Izo

In the distant past, a great samurai warrior named Izo was put to death in a most heinous manner. But his spirit does not rest, and he now wanders the earth, traveling through time, killing (almost) every living thing he comes across. While most of this film is just pure slaughter (which many fans will enjoy), watch for the deeper messages and symbolism.

The acting all around was wonderful. As usual, unless you're a big fan of Japanese cinema, you'll probably only recognize Takeshi Kitano. This makes it far easier for me to comment on the acting, not having to make running jokes on an actor's past career. Takeshi is pretty much flawless in his film choices, so you should already know this will be good when you see his name (not to mention it's a Takeshi Miike film, which is great).

My expectations for this film were mixed. As stated, Miike and Kitano are a great pair, but I was told this was something of an action film and less of a horror film. And I suppose that's true, although horror fans are going to get more than their share of blood and questionable perversity (incest, anyone?). I came out liking this film a lot more than I had thought I would, thinking there's no way it could out-do "Visitor Q" or even "Audition". But I think it very well may have.

The blood is what's going to attract most people. Izo kills school children, an old warrior with a voice box, businessmen and everyone else. It sprays a lot, and the swordplay is enjoyable. The variety of things killed makes up for the fact that the plot doesn't really have much to offer (besides countless stabbings, slashings and beheadings).

What hooked me was the philosophy and symbolism. We have Izo, who is consumed with rage, slowly turning into a demon as he kills (what appears to be a Japanese oni, though my grasp of Japanese mythology is limited). We have a troubadour who follows him around singing songs (some of them up to seven minutes in length). Is he the narrator, or Izo's soul crying out? We have the snake creature, the mother of all humanity and a board of directors for some big corporation. And, most interestingly, a teacher teaching students about "democracy" and what a "nation" is in the most abstract of terms. Like what John Searle or Richard Rorty would say. And if Izo is killing everyone, we are left to wonder why there remain a few -- very few -- people he leaves alive.

Come for the blood and stay for the symbols. You'll need to watch this one two or three times to really begin to understand and appreciate it. In all fairness, it may be boring for some people (how many times can you stab someone) but I think it's art in the purest, most animalistic of forms. You like "Audition" or "Ichi the Killer"? Give this one a shot.

The Philadelphia Film Fest program guide described the plot of IZO as such:

"A samurai travels through time with just one goal: to kill every single human on the planet."

That basically sums it up. A man takes a sword and hacks away at nearly all the people he comes in contact with. He stabs a military general to death with the help of some zombie soldiers. He slices his own mother's body in half from the waist down. He kills some kids, he kills some businessmen, and he kills a real estate agent who turns out to be a vampiric demon. When he kills infinity (yes, infinity ITSELF, not an infinite number of people) and the movie STILL doesn't end, things start to get a little tedious.

Knowing Miike, you'd be right to expect some outlandish violence, a high body count, and perhaps a mind-boggling plot from all of this. What you might not anticipate is a lot of philosophical mumbo jumbo, World War II stock footage played backwards and forwards, and a guitar player who appears every so often to sing throatily about elephants and flowers. (At one point the camera lingers on this guitarist's face for a full SEVEN MINUTES or so without any cuts or camera movement.)

Though I think I may have liked Izo, I have many criticisms.

First of all, for a film about sword-fighting, IZO lacks both the beauty of HERO and the direct outrageousness of KILL BILL. Quite simply, the fights were poorly choreographed and involved too many cheesy stunts. Izo flies over his enemies a few times, just like the characters in CROUCHING TIGER flew, only less elegantly. Izo dodges a bullet in slow motion just like Neo did in the MATRIX. The sound of a heart beating played over fade-ins and fade-outs just like it does in every made-for-TV horror flick in existence. During the rare times when Miike WASN'T deploying effects that have already been clichéd for years, each sequence seemed to go like this:

1. Close up of Izo's face 2. Close up of other guy's face 3. Shot from behind other guy as Izo hits him in the stomach with sword 4. Close up of other guy falling down

For the first ten minutes I didn't mind the lack of special effects or variety, but once I realized that there wouldn't be any progression and that the film would go on like this for a full two hours, I began to feel rather antsy.

The repetitive fight scenes could have been alleviated by some decent cinematography. If you can't give me an engaging plot, at LEAST give me something interesting to look at! But no. The whole movie had a very sloppy vibe, as though it had been rushed through production. Many of the shots seemed haphazardly composed or not composed at all, like arbitrary shots of tree branches and jittery hand-held action footage. Indoor shots were often over-exposed by light coming in from the windows but otherwise under-exposed. I sometimes had the sensation that brief flashes of stock footage were inserted to make up for gaps in continuity. Also, it could be that I saw a worn print, but the first half of the movie had a very brown, drab feel. Perhaps some sharp color could have livened things up.

