Nagisa Oshima

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Peacock
Joined: Mon Dec 22, 2008 7:47 pm
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#51 Post by Peacock » Tue Aug 18, 2009 1:36 pm

Extremely exciting Oshima season coming up at the Filmhouse this Sept/October in Edinburgh, for all you Scots out there!!!

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Wu.Qinghua
Joined: Sat Aug 15, 2009 4:31 pm

Re: Nagisa Oshima

#52 Post by Wu.Qinghua » Fri Aug 28, 2009 3:47 pm

Alexander Jacoby's article on Oshima which is to be found in this month's 'Sight and Sound' is online. You find it here http://www.bfi.org.uk/sightandsound/feature/49564

One short question. I remember having read on this forum months ago, that Criterion might release some of Oshima's films in the nearer future. Can anyone of you tell me if that's right and which movies they are likely to release?

Edit: If I'd live in Edinburgh I knew what I'd do in september and october ... but I do not ...
:?

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The Fanciful Norwegian
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#53 Post by The Fanciful Norwegian » Fri Aug 28, 2009 10:41 pm

Wu.Qinghua wrote:One short question. I remember having read on this forum months ago, that Criterion might release some of Oshima's films in the nearer future. Can anyone of you tell me if that's right and which movies they are likely to release?
The ones controlled by Janus, presumably. Those would be:

Cruel Story of Youth
Japanese Summer: Double Suicide
Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence
Night and Fog in Japan
Pleasures of the Flesh
The Sun's Burial
Three Resurrected Drunkards
A Town of Love and Hope
A Treatise on Japanese Bawdy Song
Violence at Noon

And of course the already-released Realm of the Senses and Empire of Passion. Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence, Cruel Story of Youth, The Sun's Burial and Night and Fog in Japan are the only 100% confirmed titles, but at least some of the others will show up, probably split between Eclipse and the main line.

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Peacock
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#54 Post by Peacock » Mon Sep 14, 2009 8:28 pm

Well seeing as there's sadly no sign of Death by Hanging english-subbed, on the horizon, it can be viewed here on youtube
I've never seen this film before, is it worth seeing it this way?

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Awesome Welles
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#55 Post by Awesome Welles » Tue Sep 15, 2009 9:46 am

No. It's a wonderful cinematic experience. I wouldn't recomend it. Pick up a boot or wait for a screening to come up. Oshima's films are currently at the BFI, there's always a chance it will travel. Hound the Filmhouse to play it.

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Peacock
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#56 Post by Peacock » Tue Sep 15, 2009 10:18 am

Thank you for your advise, well it's playing at the filmhouse tomorrow and thurs and i thought i was working both nights but turns out i'm not... sooo will be catching it on the big screen after all!

So what's the deal with films such as Man who left his will on film, Death by Hanging, Boy etc, who owns the dvd rights to these in America and the UK? Or did I read in a thread that Oshima's wife was suppressing them? Which seems strange considering her husbands still alive...

ptmd
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#57 Post by ptmd » Tue Sep 15, 2009 12:48 pm

So what's the deal with films such as Man who left his will on film, Death by Hanging, Boy etc, who owns the dvd rights to these in America and the UK? Or did I read in a thread that Oshima's wife was suppressing them? Which seems strange considering her husbands still alive..
Nobody's suppressing them, but they were quasi-independently produced films made for the (now basically defunct) Art Theater Guild, which makes things complicated. Internationally, these were originally handled by a small company formed by Madame Kawakita's daughter and I believe that the Kawakita Memorial Institute still holds prints and rights on these. New Yorker used to hold the rights for the US, and since all of their titles are currently blocked from public screenings in North America pending the sale of their holdings, that may be a further complication, although I can't imagine that would affect things in the UK very much and I think their rights may have lapsed before the company folded.

In any case, none of these films should be watched on Youtube. The prints are traveling and English-subtitled DVDs are in the works, so just try to be patient (and make every effort to go see the prints if you can, they are stunning).

