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The official webpage for Nobuyoshi Sasaki's Kôsô: bôryokudan vs gyangu is now online, and there's a trailer for the movie on that page. The movie is scheduled to be released on DVD and VHS in Japan by GP Museum Soft on June 25. Its principal cast is as follows: Hakuryû, Kuniyuki Masakatsu, Takeshi Yoshioka, Yoshimi Asada, Kômei Inose, Moro Morooka, Kôjirô Shimizu, and Hideo Nakano.

Oooh ... a happy little find from GreenCine, who are being just far too kind to us these days ... IndieWire has a list of seven late additions to the official Cannes lineup including Jan Kounen's Darshan – l'Etreinte. It's referred to on Kounen's site as Another Reality and I believe it is the same film the IMDB refers to as Other Worlds. Whatever you call it this is the documentary on shamanism that Kounen shot around the same time he was making Blueberry. Check out a nearly ten minute promo reel of footage from the film here.

It may not be in the official selection, but for every film 'officially' at Cannes there are probably five to ten more (at least) screening in various sidebars and industry showcases and Arclight Films has announced that Sha Po Lang will be one of those, with screenings scheduled on the 14th and 15th of May. They're bringing the musical version of Reefer Madness, too. Tee hee.

But enough of that. Check the trailer here. Thanks to Chelle at DonnieYen.us for the info.

Good news for Kim Ki Duk fans ... Logboy just spotted this listing for this upcoming Korean DVD issue of Address Unknown, one of Kim's lesser known films. It looks as though it's getting a solid release, too - two discs with a stack of special features and the feature subbed in English, French and Italian. I guess people are starting to realize that he's more popular outside of Korea than he is inside ...

No sign of this one on the major US retailers yet, but we'll let you know when it turns up ...

The one hole in my Mamoru Oshii viewing is his contribution to the long running Patlabor series. I've seen the third Patlabor feature, but neither of Oshii's two, nor his contributions to the various TV incarnations but for some reason I always try to keep track of what's happening in that particular giant robot world ...

What's happening is a new series slated to hit North American DVD this summer. Central Park Media are due to start releasing the latest Patlabor TV series starting in mid July. No Oshii, but the talent involved is far from shabby ...

Thanks to Cameron for the link.

The teaser trailer for Chan-Wook Park's Sympathy For Lady Vengeance - the third in his revenge trilogy following Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance and Oldboy - has turned up online and it looks ... well ... it looks like a Chan-Wook Park film, which means bloody well awesome.

The official Korean source has the teaser available in streaming format only, but the video stream is brutally slow right now - I imagine their servers are being swamped - so we have captured the teaser and will be hosting it in downloadable form here for as long as our bandwidth holds out. It looks goooooooood ...

Teaser found via Hitman over in the KFC Forums. That guy's swell.

This is interesting ... after a loooooong period of silence David Fincher is, once again, a busy boy. He's got his film about the Zodiac killer in the works right now and according to the Hollywood Reporter the long stalled out Curious Case of Benjamin Button is now all set to go with Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett starring. Hey, look! It's the original cast of The Fountain!

Pitt stars as a man who ages in reverse and falls in love with Blanchett - age thirty - when he himself is fifty. I'd be more interested if they were still using the Charlie Kauffman script - can you imagine a Fincher directed Kauffman flick? - but Eric Roth isn't exactly a slouch, The Postman notwithstanding, and I'm a fan of Fincher regardless. I've even got a soft spot for Alien3.

Tempted to drop coin on the Thai DVD of Godzilla Final Wars? I did, just because I'm impatient and god only knows when a properly subtitled version will release but Logboy jsut sent me the link to the first proper review has turned up over on Tokyo Monsters and it sounds a bit dodgy. Good thing it's cheap. Check the review here.

According to Screendaily A Tale of the Cinema, the latest film from Woman Is The Future Of Man director Hong Sang Soo, has been added to the official lineup at Cannes.

You can check out the trailer here in Real Video format.

Not quite sure what happened, but our comment system has crapped out. We're working on getting it fixed and all should be well soon ...

