlay. Stylish ultraviolence, punctuated by moments of sheer hilarity. Spaghetti Western grit and mud and ugliness, juxtaposed perfectly with gorgeous Japanese imagery.
Only quibble–somebody needs to teach Tarantino how to pronounce “sukiyaki.” It’s only got three syllables! That swallowed Japanese “u” is hard for gaijin to figure out so I’ll give it a pass, though.
And why a didgeridu player? Surreal, just surreal.
Yes. Yes, it is.