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Product Detail |
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Audio Format: DD 5.1, DD 2.0
Video Format: Widescreen 2.35:1 (Anamorphic)
Languages: Japanese, French
Subtitles: English, Korean
Region Code: 3
Year Made: 2009
Running Time: 112+123
Release Date: 05/04/2009
Drama-comedy. Directed by Michel Gondry, Leos Carax and Bong Joon-ho. (Not rated. 112 minutes. At Lumiere Theatre and Shattuck Cinemas in Berkeley.)
In theory, gathering a bunch of top-flight directors to make a collection of shorts around a specific place or theme is a blockbuster idea. It must be; it is attempted routinely, in "New York Stories," "Four Rooms," "Paris Je T'aime" and the forthcoming "New York I Love You."
But pulling together disparate shorts is an experiment that rarely works as well as it does in "Tokyo!" The opening piece of the triptych of films all set in and to some degree about Tokyo, is by director Michel Gondry ("Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind"). In his story, "Interior Design," adapted from a comic, Cecil and Jordan in New York, a young couple Hiroko and Akira (Ayako Fujitani and Ryo Kase) move to Tokyo and crash in a friend's postage stamp-size studio. Their exuberance is tested by urban realities: parking tickets, cockroaches, pull-out sofas and difficulties finding jobs. Unsurprisingly, they come unwound, but the ending features an unlikely turn of events that propels the story into Gondry's arena - magical realism.
The second story is even more fantastical: Titled "Merde," it centers on a grotesque leprechaunish figure emerging from the Tokyo sewers and causing havoc. French filmmaker Leos Carax tells the story through cell phone footage, deadpan newsreels and a hilariously obscene courtroom scene. It could be a bit shorter, but "Merde" satirizes all kinds of issues - immigration fears, terrorism, French lawyers - while remaining defiantly absurd.
The third story is both the most serious and the weakest of the lot. Bong Joon-ho makes a fable out of the life of a Tokyo shut-in or hikikomori, played by Teruyuki Kagawa. The piece is visually appealing - the hikikomori's apartment is frequently described as "perfect," with 10 years of pizza boxes artfully stacked - but is too self-conscious, with a schmaltzy ending. But the overall project succeeds at offering three tantalizing films for the price of one movie ticket. That's value.
Special Features :
Disc 1:
- Audio Commentary
Disc 2: Supplement (123 min.)
- Making Of
- Interviews - Joon-ho Bong, Leos Carax, Michel Gondry, Gabrielle Bell
- Deleted Scenes
- Outtakes
- Trailer
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