Cure

I saw CURE at the San Francisco Film Festival in around 1998, and like many, I found the concept and craftsmanship arresting. A number of audience members stayed around afterwards to discuss it - it's a psychologically complex tale of hypnotism and the seductions of altered consciousness. Koji Yakusho (DORA HEITA, 13 ASSSASSINS, etc.) is at his acting peak as a detective who tries to solve a series of murders that don't seem to relate to common logic.

Recently, I saw the DVD version of the film - and it's clear that the film had been cut severely. Most viewers have only seen the US DVD version, so they're not even aware of the problem. A few of the more graphic sequences were cut, important portions of the narrative set in an old sanatorium were excised, and the violent finish was excised entirely. (The US DVD concludes with the suggestion of a further killing; the theatrical Japanese version is more powerful and unambiguous.) In some cases, a later, recut version may be better than the original; however, that's not the case here.

There's scant online text relating to the differences between the two versions.

It speaks well for director Kiyoshi Kurosawa that he took a low-budget police procedural and made an innovative thriller out of it. Most of the scenes are under-edited and shot at a distance, to extract the most from the hypnotic storyline; the longer, hypnotic sequences are several minutes long, with no edits. Because the film uses medium-distance shots to give a sense of hypnotic disassociation, viewers with larger screens will gain an advantage.

I strongly recommend seeing it - but would suggest you seek out the original, uncut theatrical print if you can. The differences are striking. I'd rate the original print as 10/10; the cut/domestic DVD is maybe 7/10. This film would profit from a Criterion reissue, but that doesn't seem to be in the works.

In the wake of the sarin-gas attack mounted by the Aum Shinrikyo cult on the Tokyo subway system in 1995, horror films enjoyed a sudden spurt of popularity in Japan. Many of the films focus on hypnosis or media-induced violence, the fragile normalcy of modern life, and grisly deeds committed by seemingly ordinary citizens. This unnerving 1997 thriller, which seems like a direct response to the Aum Shinrikyo incident, offers a glimpse of how our own national cinema may absorb the blow of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. A rash of senseless murders wracks Tokyo; the victims have deep X-shaped gashes across their throats, and the killers (often their loved ones) are found in a daze. The only connection appears to be a mysterious drifter (Masato Hagiwara) who gets into random strangers' heads with a single, oft-repeated question: "Who are you?" What makes this subtle, quiet shocker so unsettling is the idea that everyone has secret resentments that render him or her hypnotically pliable--that everyone harbors some glimmer of murderous rage that can be exploited, whether by a drifter or by religious extremists. The writer-director, Kiyoshi Kurosawa, a prolific Japanese filmmaker who's developing a large cult following here, heightens the unease with buzzing soundtrack noise and eerie long takes that leave us consistently unprepared for the violence to come. And the last sequence will leave people arguing--it requires close attention, culminating in an ending even more disturbing in its implications than the conclusion of SEVEN.

This film is like a Japanese "mate" to Se7en, although in many ways I think it's superior. The ending is rather enigmatic but if the implications are as I see them (no spoilers) then it is the ending I wish Se7en had gone for. Like many Japanese films I've seen, I get the impression that I'm missing things (cultural outlooks, social relationships) that the Japanese must see. But even knowing that it was a very disturbing film and the director knows how to add to it. It's an extremely dark film (in many ways) and near the end it sounded like something the entire movie was "breathing", like a demon close to your ear. A very eerie effect. Worth seeing.

I think it is important to distinguish Cure from the avalanche of white-face-ghost-girl Japanese horror flicks that followed in Ringu's wake. Purely because it's a different beast and lumping it in a convenient J-horror niche is doing it a disservice. I won't go into plot specifics because it's only a skeleton for Kurosawa to hang his atmospherics. That said, I can understand the complaint many viewers seem to share ("man, it doesn't make sense") but without having any claims on solving Cure's riddle, I'm satisfied with letting wash over me, one watch at a time.

Kurosawa wisely doesn't attempt to explain his plot. He's content to lift the veil just enough for us to sneak a glimpse in before he disorients again. The plot slowly builds through little tokens that are never followed by an orchestral crescento to signal their arrival. They just happen. A small photo in a book, muffled words on a phonogram, an old video, the ramblings of an amnesiac, theories on 18th century Austrian doctors. In the course of the film, everything seems to be coming together only to remain elusive in the end. In that aspect I find Cure to be closer to Last Year at Marienbad than your average Ringu clone. It's not about making sense, it's about pushing limits within which you can. It's about soaking in the impression it makes. When muffled words come through a phonogram, they're more incoherent ramblings than a telegraphed plot solution; but they contribute just as well to the overarching feel. This elliptic mentality is abetted by Kurosawa's choice of a slow, deliberate pace and many long shots, entire scenes covered without any cuts. The gritty and rundown aspect of Tokyo is photographed like a more naturalistic version of David Fincher's work and does the job well.

It's my impression that a surrealist air hovers above and at the heart of Cure, at times reminiscent of a more languid version of Lynch. It is undoubtedly a horror movie so don't be put off by my Resnais comparison, but it's as much bleak as it is subtle and leaves enough to the mind's eye to make you carry it out with you.

The only time I can recall being as spooked by a film was when my parents took me to see "Hangover Square" - a gothic Jack the Ripper thriller - when I was 8 years old. I guess they couldn't find a baby-sitter. That took me about a year to get over, a low-key, all-too-realistic chiller about the banality of insanity.

"Cure" is such a perfect depiction of madness that just about every shot could be framed & hung in a gallery. You can't analyze this one, it doesn't follow a cartesian line of logic; nor does it blast you with halloweenish surprises in the style of Elm Street & its knock-offs. This has far deeper & subtler impact. I found as I relaxed into this film that images of recurring dreams & nightmares I've had since childhood arose & blended into what I was watching. Can't get much creepier than that.

That said, the images & emotions that this film evokes are on a very high level of poetic art. One of the most impressive elements of "Cure" is the director's ability to convey the magnetic manipulative appeal of Mamiya - surely one of the scariest things in real life & very difficult to convincingly convey on screen.