Whoo! According to Grady Hendrix and his magical Kaiju Shakedown elves Katsuhito Ishii's Funky Forest has been picked up for North American release by VIZ. This is a bold move by VIZ because this is one very, very strange film and all of you people out there crying about how US companies love to play it safe with their choices now need to put your money where your mouth is and support the release. If it screens near you, go see it - which you should do anyway, because it's damn good as well as being weird - then pick up the US release when it comes out even if you've got an import version. If we don't support companies willing to take chances they'll quickly stop taking them. Or go out of business.
Expect a certain University Film Society to be booking this as soon as possible.
www.cinssu.ca
Katsuhito Ishii's The Taste of Tea is playing Nov. 23rd at Innis Town Hall in Toronto.
In my top 10 of 2006 and easily in my top 3 theater experiences of all time. This movie is more than a ride, it's a warp-drive tour of brilliance and madness.
I'm definitely buying this. There will be subbed extras and that is enough for me. I'll keep the R2 as well, for sentimental value, it is the most I've ever spent on a single regular DVD!
I'm not sure about Viz's film acquisition history and I don't pay attention to their anime licencing much either, but their manga department has been known to acquire licences for pretty gutsy titles: Short Cuts, Taiyo Matsumoto's Blue Springs/No.5/Black and White aka Tekkon Kinkreet, The Drifting Classroom....all great manga, but not exactly an easy sell in a North American market who thinks anime and manga is purely kids stuff.
But even this kinda suprised me. Nice no Mori might be a classic for twitchers, but its the type of film that would completely turn off average film viewers. Their playing to a very niche crowd. Not sure if their strategy will work out.
A good move for Viz here would be to include the longer cut as an extra, which I believe was on one of the pricier Japanese editions - although without subs. That would be interesting to see and might even offer some double-dip opportunities for fans of the film who already own the R2J.
HD might be interesting as well, although very unlikely.
I couldn't make it through this movie. I tried twice and made it further the second time but I gave up with three girls in the hot springs. It just bored me. I even tried to skip ahead and nothing seemed to ever happen. I keep reading about how great it is but I just don't get it. Yeah it looks good and its weird but I need more then that.
I did like Taste of Tea, and I liked Kamikaze Girls a lot.
bob, that's because it's a series of sketches. it's the kind of film - rare as they are - that doesn't intend to make sense until you allow it to simply be what it is, and then it ultimately sits in the mind and makes sense (in an odd kind of way) as an overall picture of sheer odness.
@bobmichaels
take a look at some early work from the 4 episode magazine from Grasshoppa titled Grasshoppa you might gain an understanding of what this movie (funky forest) is kind of about or trying to recapture; the short format but used as a feature. vignettes. sketches. but not just that. the film makers took the sketches and worked them and intertwined aspects of each to make them all act as one piece but still capable of being strong on an individual level. think portmanteau.
give it another shot. don't force it. sit back with a cold one and relax. appreciate the film for what it is. once you can watch it all of the way through without analyzing the shots and technicalities of the film then will you understand.