*** UPDATE ***

All is well. And just because I haven't for a while I now take this opportunity to point out that our web-host kicks ass. Just insanely good - and fast - service. If you're looking for a home online I can't recommend LivingDot highly enough.

A relatively recent film that you may recognise from this artwork for the Japanese DVD, and I am sure I've seen the trailer before. The Official Site still exists, and gives an option for the trailer, but it seems to be dead (only tried the QT option).

It's an over the top Samurai gore fest apparently. Coudn't find much about it that's still actually online, so perhaps someone can go hunting for reviews and so on. The film seems to have a sequel coming to DVD in Japan sometime in July.

The synopsis from the MTI Video / Saiko Films (the company releasing it stateside) website says, "Kibakichi is a lone swordsman from Yokai, a land of monsters that once co-existed alongside man. Raised on raw meat rations and with an affinity with the full moon as well as a blistering skill with the sword his Yokai persona is that of a werewolf! In his venture to seek out goodness amongst man he finds himself in a desolate village and in the middle of an age-old battle between good and evil.

Geisha turn into giant carnivorous spiders, samurai change into werewolves, and ghostly monsters and skeletons prey on humans, KIBAKICHI delivers all the grit of a spaghetti western with the violent grace of a samurai flick."

Seen this floating around CDjapan and some Japanese text sites for a week or so, now I know it both has English Subtitles and stars Tadanobu Asano, and it's directed by Kuzuo Kuroki I am putting a little thing here to let you know it's coming soon.

Yesasia.com : Standard Edition $40 / Deluxe Edition $60.

Now is your chance, drop everything, scrape that cash from the back of the sofa, count it, change it into crispy notes at the bank and buy that plane ticket. A rare chance to see what looks like every single Studio Ghibli film on the silve screen. Fantastic.

The official site for the showings is here, so go for more details if you need them.

via Nausicaa.net.

My mission for today, to make Opus happy. Here you go, Opus. It's now confirmed that the film which follows the superb 'Voices Of A Distant Star' will get its assumed R1 release in just a couple of months time. Nice.

via AnimeOnDVD.

Now, I'm not one for gossip but Sheila in Accounting told me that her brother overheard his sister-in-law on the phone with someone really close to the agent of... erm... ahem.

Gosh. Tonight is a fun night for news. I've almost peed my pants twice now with all the fun news out there. Killer sheep. Now this...

11 days ago Jennifer Garner was semi-officially taken off the market when she got engaged to Ben Affleck. Now the hot gossip is that the two hollywood hotties have spawned and she is expecting child.

Great. Another future good looking Hollywood actor with no talent and a doomed career. Kid should call it a day and pack it in before it even begins.

Granted, this is not what we usually delve on around here at Twitch but it does make you fear for the human race.

via IMDB.

IMDB reported today that the scene involving Asian actress Bai Ling have been removed from the final print of Revenge of the Sith. Speculation surrounds the issue that it may have been because the actress is also due to appear topless in the June edition of Playboy magazine.

"I just found out that my part has been completely cut out of the upcoming 'Star Wars' movie. I do not know what happened," Ling said. "I posed for Playboy and it may have been doing that which upset [director] George Lucas. I did not know when 'Star Wars' was going to be released when my manager came to me and said that Playboy wanted me to pose topless. I did not know that Playboy was going to come out the same time as 'Star Wars.' I saw them as separate projects. I see the human body as beautiful and not pornographic, but maybe the 'Star Wars' producers did not see what I did. I am in shock." New York Post

The reason her scene was cut because she was appearing nude in Playboy is speculation however. A LucasFilm spokeswoman told the New York Post that Ling's sole scene was cut more than a year ago stating, "It was just one scene".

On a positive note, Bai Ling is going to appear TOPLESS in PLAYBOY!!!

Thank you CityOnFire for the heads up.

Oh boy. I got quite a chuckle out this. Thanks to the new and improved IFCBlog for directing me to some WETA conceptual art designs for a New Zealand based horror/comedy film The Age. The story centers around a genetic experiment gone wrong on you guessed it - sheep.

And since there are 40 million of the wooley little bastards and they outnumber the Kiwis heavily you know that anarchy and chaos must ensue. This sounds like a riot.

