Linda Linda Linda

I'm happy to report that the Japanese film Linda Linda Linda, which screened tonight at NYAFF (and was the first film of the festival that I was able to go see at the ImaginAsian theater) is hands-down the best movie I've seen at the festival so far. An upbeat and joyous film about a high school girls' rock and roll band, it's practically guaranteed to go straight to the heart of anyone who believes in music, and its power to save one's soul.

The plot is as straightforward as they come. Shiba High School is holding their annual Holly Festival complete with a musical talent show, and three friends - drummer Kyoko (Aki Madea, Battle Royale), keyboardist-turned-guitarist Kei (Yu Kasii, Lorelei) and bassist Nozomi (Shiori Sekine, of the real band Base Ball Bear) are struggling to get a band together. After their previous guitarist injures her finger and has to bow out, they recruit shy Korean exchange student Song (Bae Doo-Na, Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance) as their vocalist, and decide to cover three songs by the Clash-esquire 80's J-punk group The Blue Hearts. After weeks of staying up all night practicing, jamming until the wee hours (not to mention the fact that Song has to learn her lyrics phonetically), they are finally ready to play their music before their teachers and friends.

Admittedly, the description above probably makes this movie sound like every other movie about a band, or a sports team, or some kind of sentimental, rah-rah "Eye of the Tiger" pap. Trust me - nothing could be farther from the truth. What this movie is about is the people - the four schoolgirls that are its main characters are as quirky, and as button-cute, but also as three dimensional, as anyone you'd meet in life, and the movie's long, uninterrupted takes and improv-style acting give us a fly-on-the-wall feeling of being there. Opening with a MiniDV shot of one girl giving an on-camera interview about the Holly Festival, the movie starts out depicting its characters with shy restraint, gradually revealing more and more about their personalities, foibles, their joys and sorrows, until eventually, they literally start to feel like our friends. By the end, when the group performs their songs, we've honestly forgotten that they are characters in a film. We want to stand up and applaud.

I would honestly say that Linda Linda Linda is one of the greatest rock and roll films I've ever seen. Being a recent film, it doesn't have the legendary status of This Is Spinal Tap or A Hard Day's Night, but honestly, it's up there. This is rock and roll stripped down to its very core. No pretension, no decadence, no sex, drugs, limos, and all of that bullshit - just the three-chord structure of a song and its power to save lives. It's a truly beautiful thing to see and hear.

Saw this yesterday at the London Film Festival, and as a fan of The Blue Hearts, I wasn't disappointed. Four schoolgirls start a covers band so they can play at the school festival, and have to overcome a tight time-limit and personal dramas before they get there.

The film is beautifully acted and shot, and totally sweet from start to finish. At two hours it's a tad over-long, but some mesmeric camera-work and subtle humour helps it along nicely. The casting is superb, with every character believable and captivating. And of course the music's fantastic - the title song gets played to death but it's still a cool cover of a great Japanese punk song, and James Iha of Smashing Pumpkins does a brilliant job with the incidental music.

I'm so glad this film got an English sub, and considering how quickly the tickets sold out for these two London screenings, a full release would be warmly welcomed. Highly recommended.

Although not quite on the same level as another coming of age Japanese teen musical Swing Girls (2004), Linda Linda Linda still has that kooky charm and punk rock vibe that makes it worthwhile checking it out.

Nothing major happens, no big love drama or major fall outs in this film or bullies trying to stop them, and that's refreshing to say the least. For me this probably has the beautiful Bae Doona;s best performance to date (I might slightly give the nod to A Girl At My Door but this film runs it close). She steals the film, as the kooky exchange Korean student turn front woman, to think she was 26 at the time of this film and a bit older then the other three female leads but she makes you believe she's a teenage girl.

The other three members of the band are very good, especially Aki Maeda (Battle Royale) as the drummer. But none come close to topping Bae Doona. The ending has a bittersweet feel to it, as some else mentioned in their review that it's the last significant thing that they probably do. With shots of empty corridors and grounds of the school, it's kind of eerie in a strange way. Also big up the music of the Blue Hearts, you end up humming Linda, Linda for weeks after hearing it.

I did have some problems with it. I did have some trouble with the pacing and I felt a few scenes could have been trimmed to make a tighter film. But overall it's nit picking as this film has it's heart in the right place, plus Bae Doona stealing the show. Well worth checking out.

