Hey folks, Harry here - this isn't at all what I expected from the first review of 3: MONSTER - and that's surprising and a little shocking. I like it... and I'm, of course, dying to see the results. Beware of spoilers galore...
Dear Harry and all at AICN,
3: Monster
Yesterday Three: Monster was released in Hong Kong – but under the title Three: Extremes (not sure of the reasons for the change) which comprises of a trio of short horror films from three of Asia’s most exciting directors: Japan’s Miike Takeshi, Hong Kong’s Fruit Chan and S.Korea’s Park Chan-Wook. As a fan of all three, I was very anxious to see this – as I know many of you at AICN are too.
“Box” by Miike Takeshi
The first story is a typically creepy affair, centring on a young woman Kyoko, who seems to be haunted by a recurring dream in which she is buried alive in a box under the snow. It appears that a tragedy befell her and her twin sister many years ago when they performed together as contortionists. Part of the act involved Kyoko and her sister Suoko folding themselves up small enough to be locked into two identical boxes.
Kyoko is now a successful novelist and uses an abandoned office space to do her writing in – however it seems that someone else is in the building with her – a young girl, appearing in doorways and on staircases. Suprisingly, Kyoko does not appear overly scared when she sees the girl, but confronts her, asking what she is doing there, almost as if she knows who the little girl is. It transpires, that this is Suoko.
Yet again the instigator of fear in this film is a young, mysterious female character. Japanese Cinema seems completely obsessed with taking what should be the least threatening of all human demographics and subverting it to make it the embodiment of terror. Ringu, One Missed Call, Ju-On etc etc After a while, one can’t help but beg the question why. For if they are purely doing it for the reason that I have already stated – a simple inversion of the familiar – then sorry but this is starting to become familiar – you might say clichéd even.
An alternative idea is that horror films are the realm in which women get their revenge. They are treated so badly in other areas of Japanese culture, trivialized at home, idolized and fetishized in pornography – especially the schoolgirls (the age of consent in Japan is 13!!) – that they need some way of leveling the playing field. In these films, the ghosts (they are almost always ghosts, rather than monsters) are often in this state because of some horrible physical and emotional abuse that befell them during their lifetime: pedophilia and rape and prostitution come up again and again in these stories as motives for the spooky girls’ actions – in Ringu it’s a girl shut in a well who’s killing everyone, in One Missed Call it’s a girl locked! in a box at a hospital who killing everyone – that these films run the risk of dampening the blow, simply because there are so many of them. The audience is always made to sympathise with the ghosts in these films, to understand that they are trapped or forced into this limbo – but even the most kind-hearted of moviegoers grows tired of the same motives if used time and time again.
But I digress.
Although the spooky girl in the old building routine is starting to tire, Miike keeps the audience hooked, the story is creepily atmospheric and beautifully photographed. The story seems to go round and round, like descending a spiral staircase. Kyoko retells the story again and again – bringing the audience a little closer to the truth each time. The field of snow, the girls’ trainer, the box, the marquee, the dart, the fire – it’s a wonderful little story – until…30 seconds from the end when Miike completely cocks the whole thing up. Really irritating, and a little worrying, considering that we were now supposed to sit back and watch two more companion pieces to this one.
“Dumplings” by Fruit Chan
Now, what I should have done was go to see the feature length version of Dumplings that was released last week. I meant to, I really did – we weren’t given any notice that they were going to do what they did – which was pull it after one week and replace it with the trilogy. It’s a shame – because the forty minute version that I saw last night was really good. It’s a devilish little tale about an actress (Miriam Yeung) who has retired to live off her rich husband but desperately wants to keep her youthful good looks. She goes to see a mysterious woman from Mainland China who lives in a crappy, rundown tenement building.&nb! sp; Word on the street is, her dumplings will keep you looking beautiful forever and how can you doubt it when the woman in question is played by AICN’s Asian temptress du jour Bai Ling. “I’m mine own best advertising” she so rightly states. The fun starts when it is revealed – in glorious close up – that Ling’s secret ingredient is human foetus. Oh yes, this is dark comedy along the lines of the best moments of Hannibal.
Dumplings is the most socially conscious of the three stories addressing such topical subjects as abortion, incest (man, do they love incest in Asian movies!!) as well as the obvious infatuation towards beauty products, in particular skin care that seems to be ingrained in every Chinese woman’s gene coding – if not every woman full stop.
I was delighted to discover that the film was shot by Chris Doyle, whose photography is currently on display Stateside in Hero – I just can’t get enough of that guy’s work. He does a fantastic job of Bai Ling’s grungy apartment, picking out every speck of mould and flour whilst maintaining that beautiful soft-focus look he displayed so well in In The Mood For Love. (Incidentally, 2046 is out at the end of this month, looks awesome!!)
Chan balances the different themes in this story very well, making this cringingly funny when it ought to be (the crunching of baby bones as Yeung eats the dumplings) but serious enough when highlighting HK’s nonchalant attitude towards abortion. Definitely the best of the three.
“Cut” by Park Chan-Wook
This is the moment when Park has finally proved that he is human after all. Cut, put simply, is rubbish. I’m a big fan of Park’s films – I love them all, but here he flaunts the kind of rushed over-confidence that Tarantino displayed in Four Rooms. This story just doesn’t work and is easily the weakest of the three. It is such a shame that this segment ends the film as it leaves the audience so unsatisfied that it almost brings the whole anthology down with it.
Lee Byeung-Heun (from JSA) stars as a young film director who seemingly has it all – the looks, the money, the girl and to top it all off – he’s a decent guy too. This is the point that infuriates one of his film extras to the extent that he kidnaps the director and his girlfriend and ties them up on the set of his own film. The Extra just can’t accept that someone he wants to hate can be so amenable and pleasant. His aim is to tarnish this man’s perfect image by making him do something unspeakable. The Extra has strung the girlfriend up to her piano, using piano wire and is going to cut her fingers off one at a time if The Director doesn’t kill a small child that he has brought along with him. There are echoes in this story to Oldboy – the punishment, the bringing-down of a good man, but this time round Park’s work just comes across as lazy.
Now, I’d like to say that Park’s work on a bad day is still better than most directors’ very best – but the truth is, it isn’t. Cut is self-indulgent, muddled and just not very good – and while I’m not going to hold this against the man it is painful viewing, not because of the violence on the screen, but simply because we know he is capable of so much better. As Roy Batty is told in Blade Runner “The light that burns twice as bright burns half as long – and you have burned so very brightly”. Let’s just hope this isn’t the case for Park Chan-Wook.
Until next time,
Marshy
