Anime On the Big Screen: “Miss Hokusai”

Venue: Capitol Cinemas, 6 Franklin Street, Manuka, ACT
Date: Thursday 15 October 2015
Distributor: Tokyo Theatres Co., Inc. (presented by the Japan Foundation as part of the Japanese Film Festival)
Format: Digital Projection, Japanese dialogue with English subtitles
Length: 90 minutes
Production Date: 2015
Currently on Home Video in English (as of writing): No

It was only a month ago we had the “Love Live!” movie in cinemas. Now this week, from Wednesday to Sunday, the Japanese Film Festival has come to town. It is really a reflection on the current state of Japanese cinema; it’s pretty crap. The vast majority of films screening are live action adaptations of manga or light novels with Jidaigeki films coming a close second, and a small selection of “box office hits” that have had the life wrung out of them by production committees (a group of companies that have a financial stake in the film, who often know nothing about the film making process, but are more than happy to interfere with every aspect of production including the script and casting). Only one independent film made the cut. It’s a pretty abysmal selection of films. Even worse is that in every city the selection of films changes, so if you want to see a specific film, you might have to head to Townsville, Perth or wherever it’s playing.

There are some anime films in the line-up this year. Most annoyingly ”The Case of Hana & Alice”, which I really wanted to see, is only screening in Brisbane, Perth and Sydney. The only anime film to screen here is “Miss Hokusai”. With the Arc cinema at the National Film and Sound Archive operating very infrequently due to federal government funding cuts, the festival is now held at Capitol Cinemas in Manuka. Manuka may be a posh area, but Capitol Cinemas are easily the most unkempt, rundown cinema in all of Canberra. Look, I know it’s the oldest cinema in Canberra, but seriously a renovation is sorely needed. It feels as if nothing has changed in the last decade since I last saw a film there. In fact I don’t think any improvements have been made to the cinema since I moved here some 21 years ago.

I grabbed my ticket and made my way up the old stairs to the cinema 6. Bizarrely there was a table outside the doors with few women in their 70’s milling about with bags. I wasn’t too sure if there were there for some sort of reason to do with the festival or another screening, or if they had commandeered the table for their own purposes. They latter came into the cinema but left soon after. In fact quite a few people came in, realised it was the wrong screening and left. Most of the audience were festival going types with quite a few ex-pat Japanese in the crowd. Otaku types were few and far in-between; a couple of guys, one with a Gatchaman t-shirt (I often seem him around these type of events), a couple in their twenties with the lady wearing a Totoro backpack. In all around 45 to 50 people showed up the screening, which surprised me a bit. A number of adverts ran at the start of the screening, mostly of the festivals sponsors. The Japan National Tourism Organization one was interesting. Apart from the usual clichés (Mount Fuji, Geishas, Shinkansen, the Tokyo skyline with Tokyo Tower etc.) they had a couple of shot of the infamous Robot Restaurant in Kabukicho, Shinjuku. While it was one of my favourite experiences when I when over there a couple of years back, Kabukicho is a red light district, albeit a relatively safe one. Even the rather safe Robot Restaurant feels a little dodgy with its showgirls with Yakuza tats and the doorman who looks like he stepped out of a crime drama.

Finally, after a good ten minutes of adverts, the film began. “Miss Hokusai” tells the story of late Edo period ukiyo-e painter and print maker Katsushika Hokusai, aka Tetsuzo, and his daughter O-Ei. Hokusai, in his mid 50’s in the film, is most famous for the instantly recognisable wood block print “The Great Wave off Kanagawa” as well as “Fine Wind, Clear Morning” aka “South Wind, Clear Sky” or “Red Fuji”, both part of his “Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji” series. Set in 1814 in bustling Edo, some 15 years before Tetsuzo created his famous “Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji” series, O-Ei, in her early 20’s, and her father live in various run down apartments creating their artwork. While O-Ei is an accomplished artist in her own right, most of the time her work goes uncredited as she plays assistant to her father, who at this point is quite famous. He has many clients across the country and has created many works including giant dharma on a 180 square metre wide sheet of paper, to a pair of sparrows painted on a grain of rice. Hokusai is a workaholic and only paints, eats and sleeps. The pair move out of apartments when rubbish from rejected artwork and remains from brought home meals overwhelms their work/living space. Living with them is a young man named Zenjiro. An alcoholic and ex-samurai, he has taken up ukiyo-e painting, mostly of the erotic kind. Though he is criticised by both O-Ei and her father for lack of originality, he will later become famous for his erotic artwork and prints of beautiful women under the name Keisai Eisen.