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puxzkkx
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#58 Post by puxzkkx » Sun Sep 20, 2009 4:34 am

Peacock wrote:Well seeing as there's sadly no sign of Death by Hanging english-subbed, on the horizon, it can be viewed here on youtube
I've never seen this film before, is it worth seeing it this way?
I got an English subbed version, bootleg DVD but great picture quality, off Amazon. Don't watch it on YouTube - don't watch it on a computer at all, actually. It's just not the right experience for a film like this. The film itself is a knockout, filters surrealism and an almost screwballesque strain of comedy through a really rigid directorial structure... juggles multiple themes with biting wit and scathing political commentary. Simply fantastic.

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Peacock
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#59 Post by Peacock » Sun Sep 20, 2009 10:04 am

Caught Death by Hanging at the Filmhouse and really really enjoyed it, loved how the film grew more and more surreal as it progressed, it really was hilarious especially the scenes with the Chief of Police reconstructing the murders, personally i think it's a rare thing when a film manages to perfectly juggle comedy and social commentary and Oshima manages it perfectly. One minor critisicm, some of the time the preaching was a little to obvious like a brief exchange going (very roughly) something like this: "We should execute all the Koreans, every single one" with another character agreeing.

To me, what really stands Oshima apart from other directors is the use of mysertious characters in quite prominant roles:
In Dear Summer Sister (sorry i don't yet know the names of actors in Oshima's films) the old man in Okinawa to find someone to kill him, and the younger man who's "only goal is to find someone to kill"; the Chief Prosecutor in Death by Hanging who sits, sphynx like, never getting involved in any of the action until the end, he doesn't even look at the action but stares blankly ahead, a character later on in the film says that he'll soon be a supreme court judge because he doesn't think, and of course R, who seems to have Amnesia and we're never sure exactly what he's thinking; Japanese Summer: Double Suicide another ex soldier who is looking for someone to kill him, and several merecenaries in the bunker where the bulk of the film takes place they talk a lot, they are involved in the plot a lot, but they never make their immediate or future intentions clear,by Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence Oshima's dispelled with the unexplained characters and tries to understand each character with plenty of symbolism (the hair cutting) and the occasional revealing words.


It's amazing visually how much his films differ; Japanese Summer: Double Suicide looks like a cross between Antonioni and Urusevsky, dazzling close ups cut with huge long shots of a sterile white world, fast pans, lots of characters placed in the frame, very long shots, and very short. A really beautiful film.

Then Dear Summer Sister is almost totally handheld, with lots of short shots which often seem to randomly cut out parts of the face, and almost no importance at all on set or location design.

(Sorry i watch a lot of films but am still not very good at writing about them!!)

Has Oshima ever discussed his influences either director or filmwise?

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RobertB
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#60 Post by RobertB » Tue Jan 26, 2010 5:54 pm

I would be very interested in getting hold of some of the films Oshima did before In the Realm of the Senses. I have watched bootlegs of Shonen and Ceremony, and I would love to have them in official versions with better picture and sound. I also bought one of the Yume DVDs but I found the quality too bad to be worth getting any more. So after reading this thread I get the impression the best thing to do is import the Japanese boxed-sets and look for translation files on the net. Can anyone recommend which box to start with?

Also I would love it if someone can explain the wedding in Ceremony to me. :D I have no doubt i missed a lot of the subtext in the film. Is the wedding showing how japan pretends there is something left that is still pure and true to the spirit of Japan? Or am I way off the target? :?

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tajmahal
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#61 Post by tajmahal » Tue Jan 26, 2010 5:58 pm

RobertB wrote:I would be very interested in getting hold of some of the films Oshima did before In the Realm of the Senses. I have watched bootlegs of Shonen and Ceremony, and I would love to have them in official versions with better picture and sound. I also bought one of the Yume DVDs but I found the quality too bad to be worth getting any more. So after reading this thread I get the impression the best thing to do is import the Japanese boxed-sets and look for translation files on the net. Can anyone recommend which box to start with?

Also I would love it if someone can explain the wedding in Ceremony to me. :D I have no doubt i missed a lot of the subtext in the film. Is the wedding showing how japan pretends there is something left that is still pure and true to the spirit of Japan? Or am I way off the target? :?
There is forthcoming Eclipse box ,and I'm sure I read a future Criterion mainline release. The Eclipse has been in the works for some time. Check out the forthcoming Eclipse and Criterion threads, as there is a list of possible titles.

