Wednesday, October 01, 2008
Nouvelle Tsunami 3: Yakuza Eiga
In my recent posts about the "Japan in Black" program at the just wrapped San Sebastian International Film Festival (trace back from my Sept. 20 entry) I forgot to mention the premiere of Parisian documentarian Yves Montmayeur's Yakuza Eiga, which I briefly touched on in my first "Nouvelle Tsunami" post last December. You can read a synopsis and watch a clip of Yakuza Eiga here. 
I've met Yves on two or three occasions in Japan -- he's a very enthusiastic guy and has gradually become the go-to-filmmaker for French documentaries on cutting edge cinema, particularly Asian directors. I knew that he was working on Yakuza Eiga very diligently and that my friends at Toei (who of course mass produced pictures in said genre) helped him out.
Yakuza Eiga has gotten some good coverage in Japanese, too. Journalist Nakayama Harumi, whom I met at this year's Pia film fest, wrote this article on Cinema Today. No time to translate it but he tells a couple of good stories involving kidnapping and arrests. I've heard a few of my own tales about unannounced "set visits" and who's for real/just acting.
Edit: For those in the Kansai region, the film is playing at the Kyoto Film Festival on Oct. 11.
3 comments:
do you think he might pass me a subbed screener?
cool doc. hope I get to see it someday (w/ English subs).
JG - i'll be in London (first time) at the end of the month. Any kips you can recommend for alcohol fueled debauchery?
The director dropped me a note to say he was working on that very thing (Eng. subs).
I've never lived in London and if it's booze you want to know about Jasper Sharp is your man. But he's currently busy showing Tender Throbbing Twilight at Raindance, among others.
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