Tetsuzo is separated from his wife, whom O-Ei regularly visits. The pair had a child named O-Nao who is now around 6, but was born blind. She is cared for by Buddhist nuns at local temple, however O-Ei regularly visits her for outings. Zenjiro introduces a young and upcoming artist called Kuninao to Tetsuzo. Kuninao hopes Tetsuzo will become his mentor. The trio often had out on the town when Tetsuzo is frustrated with his work. In one such instance, O-Ei accidently ruins a large dragon piece that her father has been working on when ash from her pipe falls on it. With one day until the deadline for the piece to be complete, Tetsuzo blows off his client’s concerns and goes out drinking with Zenjiro and Kuninao. O-Ei ends up completing the work during the night.

The film itself is a series of vignettes, probably due to the fact it is based off an episodic 1980’s manga called “Sarusuberi” by Hinako Sugiura. As a result it’s pretty hard to write up a proper synopsis of the film. After the introduction of the main characters, the audience is treated to a number of mostly unrelated stories. For example O-Ei is commissioned to do a portrait of a courtesan and heads out to do some preliminary sketches with Tetsuzo and Zenjiro in tow. Having heard rumours of the courtesan’s neck growing while she is asleep, Tetsuzo tells the courtesan a story of when his hands used to leave his body and roam around the city. He cured phenomenon by bandaging his hands and placing sutras on them. Intrigued by the story, the courtesan tells the trio to stay for the night and only come to her chamber if they hear a bell being rung. Later than night they hear the bell which is attached to the courtesan’s pillow. They witness her neck twitching and eventually a ghostly apparition of her head and neck separate from her body and flies around the room, though seemingly trapped by the mosquito net canopy surrounding her bed. The courtesan wakes and tells them that the apparition often escapes the canopy and asks if she will need to do the same as Tetsuzo to rid herself of it.

A second story involves more paranormal strangeness as Tetsuzo is asked to help exorcise a panel painting of hell he painted many years ago. It seems to have possessed the lady of the house. The audience is also shown much of O-Ei’s daily life such as her fascination with fires (a common spectacle in the era) and her infatuation with another ukiyo-e painter named Hatsugoro (better known as the famous ukiyo-e artist Totoya Hokkei). In the last part of the film O-Nao becomes deathly ill and moves in with her mother. O-Ei tries to get her father to come visit her, but he seems apathetic towards his younger daughter. O-Nao feels she is the one in the wrong and that somehow she is troubling her father.

As I previously mentioned this film is based on Hinako Sugiura’s manga “Sarusuberi”. Sugiura was quite an interesting woman. Originally an assistant to feminist mangaka, poet and essayist, Murasaki Yamada, she was heavily influenced by the Edo period and researched her Edo period manga in great detail, often illustrating them in an ukiyo-e style. She eventually gave up manga in the early 1990’s in pursuit of research on Edo period lifestyles and customs and wrote several books on the subject. I would suggest her life would make for an equally interesting film as O-Ei’s. Unfortunately the manga isn’t available in English, but I assume the episodic nature of the manga is in part the reason why the film feels a bit disjointed. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It comes off as a kind of “slice of life” type movie; different things happen every day to the main cast. The problem of course is there really is no cohesive narrative to the film. Sure we have the subplot of O-Nao and O-Ei’s family ties, but that’s not quite enough to hold it together. In the end the film just closes as it begins with O-Ei on the Nihonbashi bridge, with text explanations of what happened to the characters after the film. It does feel like a bit of a anti-climax.