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RobertB
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#62 Post by RobertB » Tue Jan 26, 2010 7:47 pm

Thanx. I had seen it mentioned in this thread, but I checked the fortcoming thread now. I can see a US release has gone from "it will come" to "it will come soon", but still no titles announced. The one they did release - In the Realms of the Senses isn't really my thing. So assuming it will take years before Criterion have released all the interesting titles, any suggestion for a Japanese box? I have contacts in Japan and can get films with a retailer discount. :)

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Peacock
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#63 Post by Peacock » Tue Jan 26, 2010 8:26 pm

RobertB wrote:Thanx. I had seen it mentioned in this thread, but I checked the fortcoming thread now. I can see a US release has gone from "it will come" to "it will come soon", but still no titles announced. The one they did release - In the Realms of the Senses isn't really my thing. So assuming it will take years before Criterion have released all the interesting titles, any suggestion for a Japanese box? I have contacts in Japan and can get films with a retailer discount. :)
They'll no doubt release an Eclipse set probably with around 5 films seeing as they have the rights to so many; I really would wait.
Criterion also released EMPIRE OF PASSION, a pretty interesting film -which is quite different from REALM; although for me personally, everything pre REALM is in another league.


I interpreted the wedding scene in THE CEREMONY as not so much a knowing pretense, but a completely unaware one. For these upper class citizens, tradition, and status must be maintained always, no matter the circumstance; doesn't matter to them the consequences for the individual

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zedz
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#64 Post by zedz » Tue Jan 26, 2010 8:59 pm

RobertB wrote:Thanx. I had seen it mentioned in this thread, but I checked the fortcoming thread now. I can see a US release has gone from "it will come" to "it will come soon", but still no titles announced. The one they did release - In the Realms of the Senses isn't really my thing. So assuming it will take years before Criterion have released all the interesting titles, any suggestion for a Japanese box? I have contacts in Japan and can get films with a retailer discount. :)
I think In the Realm of the Senses is one of Oshima's weakest films, and that he was never really the same after his early 70s hiatus from feature filmmaking. I don't know the details of the Japanese boxes, but if there's one with 68-70 titles like Death by Hanging, Diary of a Shinjuku Thief and The Man Who Left His Will on Film, go for that. This is his most fertile period, the rights are complicated, and I don't think we've ever had any hint that Criterion holds the rights for them.

Criterion does appear to hold the rights for a good number of the earlier films, and the recent clue suggests we'll be seeing some of them sooner rather than later, so I'd recommend holding out.

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RobertB
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#65 Post by RobertB » Wed Jan 27, 2010 1:58 pm

OK. I'll give Criterion a month or two and then get a box from japan with whetever they arent releasing from around 1970.
Peacock wrote: I interpreted the wedding scene in THE CEREMONY as not so much a knowing pretense, but a completely unaware one. For these upper class citizens, tradition, and status must be maintained always, no matter the circumstance; doesn't matter to them the consequences for the individual
I don't agree. I remember the main character makes a comment about politicians speeches during the wedding. And it finishes with a failed coup d'etat which is obviously copying what Mishima did a year earlier. So my interpretation is that the strangeness of the wedding is much more than just tradition. My belief is that THE CEREMONY is commenting a lot of Japanese political issues that may be considered rude to discuss in Japan. The Manchukuo regime is one, and conservative elements who wanted the Emperors status to be reinstated is another. But I'm sure there is a lot more.

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zedz
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#66 Post by zedz » Wed Jan 27, 2010 2:42 pm

RobertB wrote: But I'm sure there is a lot more.
Not to be flippant, but in Oshima films of this period there's always a lot more, and The Ceremony is a very political film, so I'm sure you're right about those specific references. But don't worry about trying to tie the film down just to the level of political allegory: the film's firing in a lot of directions at once.

One of the reasons that this stretch of work is one of my favourites by any director is that I know I'll never get to the bottom of some of these films. Even once you've pretty much figured out what all the different levels of a film might be, the significances within those levels, and the resonances between them, keep expanding.