"Is that mint sauce in your hand? Too baaaaaad for 'ewe'!" Now that's clever. You see how I replaced 'you' with 'ewe' which is what a female sheep is called... oh just forget it and go see the pics.

Shooting for Chan Wook-parks next film, Sympathy for Lady Vengeance, wrapped up last week shooting the final scences in Australia of all places. And once again Chan has pulled all the stops to film the final sequences of the film in secret, like its predecessor, OLD BOY, which had its final scenes shot in New Zealand. The final scenes of Sympathy for Lady Vengeance will not be revealed until the film hits theatres in Korea in July.

via KBS Global.

Todd is a flagrant von Trier fan so he will like these very much. IonCinema once again comes through with exclusive images, this time from Lars von Trier's upcoming Manderlay, the second installment of his "USA---Land of Opportunities" trilogy.

The official website for Tsui Hark's Seven Swords has gotten a bit of an update since last I visited. No English yet, and no trailer, but there are a good number of additional photos online, including a healthy batch of stills from the film. Hit the third link from the bottom for those, then just click around and see what else pops up ... It's certainly the best looking film Hark has made in a while ...

Via Monkey Peaches.

Ah, it's been far too long since I perused David Lynch's official site but I just stumbled across this on the IFC Blog. Curious what the weather is like in LA? Ol' Dave will be happy to tell you. Just click here.

ADV Films have announed the date for the upcoming R1 USA DVD of Hideo Nakatas' superb 'Dark Water', which they had recently show in the USA at cinemas too.

Based on Kojio Suzukis books, as was Nakatas original 'Ringu', hopefully most will have already seen this stunning work. If not, and you think this might be a step-up from the old R3 HK disc, it's worth every penny. Both the 'Ringu' and 'Dark Water' books are also available in English translations.

via Fangoria.

*EDIT* Replaced the picture, found the artwork posted in the forum at DVDTalk.com.

Huzzah! Just got off the phone with my insurance broker and things are finally wrapping up post break-in. The check, as they say, is in the mail. Which means I will very soon have a bucket of money to rebuild my stolen DVD library.

Now, I liked the batch of stuff that I had, but that doesn't mean that it couldn't be better, so I'm soliciting your input. Here's what I want: In the comments section below post for me your top five domestic titles (domestic in this case being North American), your top five imports, top five guilty pleasures, and your top (bottom?) five films to stay the hell away from. I'll take 'em under advisement ... Ready? Go!

Just astonishing stuff. Breathtakingly worthwhile. 39 episodes over 9 discs, 18 years (from 1982 - 2000) of perhaps the first and most memorable series that brought us many of the very familiar 'Alternative' comedians as they have been known. Now, after many years of wishing I could see those shows like 'The Bullshitters' (a parody of 'The Professionals'), 'Strike' (a parody of Hollywood making a movie about the 1980s miners' strike'), 'Bad News' (similar to 'Spinal Tap' in some respects), and 'Five Go Mad In Dorset' (a parody of 'Secret Seven' and 'Famous Five' style books) I can see all these and more.

Fantastic. Made my day.

DVDTimes.co.uk have a complete rundown of all the episodes here, the BBC comedy guide (even though the show was Channel 4) gives a full background story here. As you will see from the huge list of names involved, it pretty much involved just about everyone of note in British comedy from the past 30 years.

The film managed $21m / £14.2m over the first three days in the States, beating 'XXX : State of the Union' which was the nearest new opening, and 'The Interpreter' which was pushed into second place having opened previously. Lagging behind all these were the 'Amityville' remake, and surprise hit 'Sahara'. Overall, ticket sales were down for the tenth consecutive week.

In the UK the film opened over this past bank holiday weekend, and managed £4.2m in its' first three days. It also beat 'XXX : The Next Level' (the sequels alternative title being used here).

Via BBC (UK piece / USA piece).

This is a little outside our normal sphere here but I'm throwing it up because I'm a big, big fan of David Edwards and I know at least one of our regulars here is as well ...