Those few people who commented this movie is 'boring' are missing the point entirely. Perhaps it is a matter of taste, what you are looking for in a movie. If you are looking for those quick pick-me-up rock'n roll flicks, with heroes/heroines get the girl/boy and fat recording contracts after performing jaw-dropping numbers, overcoming incredible odds, then perhaps this movie is not for you.

But pick you up in a bigger and more satisfying way this movie does. This movie is realistic in that it does not need artificial plot devices and major suspension of belief on the part of the audience. It just shows what ordinary teenage high school girls trying to put together a rock band in a few days for a festival would do in those precious few days of their lives. This is perhaps the last significant thing they will do before they head out to the real world (and maybe college).

Kudos to the director who sets the right pace for the scenes. In my opinion, Japanese movies in general have slower pace than necessary, but for this movie it was the right one and gives the audience the feeling that they really spent those few days with them. It is time well invested and gives the viewer a big payoff.

Of course Bae Doona absolutely steals all the scenes she is in. Not only she is an amazing talent, but these roles come naturally to her since she cut her tooth in a highly-acclaimed high school TV drama before taking on motion pictures. Look for her in the forthcoming 'The Host (2006)'(Korean title 'Gwoemul').

All in all, a very satisfying movie. And I just had to buy the Blue Hearts CDs. The songs just would not leave my head!

Having just had a week filled with watching two Shakespearean tragedies, I was ready to be uplifted and found the perfect answer in Nobuhiro Yamashita's Linda Linda Linda. It is not only a feel-good movie, it is a feel-great movie that had the audience dancing in the aisles (figuratively, if not literally). Yamashita has managed to put together not only one of the best rock films but also one of the most truly honest films I have seen about what life is like for teenagers. It also has a very infectious song, Linda Linda Linda, arranged by former Smashing Pumpkin James Iha that will roll around forever inside your brain. The songs are not lip-synced but are actually performed by the talented actress musicians.

The plot is simple and can be summarized in a paragraph or two but the strength of the film is not in its story but in its quirky humor, natural conversations, great music, and the small moments that convey the roller coaster existence of high school life. Four girls attending Shibazaki High School in Japan want to compete at the annual Holly Rock Festival but things are not going their way. With less than three days before the competition, Moe (Shione Yukawa), the lead guitarist, has just broken two fingers in an accident and is unable to play. Two members, Kei (Yu Kashii) and Rinko (Takaya Mimura) have had a falling out over Rinko's attempt to recruit a boy to play in the bandand are not on speaking terms.

A patchwork solution is proposed where Kei decides to be the guitarist while Kyoko (Aki Maeda) moves to drums and Nozomi (Shiori Sekine) plays the bass. All that is left is to find a singer and a song, no small task. With days left to prepare, the girls agree to choose the first person who walks in the corridor in front of them. Since the first person was a boy, they decide to pass. They also pass on Rinko, a vocalist they used in a former band.

Since Rinko doesn't want to sing the song they've chosen, they pick the next girl walking by, a Korean exchange student named Son (Bae Du-na) who agrees to sing but without much knowledge of Japanese, rehearsals are a struggle to communicate. Calling themselves the Paran Maum, the girls have to sneak around the school and rehearse at night, often falling asleep on the floor. The pace of the film is slow and the girls face challenges but they are real life events, not "movie" problems. Kyoko is attracted to Kazuya (Katsuya Kobayashi) but needs to find the confidence to let him know. Kei must learn to work within the confines of a group and give up some control and Son has to become comfortable enough with the language to perform.

While the story may sound like a teenage soap opera, Linda Linda Linda stays away from cliché and the film is without contrived plot twists or dramatic confrontations with parents (who are mostly non-existent in the film). Along the way, however, there are some very endearing moments. One is Son's attempt to enter a karaoke club without buying a drink and her back and forth conversation with the attendant borders on the painfully hilarious.

Another great scene is when a young boy tries to communicate in broken Korean to Son that he loves her but there is more than a language barrier. The acting in Linda Linda Linda is uniformly excellent, especially the performance of Bae Du-na who moves from being shy and inarticulate to front and center stage and sweeps you away with her great smile. The ending of the film is so perfect that I dare not give it away except to say that the feeling the film leaves you with is one of pure and simple joy.