japanese film festival

This year's Japanese Film Festival brings us a selection of 9 Japanese horror films. Just caught the screenings of House (hau-su) by director Obayashi Nobuhiko and Blind Beast (Moju) by director Masumura Yasuzo, based on a novel by mystery writer, Edogawa Rampo, which left me feeling rather disturbed. The series of free and paid screenings at the National Museum Theatre ends this sunday.



japanese film festival

train town

something i caught at Short & Sweet, a weekly event at Cafe 1001 on Brick Lane, Train Town stood out from the list of shorts for its dead serious, deadpan humour. directed by Keith Bearden, the film uses a simple allegory of a model train store, taking it in an unexpectedly political direction. annoyingly enough for the lurking internet movie buffs, Bearden has not put the film out on youtube, meaning that one has to see it at a festival (take that, cheapskates) - but the movie has been making many rounds at various festivals, so all is not lost yet.

withnail and i

absurd british comedy that nobody understands except, well, the british: check.
homosexuality, 'camberwell carrots' and a permanent state of inebriation: check.
bang-on characters that still persist till this day in london town: check.

some would consider this a poignant "coming-of-age comedy", attaching a hundred other tails of adjectives to it, but it really is two excellent drunks getting up to some excellent, excellent business.

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