Edwards is best known as the leader of the now defunct 16 Horsepower, a well-nigh unclassifiable band out of Denver. The best musical label I've seen attached to 16HP is gothic country, I tend to describe them as the audio equivalent of a William Faulkner or Flannery O'Connor novel. We're talkin' howling vocals, fire and brimstone and a deep, alarming twang. Edwards is now chasing a solo project - Woven Hand - full time, but this wasn't really the case of someone looking to braoden their horizons. Woven Hand music is largely the same as 16 Horsepower's, so why branch out? Simple: Edwards was commissioned to write music for an experimental dance troupe and the resulting performance - Blush - has since developed into a pair of albums, an extensive European dance tour, and now a film. A film with a trailer. Right here.

Check the dancin' man's website here and Edwards' US record label home here.

It's not the whole thing, but a string of titles for this year's New York Asian Film Festival have leaked out and it's gonna be gooooood ...

Check out the list:

Vital, Taste of Tea, Survive Style 5, A Snake Of June, Marebito, Smaritan Girls, Kamikaze Girls, Hana and Alice, Tetsujin 28, Gagamboy (Someone point me to a trailer on this! Please!), Josee The Tiger and the Fish, Someone Special, P, Karaoke Terror, Kekexili, Crazy N The City, University of Laughs, Arahan, R Point, A Family, Three Extremes.

Not bad ... my time off from the day job is the week before this, but I'm tempted to try and swap time with someone and make the trip down. Things roll from June 17th until the 30th. Check out the website here.

The Korea Times has a fantastic interview with director Song Il Gon - best known for Spider Forest - discussing his forty minute, single take film Magician(s) as well as the benefits of digital video technology. Go read this thing and tell me the descriptions of his earlier digital shorts don't have you squirming ...

Via the new and improved IFC Blog.

A while back Twitch regular Swarez posted a note in our forum - which you really should join - saying that he'd been asked to interview Ron Perlman for a paper in his native Iceland and asking if anyone has suggestions for questions. Vulture that I am I immediately swooped in and offered to run the English version of the interview here at Twitch ... I must be a more appealing vulture than most, because he said yes. So here it is, the fruits of Swarez's labors, talking to the man about his new Iceland-shot horror flick, Hellboy, Jeunet, directing his first film and a good load of other stuff ... big, big thanks to Swarez ...

Continue reading "Ron Perlman Interview!"

Criterion have posted the release specs for their two upcoming Seijun Suzuki release - Gate of Flesh and Story of a Prostitute - as well as the cover art for Gate of Flesh. Not surprising at all is that they both look to be dead solid releases with new transfers, new interviews with director Seijun Suzuki, and essays to put the films in context. You can hit the Gate of Flesh page here and the Story of a Prostitute page here.

Thanks to Aaron for the heads-up.

A while back I linked to the trailer for Zee Oui, a Thai film based on the true story of a cannibalistic serial killer who preyed upon young children. Great trailer, great premise, more than enough to get me to drop coin on the Thai DVD, a disc that has been sitting unwatched on my coffee table for a good little while now as I deal with more urgent stuff. Well, there's a detailed review up at A Better Tomorrow here and it sounds like there are some significant problems ... ah, well ... the curse of the good trailer strikes again ...

I have a hunch that this has already been floating around a bit, but today was the first I came across it and I gotta say ... that's one great poster. I finally got around to seeing the first Saw last night and while it's not a perfect film I had a lot of fun with it and this poster promises more of the same without taking itself too seriously ... nice ...

Yeah, I know ... I know ... it's already out, we've shilled for it enough, it's time to move on ... what can I say? This made me chuckle. Intergalactic reviews for the Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy ...

Here's what I found scouring Japanese sites for artwork and specifications for the Japanese DVD for 'Vital' which is out at the end of June. The artwork is the same as used in various posters for the film, so they could be speculative mock-ups. To the left is the Standard Edition, the right is the Deluxe Edition. These are being used on various sites, so they could be accurate, and they are displaying the DVD logo on them.

< Recording contents >

< DISC-1 > : Audio commentary - Kojima Kazuo & Tsukamoto Shinya. Hot news report. Theater trailer. TV spot (2 versions).

