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International Eye Candy: MOTHER, CROOKED FINGERS and much more!
International Eye Candy April 1, 2009 Sure, it may be April Fool's Day but there aint no foolin' here. Nope, it's Todd from Twitch here with another edition of International Eye Candy, our bi-weekly wrap up of the best and brightest and – occasionally – just plain strangest films from around the globe. This time out? Toilet sex! Bollywood Stallone! A flurry of Nordic genre pictures! The latest from the director of THE HOST! And, of course, the proverbial more, more, more!
We begin in Korea with MOTHER, the latest from THE HOST director Bong Joon-Ho. After creating the biggest film in Korean history – and before creating another massive scifi spectacle with the help of OLDBOY's Park Chan-Wook - this is a return to 'small' films for Bong, the story of an aging woman trying to clear her mentally disabled son's name after he is railroaded into confessing to a crime he did not commit. This is much more in line with the Bong who made MEMORIES OF MURDER and since that was a flat-out brilliant film, that's more than okay with me.
From a little Korean crime film we move on to a little Canadian crime film, this one a French language caper comedy titled CROOKED FINGERS starring the great – and criminally under appreciated – Roy Dupuis. It's a bit of a road movie, a bit of a comedy, a bit of a morality play and all of it looking absolutely fantastic. And, yes, I realize I just said that about a film represented here by a row of naked asses.
From Canada we head to another land filled with empty spaces and more snow than anybody knows what to do with, that being Russia, where we find NEWSMAKERS. This one is the Russian remake of Johnnie To's BREAKING NEWS. It's a film we've written about in this space before but it's back thanks to a freshly released – and remarkably true to the original film – full length theatrical trailer. I've never considered BREAKING NEWS to be one of To's real a-list films but it's not without its charms – or its fans – and the idea of moving it to Russia is weirdly compelling.
From Russia it's just a short jaunt over the sea to Sweden, where we find KENNY BEGINS, the big screen, flowing hair, hysterically b-grade adaptation of cult television series KENNY STARFIGHTER. Again, we've written about this one before but I'm absolutely in love with the look of the thing and it's back thanks to a fresh clip. Instant cult hit here, kids. Take my word for it.
Right, I promised you toilet sex and toilet sex I shall deliver. The film is MY LOVE LIVES IN THE SEWERS, a new short from Spain, and it features – appropriately enough – a young man involved in a steamy love affair with a woman trapped in the sewers beneath his house. Their only means of physical contact is stretching through the pipes connecting the family toilet to the sewer system, their only means of communication messages passed back and forth on toilet paper. This is truly bizarre, unique stuff that announces yet another amazing talent from Spain.
Off to Japan now for the latest trailer from DONJU or DUMB BEAST, the latest film to come from the pen of Kankuro Kudo, the writer / director / award winning playwright / rock and roll guy who also penned PING PONG and Takashi Miike's ZEBRAMAN. This one stars Tadanobu Asano (ICHI The KILLER) as a terminally stupid reporter to dim to realize that he has become the subject of multiple assassination attempts, attempted killings thwarted inadvertently thanks to his own stupidity.
We stick in Japan a bit longer now with the trailer for EDEN OF THE EAST, the new television anime series from director Kenji Kamiyama. Who? Oh, you know, just the director of the hugely acclaimed GHOST IN THE SHELL: STAND ALONE COMPLEX series, striking out into purely original territory here for the first time in his career, Original story or no, it definitely dips into some familiar Kamiyama territory, namely a love-hate relationship with technology, identity issues and widespread terrorism.
Why stop with one bit of anime when you can have two? Particularly when the second is the latest theatrical release in the re-launched NEON GENESIS EVANGELION franchise? This entry is subtitled YOU CAN (NOT) ADVANCE and, like the first feature, will be made up dominantly of re-animated sequences from the original television series – Asuka arrives in this volume – though unlike the first feature this one will also feature some entirely new material. New, old, whatever … Eva is legendary for a reason and any buff and polish is big news.
Want your giant robot fix a little bit goofier? Then I present to you Jeffery Lau's METALLIC ATTRACTION: KUNG FU CYBORG, quite possibly the highest budgeted unrepentant b-film you're likely to see this year, though fellow Hong Kong product FUTURE X COPS is going to give it a run for the money in that category. Lau is best known for directing Stephen Chau's CHINESE ODYSSEY films, which should give you an idea of where this supposed answer to Michael Bay's TRANSFORMERS is coming from.
Back north to Norway now, for the first of two pictures featuring stellar Norwegian actor Kristoffer Joner. This one is SKJULT or HIDDEN, a horror picture about to hit screens in Norway that looks to be a pretty compelling blend of eastern and western influences, a smart stew of haunted house, ghost story and survival horror. Joner is fantastic in pretty much everything he does but particularly so when he dips his toes into the genre pool and this looks fantastic.
And it's Joner part two with ROTTENETTER, a film in which he plays a key support role. This one is miles away from SKJULT, however, and much more in keeping with rotten-to-the-core anti-capitalism pictures like WALL STREET or LESS THAN ZERO, a glossy but rotten portrait of a success-at-all-costs stock broker. It's been a while since someone did one of these and did it well but it seems appropriate given the current times and this one looks like just the perfect blend of polish and despair.
Naked moped bikers! From Denmark! It's THE WILD HEARTS and it looks fantastic!
Having seen David Morley's MUTANTS I must confess that it has some significant flaws but, that being said, it also does some very unusual things with the whole zombie mythos that make it quite worthwhile and, hot damn, the guy cuts a great trailer. THE HORDE is going to be the French zombie film of the year, no doubt, but this one is certainly giving it the ol' college try.
What do Sly Stallone, Brandon Routh and Denise Richards all have in common? They've all gone over to Bollywood to star alongside Akshay Kumar in KAMBAKKHT ISHQ, a rom-com in which Kumar plays stunt man to the stars. It looks absolutely atrocious, frankly, but there's ol' Sly front and center in the trailer and no doubt laughing all the way to the bank to cash the check for this one …
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