Thread: Last Movie Watched

part two.







Confessions

from the sound of their voice to their trained gait. the romantic image of a Japanese woman has always been one of soft beauty and grace. Takako Matsu embodies this, and Confessions is rife with it.

a completely seductive tale of revenge in a yarn about a schoolteacher whose daughter was killed by two children in her class. she begins to slowly tell the entire class about who was responsible, and the course of action she took - because as children, they were completely protected from prosecution under the law.

throughout the rest of the film, you are quietly made privy to the outcome of the perpetrators' crime as you play wall fly in each pupil's life and end with a comfortable satisfaction that these two kids got theirs… and BOY did they get theirs.

Confessions made the Academy's short list for Best Foreign Language Film in January.

sensational movie (and another Blu)… i suggest you watch alone!

4 out of 5







Cure

one of very few movies among adgy-san's vast universe of Asian Cinema knowledge that i knew about and wanted to see.

the story follows a police detective who is investigating a series of exact style murders though the actual killer is different every time. even stranger though, is that each killer readily admits to the crime despite having no motive and no real coherent recollection of their motivation.

he eventually discovers an amnesiac who he learns to be the only common link between the murders because he was last to make contact with each perpetrator. upon interrogation, our hero finds the amnesiac has studied mesmerism and hypnosis, and despite his inability to grasp how, the detective comes to the conclusion that the amnesiac is nothing of the sort… and that he is a hypnotist-prime, forcing the hand of these killers simply by the power of simple suggestion.

however, the "amnesiac" is as equally consumed because the Force apparently doesn't work on Japanese detectives… the perfect candidate to pass the torch to…

being that cameras are a type of… window to the soul, it was not lost on me, the thought of naming the amnesiac - Mamiya. totes first world clever!


this movie smokes just about ANY American thriller that can be got these days… i suggest you watch in a small group, so you can bounce ideas afterward.


4 out of 5







The Chaser

kind of like Ralph Fiennes in that New Year's Eve movie, you got a cop turned pimp. he's just had a couple of ho's gone missing and is in money trouble. he sends one of his girls to a customer who he later realized was the last John assigned to each of the missing broads. Ice-T then goes to his old precinct for help, but learns that he's on his own because the rest of the force was tied up due to a fiasco involving the Mayor and human s***.

while in the process of thoroughly ruing the 3rd trick's day, our John is interrupted by some church friends of the owner whose house he's taken over, and has to stop to deal with the other problem in his life. beginning to get sloppy results in a chance meeting, which gives way to his eventual capture. but due to lack of physical evidence despite a confession that will appear to the already heated media (due to the cops' handling of the Mayor) as having been coerced to save face, the suspect is released, and the pimp arrested. during this time the investigation leads the pimp to the 3rd girl's daughter… who he reluctantly brings along until she winds up in the hospital after getting hit by a courier on a moped.

pimp breaks out and gives chase, while the killer goes back to finish his work. he eventually tracks him down and they have at it… now with being the sole contact for the hospital after having signed H3O's daughter in as her father, she becomes his sole responsibility.

this is a story of a good man gone bad gone good again because it was always in him, but was story-boarded more like it would have been more effective as a dark comedy… i had to resist the urge to chuckle at times. however, a big part of the theme and ending would have to be completely changed to have the redemptive element taken out.

i enjoyed it, but it could've run a bit smoother and less intrusive in small spots…. weekendy afternoony big titty spread cheeky sort of thing.

3 out of 5.