Audition

Art-house horror flicks are not a very common genre (few come to mind except 'Don't Look Now') but Takashi Miike's film 'Audition' is a welcome addition to the canon. Beautifully shot and orchestrated, it is both a subtle personal drama and one of the most genuinely horrifying things I have seen. The early stages of this film resemble a work by Claude Sautet, only seen through a Japanese sensibility, about the relationship between an older man and a beautiful young woman, but there's something slightly discomforting both in the man's definition of the perfect partner, and in the person he finds who fulfills it. The story slides into first a mystery, and then a full blown horror story, the power of which comes from following a very simple golden rule: namely, make the audience care about the characters first: one small needle can be very very scary if you think that it's for real. And by keeping the meaning ambiguous (unlike, say, 'The Shining', with its self-defeating collapse into hyperbolic mania), the film also retains its impact after the initial shock.

This sense of ambiguity is also crucial to the film's claims to be something more than simply an unorthodox gore-fest. 'Audition' constructs, and then deconstructs, a certain vision of the world and the "horror" scenes are only part of this. The result is utterly beguiling, and one can even see similarities with Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness' in 'Audition's' portrayal of a man's complicit relationship with hell.

In some ways, this is not a universal film and I could not imagine it working in English: can you envisage any Western actress speaking the Eihi Shiina's lines with a straight face?. Whether that's because the film is saying something profound about Japanese culture, or whether the fact that it appears to do so can finesse the issue for foreign audiences, I'm not sure. Dramatically, 'Audition' is, despite its climax, not the best film ever made. But atmospherically speaking, it's a masterpiece.

Movies like Scream, I Know What you Did Last Summer, and their teenage-pheremone-reeking ilk have absolutely no right to call themselves "horror movies" when we have a film like Audition to watch.

This movie starts out very slowly, very sweetly, and builds to a fantastic gruesome climax that you don't see coming. Genuinely scary. I am a huge horror movie affectionado, and I have NEVER in my life watched a movie that made gasp like this one did. I was revolted, I was disturbed, I was scared.

Why is this movie so much better than anything I've seen? Subtlety. This movie makes good use of silence, sound effects and off camera action to SUGGEST instead of SHOW you what's happening. It's much more satisfying to watch a movie with this kind of approach than it is to watch people get stabbed with blood spraying all over the place. This movie follows no classic "horror movie rules". It's completely original.

It's not without its faults, of course. The plot is a little strange, and as the movie progresses on it sometimes gets a little hard to follow. Some would also argue that the beginning is too long and too heavy, but I think this is a perfect and even needed contrast to the crazy goings-on that will unfold.

This is a fabulous movie. Check this out if you'd like to see a REAL scary movie.

In Tokyo, Shigeharu Aoyama (Ryo Ishibashi) is a widower that grieves the loss of his wife and raises his son Shigehiko Aoyama (Tetsu Sawaki) alone. Seven years later, the teenage Shigehiko asks why his middle-aged father does not remarry and Shigeharu meets his friend Yasuhisa Yoshikawa (Jun Kunimura), who is a film producer, and tells his intention. However, Shigeharu has difficulties to approach to available women to date and Yasuhisa decide to organize a sham audition for casting the lead actress for the fake movie. They receive several portfolios of candidates and Shigeharu becomes obsessed by the gorgeous Asami Yamazaki (Eihi Shiina). Despite the advice of the experienced Yasuhisa, Shigeharu calls Asami to date and he falls for her. But who is the mysterious Asami?

"Ôdishon" a.k.a. "Audition" is a great horror movie with a creepy, disturbing and even realistic story but with less violence, weirdness and gore than the usual, for a movie directed by the Japanese director Takashi Miike. The characters are very well developed and the beautiful Eihi Shiina is perfect in the role of Asami. The scene when she says "deeper, deeper, deeper" is scary and remains imprinted in the mind of the viewer. My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): "Audição" ("Audition")

Note: On 21 March 2017, I saw this film again.

There are about 15 minutes of "Audition" that everyone remembers and talks about, and about 95 minutes of movie that you'd think didn't even exist if you listened to others' comments. But this is the director's fault; when you set out to shock your audience as much as Takashi Miike does in this film, you can't blame the audience if all they remember about your film is the shocking part.

Which is a shame, because "Audition" is quite a bit more than a mere horror movie. It's really more of a feverish psychological drama along the lines of a David Lynch film. In fact, in structure and tone, this film reminded me of Lynch's "Mulholland Drive," and if Lynch didn't have his own unique style and brand of film-making, I might wonder if he was inspired in part by this film when he made his own.

What other comments here have done nicely is summarize what "Audition" is "about." A man (Shigeharu Aoyama) mourning the loss of his wife looks to find the perfect woman to replace her, and he holds bogus auditions for an ostensible film role in order to find her. But the girl who catches his interest (Asami Yamazaki) turns out to be a much better actress than he bargained for. What other comments DON'T necessarily convey, however, is how much of this film takes place in the world of dreams, and how blurred the line between reality and fantasy is. This dilutes the violence of the film's final moments, because there is a strong suggestion that this violence is taking place in the protagonist's nightmares.

Is "Audition" a critique of the confined roles women are forced to inhabit in Japanese society? Is it about Aoyama's guilt in feeling the need for a woman to replace his dead wife? Is it about his fear of finding a girl that actually can replace her, thereby diminishing what he had with her? Is the film about the extent to which all relationships are "auditions," where each person involved makes him/herself vulnerable and exposes him/herself to acceptance or rejection at the whims of another? A case can be made for its being about all of these things.

When the violence comes at the end, it's not as graphic as the hype would lead you to believe. Even so, I wish Miike hadn't pushed the envelope quite so far. One has to wonder if the emotional impact of the film would have been any less just because the violence was less graphic, and I suspect the answer to that is no. The violence feels gratuitous and cheapens slightly everything that comes before it. It mars the film, but fortunately it doesn't ruin it.

This is far more of a thinking man's film that its reputation would lead you to believe. Those who come to it for the titillating shock of its gore are bound to be disappointed.

Grade: B+

Seven years after his wife dies, Shigeharu Aoyama takes his con's advice and begins looking to remarry. With help from a film producer friend, he sets up a mock audition looking for a woman to play a part that matches his image of his future wife. Whittling the list to 30, he picks the one that strikes a chord with him and, despite not knowing a great deal about her, starts to see her and fall in love.

I had heard a great deal of hype about this film – even the announcer on tv said it caused `outrage' in Japan when first shown. So worried was I that this film would freak me out, that I waiting until a weekend morning to watch it so that I could have daylight everywhere for hours after seeing it!

However, I must admit to having been misled; this film is a very slow little chiller rather than a horror as described. There are horror style moments but overall this is a chilling little tale of one woman's past. The build up is excellent, at times it almost comes across as a comedy; but the film does lay it on a bit thick that `something is not right' at times while not totally explaining things until near the end. That said it is still enjoyable and a little creepy, but you should prepare yourself for the fact that this is not a very fast film – it has a patient pace and you need to be into that; I was a little impatient for the first 15 minutes but after that I settled into it.

The cast are pretty good. Ishibashi is a strong lead male and it is easy to emphasise with his character. Shiina is very good despite the fact that she has to clearly show things beneath the surface. That said, she does a good job of keeping her character real and making the jumps acceptable rather than out of the blue. The telling of the story helps them both out though, keeping it slow but eerie.

Overall, I was a little disappointed with this film as I had hoped to be scared more and freaked out as much as I can be by weird stuff. As it was, this was a well told little creepy film but it is not totally deserving of the reputation it has gotten.