The director was Keiichi Hara whose last film, “Colorful”, I absolutely despised. Going through my review of that film from a few years back, well, I can see I didn’t have a fun time watching it; “It’s like a rather sad portrait of a lower middle class family with a ton of problems and their suicidal teenage boy” and my assessment of the film as “sentimental, moralistic trash”. It utterly baffled me that many critics lauded Hara as some sort of brilliant emerging anime director based on this boring, schmaltzy film that looked like it was adapted from a rejected 1980’s telemovie script. As a result I wasn’t really looking forward to “Miss Hokusai”. However as the film progressed, I quite enjoyed it. Like “Colorful”, “Miss Hokusai” focuses on a dysfunctional family, though in this film there is at least a sense of humour in the script, and it doesn’t wallow in cheap sentimentality. I soon realised that “Miss Hokusai” isn’t about a narrative as such. Hara seems more concerned with setting moods in the film than tying all the parts of the separate stories together. As I said before, this isn’t really a bad thing as long as you’re prepared to go along with what Hara is trying to do.

Personally I quite enjoyed the detailed look into Edo in the early 1800’s. There is a lot of lavish detail in not only the physical look of the animation (by Production I.G), but also in the social aspects of its inhabitants. I was rather taken by the spiritual and paranormal elements of everyday life. The visual aspects of the era are also apparent with dream-like sequences being animated in an ukiyo-e style, possibly influenced by the original manga. However the character animation itself looks a little sparse. It’s certainly not as detailed as some TV series. Because of this, it does feel at times the budget was a bit limited. The other slightly problematic aspect of the production is that some of the music feels really out of place. The rock music at the beginning and end sequences of the film clash with the historical setting. However most of the other music fits in with the Edo era and mood of the film. The end credit song by Sheena Ringo, though not fitting in with the period of the film, is quite good and sort matches and segues from the final scene which is a short shot of modern day Tokyo.

As I mentioned previously, one of the core elements of the film is the sibling relationship between O-Nao and O-Ei. There’s quite a number of charming sequences which show off their close relationship, with O-Ei vividly describing their surroundings to the blind O-Nao. A couple of scenes have O-Nao exploring her world via sound and touch, which is not something you usually see in anime. It’s all these little moments which make the film work as opposed to an ongoing narrative you’d have in a normally structured film. O-Ei is certainly the most interesting character in the film. She generally doesn't take nonsense from anyone. For example she criticises Zenjiro for his lack of originality and nicknames him "brazen" because of it. She seems quite independent at times, but others quite vulnerable. Her crush on Hatsugoro is one of the more interesting elements of her character that I sort of wish was explored a bit more. It is rather interesting that the men are portrayed as mostly no good bums. I’m assuming this is partly because of manga author Hinako Sugiura’s feminist background.

One of the biggest problems to a non-Japanese audience is the film assumes that you have previous knowledge of Hokusai’s work. A scene involving O-Nao and O-Ei on a boat makes a visual reference to “The Great Wave off Kanagawa”, but nowhere in the film, not even in the “what happened to them afterwards” on screen explanations at the end of the film, is it explained what impact Hokusai’s work had. I also think that the fact O-Ei was an underrated and uncredited artist is also somewhat glossed over (or more accurately, underemphasised) in the film. What did surprise me though was that a lot of the material in the film did actually happen and is supported by historical documents. Unfortunately this is not mentioned in the film and only way you’d find out about this is if you researched her life story yourself.

As I left the cinema, there were a bunch of volunteers from the Japan Foundation, standing and grinning right outside, holding boxes where you could put your completed survey into (of which one wasn’t given to me before I went in…). I found this as bit strange and weird as you were just confronted with these people with almost no explanation as you walked out the door. I had no idea who they were at first. Maybe the Foundation could just put a box outside and be done with it. There were at least half a dozen people collecting surveys, which was overkill.

