Black Gate

With another year’s worth of Fantasia reviews now finished, I thought I’d take the time once again to look back at what I saw and write a general overview of the films as a whole. Doing so this year, though, leads to thoughts about film on a slightly larger scale than just Fantasia alone.

I saw a bit more than fifty movies this year at Fantasia. That includes films from a range of genres, but I want to write here about the fantasy and science-fiction movies I saw. And more than that, I want to write about what I’m seeing in the cinema of the fantastic in general.

What I want to observe, mainly, is this: it’s becoming increasingly clear to me that we’re in a golden age of fantasy and science-fiction cinema. Obviously there are any number of summer blockbuster films coming out of Hollywood. But there are also epics from China, and lavish manga adaptations from Japan. And more than that, from around the world there are intelligent, gripping and more-or-less independent genre films being made. There’s a flood of work out there to watch. What surprises me, given all this, is how little I hear about it.

Distribution and marketing still play a significant role in determining what films make it to theatres, and, perhaps more important these days, what films get written about online. It’s easy to hear about a Marvel movie, or even about a major Netflix original movie. But there’s a lot out there beyond those things. You can’t help but notice, for example, that Netflix doesn’t carry the Japanese adaptation of Death Note; use that service and you’re stuck with the whitewashed adaptation for American audiences.

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After the Fantasia festival had officially concluded I still had three movies to watch. During the festival I’d requested links to view screening copies of three films I couldn’t see in theatres due to schedule conflicts, but it wasn’t until Fantasia ended that I had time to sit down and watch them. These movies were a Japanese comedy-drama called Japanese Girls Never Die (also released under the English title Haruko Azumi Is Missing, in romanised Japanese Azumi Haruko wa yukue fumei); a Thai historical martial-arts movie called Broken Sword Hero (also Legend of the Broken Sword Hero, from the romanised original Thong Dee Fun Khao); and a Chinese blockbuster historical war movie called God of War (Dang kou feng yun, now on Netflix). They made for an interesting mix.

Japanese Girls Never Die was directed by Daigo Matsui (whose earlier film Wonderful World End I quite liked), from a script by Misaki Setoyama based on the 2013 novel by Mariko Yamauchi. I can find out nothing about the novel, but the film is wondrously, deliriously complex, bristling with different timelines, subplots, and minor characters who send the film spinning off in different directions. It’s quick, challenging, and engaging.

There is Haruko Azumi (Yu Aoi, of the Rurouni Kenshin movies), an office worker in her 20s who has an unrequited love for her neighbour. There are two young grafitti artists (Shono Hayama and Taiga), at a later point in time, who find a poster of the missing Haruko and make street art from it. There is a gang of teen girls who terrorise the same streets, so that men are advised not to walk those streets at night. There is an older woman at the office where Haruko works, mocked by the men there for not having children and not being young and not being their fantasy image of a woman. There is a girl who is involved with one of the graffiti artists, who in turn are using her more than she realises. There is a clerk at a convenience store. There is a park called Dreamland. There are characters who may or may not attain their dreams. There is an unexpected beginning.

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On the last day of the 2017 Fantasia film festival I planned to watch three movies. First, at the De Sève Theatre, Indiana: a movie about a pair of ghost-breakers in the Midwest who may or may not deal with actual paranormal events. Second, I’d go to the festival’s screening room, where I’d see a dark psychological thriller called Fashionista. Finally, I’d close out the festival with a screening of a restored version of Dario Argento’s classic 1977 horror film Suspiria.

Indiana began the day for me, a film directed by Toni Comas from a script by Comas and Charlie Williams. It follows Michael (Gabe Fazio) and Josh (Bradford West), two ghost hunters in early middle-age who travel the roads of the Midwest hunting for spirits and people suffering hauntings. They’ve carved out a level of fame for themselves as the Spirit Doctors, doing radio call-in shows and occasionally arguing with skeptics — which latter role the more extroverted Josh takes to more naturally than the quieter Michael. Michael’s got another higher-paying job and is thinking about quitting his ghostbusting days, while Josh is dedicated to the profession, and even takes his son Peter (Noah McCarty-Slaughter) on the road with them. Meanwhile, a parallel narrative track follows Sam, an old man on a seemingly-nefarious mission. What drives him, and how his story links up with the Ghost Doctors, becomes part of the mystery of the film.

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Tuesday, August 1, was the next-to-last day of Fantasia. I had three films I wanted to see as the festival raced to its end, all at the De Sève Theatre. Lu Over the Wall (Yoake Tsugeru Lu no uta) was an animated young person’s adventure about indie rock and mermaids, from the mind of Masaaki Yuasa. Spoor (Pokot) was a Polish-Czech co-production of a mystery-horror film about animals that may or may not be turning against human beings. And Nomad (Göçebe) was a Turkish science-fiction/fantasy film that promised mythic overtones.

Lu Over the Wall was the second movie directed by Masaaki Yuasa I saw at Fantasia this year, having watched Night Is Short, Walk On Girl just the day before. This one, written by Yuasa and Reiko Yoshida, is an original story about Kai (Shota Shimoda), a middle-schooler in a provincial fishing town, whose indie rock band draws the attention of a curious young mermaid named Lu (Kanon Tani). The mermaid’s fascinated by their music, and becomes more human the more she hears their songs: for as long as the band plays, her fish-tail becomes a pair of legs, which she uses for enthusiastic acrobatic dancing. But the town has reason (they think) to be suspicious of mermaids and the creatures of the deep. Still, when Lu joins Kai’s band, success for the group seems assured — but forces both above and below the water threaten the developing harmony.