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tenia
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#67 Post by tenia » Wed Jan 27, 2010 4:12 pm

I don't know if the Japanese releases of the Oshima movies are English-friendly, but if not, the French Carlotta editions are technically superior.

The releases include a 3 movies + 32p booklet boxset (A town of love and hope, Cruel story of youth, The Sun's Burial) (extras : 100 years of Japanese movies (52 min), The suns of tomorrow (6 min) : a short form Oshima), and 3 documentaries (about 1 hour)), and as singles releases :

Japanese Summer : Double Suicide, Three Resurrected Drunkards, The Pleasures of the Flesh, Night and Fog In Japan, A Treatise on Japanese Bawdy Songs and Violence at High Noon. Each single release has a 6 min introduction, and Pleasures has a 25 min doc'.

30€ the boxset, around 15€ the single releases.

I honestly think they're really good, but they're not english-friendly. If it's not a problem for you, I can only recommend them to you.

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Peacock
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#68 Post by Peacock » Wed Jan 27, 2010 5:01 pm

But those Carlottas are all going to come out from Criterion, so zedz suggestion for Death by Hanging, Diary of a Shinjuku Thief and The Man Who Left His Will on Film, is a good one

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nosy lena
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#69 Post by nosy lena » Tue Feb 23, 2010 9:56 pm

there is a new box out in japan next week that is what i believe is new transfers of diary of a shinjuku thief, boy and the man who left his will on film - as well as the 25 minute film yunbogi's diary - which i don't think has been released on dvd before? it will most likely not have english subtitles - but maybe a future eclipse?

Image

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Awesome Welles
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#70 Post by Awesome Welles » Wed Feb 24, 2010 10:49 am

I would hope those films make it to the main line, they would definitely benefit from contextualisation. I would think Yunbogi's Diary would be a supplement to Boy, I didn't think much of the film but in comparison with his other films but certainly interesting. Nice still of Oshima (directing Boy?) on the box.

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cysiam
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#71 Post by cysiam » Wed Feb 24, 2010 2:32 pm

The Austin Film Society is running a series on Oshima in the next couple of months. They are going to be showing MERRY CHRISTMAS MR LAWRENCE, VIOLENCE AT NOON, THE PLEASURES OF THE FLESH, JAPANESE SUMMER: DOUBLE SUICIDE, EMPIRE OF PASSION, & IN THE REALM OF THE SENSES

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jsteffe
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#72 Post by jsteffe » Wed Feb 24, 2010 4:49 pm

nosy lena wrote:there is a new box out in japan next week that is what i believe is new transfers of diary of a shinjuku thief, boy and the man who left his will on film - as well as the 25 minute film yunbogi's diary - which i don't think has been released on dvd before? it will most likely not have english subtitles - but maybe a future eclipse?
If I understand what people have been saying earlier on the thread, these are Art Theatre Guild titles and thus have some rights issues that may be holding up a U.S. release. The Janus Oshima titles are all non-ATG. But who knows, maybe someday that will get sorted out and we can see these films as well.

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zedz
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#73 Post by zedz » Wed Feb 24, 2010 6:42 pm

Diary of a Shinjuku Thief is a real odd one. From what I understand, it wasn't strictly an ATG title, but a co-production between Oshima's own company and Kinokuniya, the bookshop where some of the action takes place. And if you think that sounds peculiar, you should see the film! Whether this arrangement makes the film more or less accessible for DVD release is anybody's guess.

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HistoryProf
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#74 Post by HistoryProf » Fri Apr 16, 2010 9:11 pm

Just a heads up: Cruel Story of Youth is going to be on TCM Sunday night (4/18) at 2am (technically Monday morning) - their weekly foreign film slot.

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knives
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Re: Nagisa Oshima

#75 Post by knives » Fri Apr 16, 2010 9:47 pm

It's very good for those curious, more than well worth the time. Sort of like a more explicit Rebel Without a Cause. I thought the ending was unnecessarily downbeat. Not that it was too sad, but it didn't, especially in the case of the girl, really work to be downbeat in that way. A sad ending for the sake of a sad ending. That minor complaint aside it is a genius film worth staying up for.

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