Anyway, in conclusion it’s a pretty good film. The lack of a cohesive narrative lets the film down a little bit. But if you just go with the flow of the film and understand that it just follows a certain period of O-Ei and her father’s life, you’ll probably enjoy it. Two things of note before I finish; this is the third time one of Keiichi Hara’s films has screened theatrically in Canberra (the previous two were “Colorful” in 2010 and “Summer Days with Coo” in 2009, which I unfortunately didn’t get to see), yet none of his films are available on home video in this country. Also currently the only English language distributor for this film is All the Anime/Anime Limited in the UK which is a bit of a shame. I was going to give it .5 less, but on balance I really think this film deserves a 7 out of 10.

Video Backlog: “Memories”

Publisher: Siren Visual (Australia)
Format: Region B Blu-ray, NTSC, Japanese Dialogue with optional English Subtitles
Length: 113 minutes
Production Date: 1995
Currently in Print (as of writing): Yes

“Memories” is a three part omnibus film based on three different one shot manga by Katsuhiro Otomo (of “Akira” fame). The first story is called "Magnetic Rose". By the last decade of the 21st century, man has conquered space and left debris of old space craft littered across the universe. As a result, salvage companies comb the far reaches of space taking anything of value from old disused satellites and other junked spacecraft. We follow one of these salvage ships, the Corona, and its crew; the captain Ivanov, navigator and computer expert Aoshima, second in command and engineer Heinz, and womanising second engineer Miguel. After disposing of a disused satellite and rejecting a final job from head office, the crew of Corona prepares to head back to civilisation for a well-earned break. However a S.O.S. message derails their plans. This is no ordinary S.O.S. Someone seems to be broadcasting Puccini’s “Madam Butterfly”. Unfortunately the message is coming from an area called Sargasso, nicknamed the graveyard of space, which is full of highly volatile magnetic storms. Despite Aoshima reminding the crew that the computer has no anti-magnetic shielding and Miguel voicing his displeasure of having to go rescue someone, Ivanov knows by law they must answer the rescue call and makes the decision to do so.

The Corona traces the point of transmission and discovers what seems to be hundreds of junked spacecraft in pieces. At the centre of this space junkyard is an oddly shaped wreck. Miguel and Heinz fly to the airlock of the wrecked vessel in their small shuttle craft. Fearing that the transmission could by a trap set by pirates, Miguel and Heinz have their guns drawn at all times. The spacecraft seems to be quite old but seems to have fresh oxygen aboard. The pair exit the elevator after the last airlock and utterly surprised to discover what seems to be an opulent European interior with massive chandeliers and what seems to be a large painting of the owner, a dark European woman in a red dress. Miguel spots what he thinks is a woman with a parasol on a grassy hill in the distance. Thinking it is a survivor he runs after her but ends up running through a hologram and into the wall behind it. Heinz laughs at him, but the pair is put on alert again when a cherub-like servant robot comes up to them stating that dinner is ready. The pair follow the robot into a dining room where they discover a sumptuous meal which actually turns out to fake. In fact most of the items inside the ship seem to be pale imitations of the real thing or in various states of decay.

In another room they discover large collections of trophies and awards and a small hologram of the ship’s owner Eva Friedel. They discover she was an opera diva that was popular nearly one hundred years ago. Eventually she lost her voice and became a dancer but felt unfulfilled. Tragically her fiancé, Carlo Rambaldi, was murdered only a few weeks before they were due to get married. Miguel discovers that the source of the S.O.S. transmission is moving. The two decide to split up to track it down and to find any possible survivors. The pair are soon drawn into a hallucinatory world seemingly controlled by Eva Friedel, but is in fact the ship’s computer who has seemingly taken on her personality. While Miguel is taken in by this world, Heinz refuses to be trapped and struggles to escape its clutches. Outside a magnetic storm is kicking up and the crew of the Corona must decide to wait for their crewmates or abandon them and save themselves.