The images here are bright and colourful, the linework loose yet clear while backgrounds remain detailed. Faces bulge and distort, pushing cartoon reality. Movement is appropriately fluid, and the whole film feels energetic, young, and vital. At the same time, it evokes atmosphere when it needs to; Kai broods, at times, and has much to brood about. Lanky, shaggy-haired, he’s a visual contrast of the brightly-coloured always-moving always-smiling Lu, and so out of the interplay of the two of them we get the movie.

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On Monday, July 31, I had three movies I wanted to see at the Fantasia Festival. First up was a surreal Japanese animated comedy, Night Is Short, Walk On Girl (Yoru wa Mijikashi Arukeyo Otome) in the De Sève Theatre. Then I’d stay at the De Sève to see an Italian documentary, Deliver Us (the English translation of the Latin title Libera Nos), about real-life exorcisms. The day would wrap up in the Hall Auditorium with a screening of Takashi Miike’s adaptation of the best-selling supernatural samurai manga Blade of the Immortal (Mugen no Junin). It looked, all told, like a lovely day.

Night Is Short, Walk On Girl was written by Tomohiko Morimi from a novel by Makoto Ueda, and directed by Masaaki Yuasa. Yuasa’s previously overseen an animated TV adaptation of another Ueda novel, Tatami Galaxy; the stories share a setting and some minor characters, but there’s nothing obtrusive to someone like me who has neither seen nor read Tatami Galaxy. Walk On Girl takes place in Kyoto, following a group of university students through a long night of seeking love, of seeking a long-lost and beloved book, and of encountering supernatural and near-supernatural entities. It mainly centres on a male student, called only Senpai (‘senior,’ voiced by Gen Hoshino), who is in love with a girl called Kurokami no Otami (literally, ‘the girl with black hair,’ here played by Kana Hanazawa). Senpai’s been arranging seemingly-accidental meetings, hoping Otami will notice him; on the night the film follows them, she goes partying and ends up looking for a copy of a beloved storybook from her childhood. This swiftly leads into a proliferation of subplots and genuinely zany characters — from the God of the Old Books Market (Hiroyuki Yoshino), to the School Festival Executive Head (Hiroshi Kamiya) who keeps the University campus under constant surveillance, to ‘Don Underwear’ (Ryuji Akiyama) who will not change his drawers until he finds (through the medium of pop-up theatrical happenings) the girl he once saw and fell in love with. The film whirls along through the night in a delirious whirl of pub crawling, dancing, philosophers (dancing and otherwise), guerilla theater, used book fairs, surveillance, cross-dressing, wishes, bad colds, punching technique, clocks, night, and true love.

I was worried for most of the film that Senpai’s obsession with Otami, which at least borders on stalking, would be glossed over. In fact it is at least addressed toward the end of the film, and the constant humiliations Senpai brings on himself throughout the movie certainly can be seen as a kind of poetic justice for his actions. In this as in much else the film is aware of its dark undertones, but maintains a generosity of spirit despite them. It’s a movie that maybe more than any other I’ve seen captures the university experience — or what one might hope the university experience would be like. It does this without naivete; it is clearly the product of older creators telling a tale of youth, but doing it without either speaking down to the young in any way or, conversely, romanticising the experience of youth.

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I ran up the steps in the Hall Building, hurrying from the basement where I’d just seen Geek Girls in the D.B. Clarke Theatre to reach the big Hall Auditorium in time to catch my second film of the day. The doors of the auditorium were still open, and I raced in and found a seat just as the movie began. It was called Mumon: The Land of Stealth (Shinobi no kuni), and I settled in knowing I had two more movies to see afterward. Mumon was a period film about ninjas fighting an invasion, and following that would come Bushwick, about residents of a Brooklyn neighbourhood fighting an invasion, then S.U.M.1, a German movie about people in a dystopian future fighting a (possible) invasion. A theme appeared to be emerging. (Two notes: one, Bushwick is now on Netflix in Canada and the US, so for those looking for a quick take on the film I’ll say that it’s a good enough movie I wish it were better; two, S.U.M.1 has now been given an expanded title, Alien Invasion: S.U.M.1.)

Mumon: The Land of Stealth was directed by Yoshihiro Nakamura (whose previous film The Inerasable I quite liked) and written by Ryou Wada based on Wada’s novel Shinobi no Kuni. It’s the sixteenth century, and Nobunaga Oda is trying to unify feudal Japan. Standing in the way is the Iga Province, home to the Iga ninjas who will kill anyone for hire. Most prominent among them is one Mumon (Satoshi Ohno), who is as lazy as he is skilled. But his amoral actions lead to a revenge-driven betrayal, setting up a battle between Oda’s forces and the ninjas of Iga. But who is one to cheer for in a battle of soldiers and contract killers?

There are some weighty elements to Mumon, posing questions about morality and loyalty and community spirit. Ninjas kill people for money, and being purely mercenary, the ninjas of Iga don’t immediately come together to make any kind of effective resistance to Oda. Mumon’s no exception, except perhaps insofar as his drive for financial reward comes about in part to keep his beloved wife Okuni (Satomi Ishihara, Hange in the live-action Attack On Titan films) in the style to which she is accustomed. The overall challenge, then, is for Mumon to grow as a person and rally his people as a community to fight off their invaders. That sounds like a fairly lightweight, if not simple, theme; but the movie goes some unexpected places.

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