< DISC-2 > : Benefit DISC (60 minutes). Making-of Featurette (19 minutes). Tsukamoto director interview (11 minutes). Overseas documentary : Venice movie festival (11 minutes). Pattern of first day stage greeting (3 minutes). Digest video clip × Music by Cocco "blue bird" (6 minutes). Oda (human body modelling) making & interview (10 minutes). Steel gallery other things.

Main part 86 minute. Single sided 2 layer. 16:9LB (vista size). Sound: 5.1ch DTS. 5.1ch (Dolby digital). 2.0 Channel Stereo (theater open original). audio commentary/subtitle: Japanese & English.

YesAsia is now taking preorders for both the standard edition and the special edition. Hit the appropriate link.

BBFC have recently certified the film uncut and have given it a 'U' for 'Universal' (i.e sutiable for all, with the added "contains mild peril" warning). They also usually put a release date for the opening, and this time it's September 1st 2005. By that time we should know of a DVD release with English Subtitles, possibly both the Japanese and American.

Wouldn't take this the same ways as perhaps the lack of preview screenings for a film like 'Alien Versus Predator' where it didn't even take several seconds beyond the suggestion the movie might even get produced before many could say "it's gonna be crap" in an assured manner.

Kim Ki-Duks new film, now apparently retitled 'The Arrow, The Bow', will not be shown in advance to the press of Korea for review purposes. HanCinema reports that the company behind the promotion of the film have said, "We want people to be able to watch the film without prejudice.’’ Nothing is there to stop people reviewing the film once it opens in Korea on May 12th 2005.

via HanCinema.

Alright all you Euro folk ... there's a new kid on the festival circuit and it may not be the biggest one going but, man is their lineup ever sweet ...

The first Dejima Japanese Film Festival runs May 27th and 28th in Amsterdam and we've got the full program for you a little bit before the official announcement. Check out this lineup:

L'Amant (Hiroki Ryuichi), Taste of Tea (Katsuhito Ishii), Blood and Bones (Yoichi Sai), Guhser No Binds Me (Hiroki Yamaguchi), Jyukai - The Sea of Trees Behind Mt. Fuji (Tomoyuki Takimoto), Kamikaze Girls (Tetsuya Nakashima), Tony Takitani (Ichikawa Jun), Tsuburo (Masafumi Yamada)

Of the lot of them the only one I'm not familiar with is Tsuburo and that's a pretty fantastic lineup of films. Throw in a panel discussion with Tony Raynes and Tom Mes and you've got one short but very sweet little event. Hit the website at the link above for full ticketing and location info.

** UPDATE **

The festival's PR man has been good enough to pass along a synopsis and some stills for Tsuburo ... read on for those ...

Continue reading "Get Thee To Amsterdam in May: The First Dejima Japanese Film Festival Runs May 27th and 28th"

Some stuff that continues from previous volumes pops up as always this month. Firstly, the final volume (no.4) of 'Paranoia Agent' from Satoshi Kon is May 10th - the show got off to a great start but has cruised somewhat, and i fear the end because of the rumblings of disappointment i've read. Another Tsukamoto movie, another I haven't previously seen is 'Hiruko The Goblin', also on the 10th; this is Tsukamotos early major studio movie, made between the two Tetsuo films in the beginning of the 1990s. The other two releases on the 10th are the second volume of Production I.Gs 'Otogi Zoshi' TV series that's a gentle-ish historical epic (at this point), and 'Appleseed' - the 2004 CGI movie that i had hoped would be subbed in Japan. It wasn't long to wait in the end.

Slap bang in the middle of the month is 'House Of Fury'. Not a huge fan of HK movies, but recent advance in relatively cheap CGI seem to offer the chance for more dynamic and unreal action movies; I hope this is one of them. A few days later is the R1 boxset of the 2001 'Bones' anime series 'Rahxephon' which i've been drifting between a decision on for a while... I will give it a try. Then the last but one volume of 'Stand Alone Complex' arrives the same day, the 17th, along with Kiyoshi Kurosawas' superb 'Charisma' and 'Seance' courtesy of Homevision. Finally, will try out NoShames discs of Sergio Martinos giallo classics 'Case of the Scorpions Tale' and 'The Strange Vice of Mrs.Wardh' out May 31st.