In the second segment, “Stink Bomb”, Nishibashi Pharmaceuticals lab technician Nobuo Tanaka is having a hard time battling his flu. Despite having a flu shot at the medical centre and taking practically every flu tablet on the market, he still can’t shake it. A work colleague advises Nobuo that a new fever medicine has been developed by the company and a sample is on the section chief’s desk and he should try it to see if it works. Later that day Nobuo visits the section chief’s office to hand him a report. He’s not there, but Nobuo notices what he thinks are the sample fever tables his colleague mentioned. Thinking he has nothing to lose, he takes one and decides to rest in the visitors’ room. Later in the afternoon the section chef races into labs in a panicked state desperate to discover who took one of the sample pills. Upon being advised that it was Nobuo and that he hasn’t left the building, he races off to find him. Meanwhile the staff begin to detect a strange smell but cannot decipher what exactly it is.

Nobuo wakes the next morning a little anxious that he slept right though the afternoon and into the night. It’s almost time for staff to be coming into work, but there isn’t any sign of movement. Nobuo passes the reception desk to find the receptionist seemingly asleep. When he tries to wake her she slumps to floor, apparently dead for a number of hours. He tries to find others to help him, but can only find dead or seemingly unconscious colleagues everywhere. He calls the emergency telephone number for an ambulance. Afterwards he discovers the section chief slumped over near the biological contamination alarm which he apparently disabled before his death. Nobuo is baffled as to why the chief has done this and cautiously decides to reactivate it. The alarm immediately triggers and a bank of TV monitors turn on to show several panicked men in suits from Nishibashi Pharmaceuticals trying to figure out what is going on. One of them, Kyoichi Nirasaki who is head of new medicine development, takes control and questions Nobuo about what tripped the alarm. Confused about the incident and alarmed about the local authorities finding about the research, he orders Nobuo to gather up the data and sample of a new type of secretly developed medicine and take them from his current location near Kofu in Yamanashi prefecture to the company’s headquarters in Tokyo, about 140 km away. He is ordered to tell no one he is from the company and leave before the authorities arrive.

Nobuo realises the medicine in question is same he took the previous day. On his way to the train station via a bicycle he discovers dead animals everywhere and strangely plants in full bloom, seemingly attempting to reproduce as they die, even though it’s still winter. He later discovers several car accidents with the drivers dead, including the ambulance he called for. The city Kofu is the same. In Tokyo at the Self Defence Force headquarters, Nishibashi Pharmaceuticals president Kamata as well as Nirasaki are called in to explain what is going on. The drug in question was made for the Self Defence Force under the orders of the minister to counter effect biological weapons but had unintended side effects which the company was researching. The army soon reports that the epicentre of the disaster seems to be moving, something which makes no sense until Nirasaki explains that Nobuo is bringing documentation and samples of the drug to Tokyo. It dawns on everyone that Nobuo is the cause of the biological contamination. This is confirmed by soldiers evacuating a panicked population and the fact everyone else is dead in the affected areas except Nobuo. Somehow the combination of the drug as well as the flu medication in his body has made Nobuo a walking biological bomb. The decision is made to try to kill him, but he is now emitting a yellow cloud gas and no one can get close to him due to the toxicity and pungent smell of the gas. With Tokyo in panic and seemingly conventional weapons malfunctioning due to the gas, they have to somehow stop him reaching Tokyo.

The final segment, “Cannon Fodder”, revolves around a young boy who lives in a militaristic society. The society is literally walled in with just about every single aspect of the citizen’s lives revolving around the military and a war against an unseen enemy. The film also follows the life of the boy’s family; a mother which works in munitions factory and the father who is a munitions loader for giant cannon. While the local media report that they are succeeding in the battle and the war will soon be over, it is clear that some of the citizens are apathetic to the cause. The father of the family is latter reprimanded due to the fact his unit botched a cannon loading. His young son has dreams of being a prestigious officer who fires the large cannons with much pomp and ceremony and definitely doesn’t want to be a cannon loader like his father.

I think I first discovered “Memories” via the manga anthology of the same name which was published in 1995 by Random House (an Australian reprint of the 1994 Mandarin Books UK version which was in turn compiled from single issue comics published by Marvel imprint Epic Comics in 1992). I recall the only story from the film in the anthology was the "Magnetic Rose" story and the other two didn’t appear. The original anthology called “Memories of Her...” was published in 1990 and contains far more material than its English translated counterparts. The film version was apparently conceived as a set of OVAs, but in 1995 eventually was upgraded into a theatrical feature. Then in 1996 or 1997, the local anime club ran the film which was taped off the Japanese laserdisc which had English subtitles via closed captions. I loved the film when I saw it and searched out for a fansubbed copy as soon as I could.