So yes, the movie was boring, ugly and maybe an EL TOPO rip-off, but somehow I thought it was good anyway. Part of my positive opinion stems from the fact that I admire any director who has a dream and achieves it, no matter how wrong they may be to do so. Also, intellectually, this IS a very engaging film. Since Izo is so unrealistic as a character, the viewer is practically forced to understand his journey as an allegory. In my opinion, Izo represents the grudge mentality: when someone hurts him, or acts like they want to hurt him, he always reacts swiftly and lethally. When a person ignores him or approaches him in kindness (like the schoolteacher, a few of the women, or the children of the future who have learned that nations do not really exist), he lets them pass without harm. His general aim is to destroy anyone who claims to have more power than he does, including the Prime Minister and God. Through juxtapositions with World War II footage, we see that Izo's attitude is linked with Japan's stance during World War II: surrender is dishonorable, but by not surrendering, one is only asking for more violence. In order to stop war, one must cease to threaten it, thereby undercutting the formation of a grudge.

While watching IZO, I felt like I would understand the details better if I were more familiar with Japanese traditions and culture. My feeling was correct. After probing around the internet, I learned that Izo was a true historical figure, a samurai-turned-homicidal maniac. I also learned that the unusual style of music played by the guitarist (fanciful lyrics, anguished voice) is a distinctive Japanese genre that emerged after World War II in response to all the suffering.

Still, I would not recommend IZO lightly, not even to Miike fans. I'm not sure if the film is brilliant or terrible, but overall... life is short and IZO is long. Watch it only if you have the time or patience for such an undertaking.

IZO (4+ outta 5 stars) Well, this movie gets only 2 kinds of ratings... either really low or really high. There's no way around it... you will have to see it for yourself to figure out which it deserves. I found the movie a bit confounding at first... but it definitely makes more sense after a second and third viewing. There really isn't much of a plot. Izo, a dead warrior, is flung arbitrarily through time. He kills everyone he comes into contact with... good, bad, he makes no distinctions. The movie is director Takashi Miike's attempt at some kind of philosophical dissertation on violence and religion. Pretentious? Well, of course! When you get right down to it, ALL philosophy is pretentious! But, is the movie entertaining? Yes. Does it provoke thought? Yes. (Even if most people's thoughts will be along the lines of "What the f*** is going on???") Imaginatively-staged action sequences are piled on non-stop, one after the other. Occasionally the action stops for some rousing acoustic guitar and wild folk-singing from Kazuki Tomakawa... who will either have you covering your ears or desperately searching for his records online. Extremely violent movie, very powerful at times ... similar in style to Jodorowsky's "El Topo". If you think you will like this movie based on the descriptions you read, you probably will. If you think it sounds like boring twaddle... well, you better go watch something else.

I was expecting a samurai film, I couldn't have been wronger. It is hard to explain "Izo" with just words, even if I could I don't think it would cover all the things this film has to say.

Before explaining the story of this film I think it is essential to talk about the visual aspect of it. "Izo" looks like another experimental film from the director Takashi Miike, lots of unorthodox camera shots and visual story telling. Acting feels very theatrical... in a Japanese way. There is no stopping in this film, it is a fast ride from start to the end and you have to catch up with it.

As for the story, Izo is the main character in this, a samurai from feudal Japan who apparently had a lot of drama in his life. After his death his tortured soul wanders around modern and old Japan, endlessly taking lives. He denies the existence of God, faces old foes, those who hold grudge against him, sleeps with his mom and kills her, he sees women he had been with, kills them, kills lots of women, kills lots of everything actually. And the whole Japan -modern and old- wants to stop this guy, he is seen as a menace to the system, he doesn't belong to the system. And he travels back and forth in time, fighting and killing everyone that gets in his way, slowly turning into a demon.

There is a lot of defiance in "Izo", against everything human civilization stands for. Its purpose apparently is to question that which made us what we are. Where does religion, law, ethics come from? And it has a very nihilist answer to all of it. While watching this I felt a lot of mythology in it, feels like a Greek or a Persian tragedy.

What I've written might sound non-sense if you haven't yet seen this and have no idea what it is like but this is as much as I can do to explain this film. I think that's what makes good art: It speaks for itself...

Izo is a vector-movie: it has a point of origin (Izo is put to death in the opening sequence), direction and speed (arbitrary revenge as determined by the edge of Izo's sword), but no destination. It must be stressed that unlike "traditional" narratives, it consciously avoids the end-point/solution/destination. The movie lets the aesthetics of its form shape the meaning of the story. The aesthetics in question being: hyper-loaded symbolism as conjured in Noh theater; PS2 architecture of the action - labyrinthine violence for its own sake leading up to the next level, which is more of the same with a different CGI background; MTV approach to video editing - Izo's bounces between layers of reality with the approximate speed of a cable channel surfer are spliced with archival footage and several "unplugged" Kazuki Tomokawa performances where the ancient Greek chorus would provide emotional emphasis.

The experience is not exactly rewarding but definitely unparalleled.

Apart from some questionable world-conspiracy and misogyny moments, an overall entertaining, extreme, and cryptically new take on film storytelling. Miike in his radical element.