whotheff

A regular heist film inspired by a real heist story. While acting was good, I found the pacing quite bad. The deep focus on the main character was not needed. A lot of events and character action in the movie look really strange as they lack reasoning whatsoever, but I'll skip them due to spoilers. Let's say I would question how professional the robbers were. While using long one shot takes is beneficial for some scenes, it made the heist scene very confusing. A bunch of masked men shouting and running back and forth. Other than that it was interesting to watch how the criminal mind works in action.

You can easily cut 20 minutes of still frames, workers doing repetitive work and other footage which brings no added value to the documentary. A few seconds of all these is more than enough to set the stage. Other than the slow pace and poor editing, there are short interviews of yogurt ambassadors in Japan which are the valuable parts. Music was interesting, the story was interesting too, but nothing exceptional. I wish they interviewed witnesses of the events described. Although they would be 70-80 years old, but that's the best age to tell stories! It would bring much more life into this documentary.

I loved the ending shot!

1999 is the year before the internet and the computers. Before the digital age took over the analog era. Yet, the arcade games are digital - one of the first digital things a kid of that age comes across. I was plesently surprised of the production quality. Events, decors, music bands, games, the street jargon - everything is exactly how I remember it. The story is also pretty close to what usually happened to a kid, captivated by the arcade games. This short film could easily stretch to a full length film if wanted. Acting is very natural and relaxed and together with the cool soundtrack by Uikeda band, it is a must see for any 90s arcade game kid!