All three segments are really interesting films. “Magnetic Rose” was directed by Koji Morimoto, the founder of Studio 4°C who also did the animation. He’s not the best known director but has directed the "Franken's Gears" segment of “Robot Carnival”, “Noiseman Sound Insect”, the “Beyond” segment of “The Animatrix “ and “First Squad”. The script was written by Satoshi Kon who adds a sub plot involving Heinz and his deceased daughter which beefs up the original story. It’s unsurprising that this segment of the film is the one that’s always considered the best in the film by critics and fans alike. The animation is stunning (though some of the CG looks dated), it’s highly suspenseful and has a fantastic soundtrack by Yoko Kanno (incorporating previously published music by Maria Callas). It’s really hard to fault this segment at all.

The “Stink Bomb” segment was directed by Tensai Okamura  who’s most famous for also directing “Blue Exorcist” and “Wolf's Rain”. Over the years I’ve really come to love this segment and I think finally it’s become my favourite in the anthology. Nobuo is such a gormless, hapless idiot who never, ever figures out he is the cause of the disaster. Add in some amazingly detailed animation including some completely over the top military sequences animated by Madhouse. I do love Otomo’s dark humour and here it is really dark and exceptionally humorous. His character designs are great too. He does plain and ugly characters just brilliantly. It’s fantastic farce where not only the military are portrayed as complete nitwits who can’t even kill one man despite what firepower they throw at him (not exactly their fault, but…), but the pharmaceutical company who end up nearly destroying a country due to a single pill. The music is great too with a weird mix of ska, military marches and brooding sting quartet with some additional brass.

“Cannon Fodder”, directed by Otomo himself, is probably the least successful of the trio. However it’s still a great film. It’s far less frantic than the other two and also less realistic looking. From start to finish it’s just one long continuous tracking shot (though there’s a few cheats along the way) as it follows one day in the life of a family who live in a militaristic society. At times it reminded me of Fritz Lang’s “Metropolis”, especially the scenes of the citizens heading off to work. The music in this segment is also quite interesting with a strange collection of instruments being used such as a Jew’s harp and accordion along with synthesisers. The biggest letdown of “Cannon Fodder” is the CG done by Studio 4°C who did all of the animation in this segment. It does look dated, especially with its use of mapping. In particular items on wall which should be 3D end up looking very 2D as the camera makes its way through a hallway. At the very least the story is quite thought provoking and the end of the film implies that everyone knows there is no enemy.

Siren’s Blu-ray of the film is quite stunning. It has never looked this good in English. In fact the resolution is so good it shows that the effects in "Magnetic Rose" were rather low-res and muddy (well compared to modern day effects). This is probably to be expected as it’s a 20 year old film and the CG effects do show their age. However the cel animation looks brilliant and clear. You can even read the documents on the table in military briefing room in “Stink Bomb”, one of which seems to be a Majestic 12 manual! The disc also comes with a terrible looking trailer (4:3 letterboxed) and a making of featurette which includes interviews with the directors and all of the pilot films, though I think some parts of the pilot films were cobbled together for the featurette. Both of these extras are direct ports from the original laserdisc and DVD versions. I still have the original Bandai Visual DVD set I bought back in 1999 of this film. It came in LD sized packaging with a reproduction theatrical programme (and English subtitles on the disc of course). I really don’t think I can sell that or junk it. It’s too nice to lose.

It’s really weird to think that this film is only available in English on Blu-ray in Australia. I really don’t understand why more of a fuss has been kicked up over its release here. Maybe that’s due to the fact it previously hasn’t had a decent release in English (sub only DVD from Sony in the US back in 2004). This film deserves to be seen and appreciated by more anime fans. I just adore the film and find it far superior to Otomo’s more recent omnibus anime film “Short Peace”. 9 out of 10.

Remaining Backlog: Nothing.