Sky High

Let me get this out of the way now. I am a huge Ryuhei Kitamura fan. I think I have now seen all of his movies (Heat After Dark, Down To Hell, Versus, Azumi, Aragami, Alive...... and even Battlefield Baseball, which he sort of had a hand in), and though enjoyed them all, I found Sky High to be one of his best. This definitely sits in my top 3, with Versus and Azumi.

Anyone familiar with Kitamura's films will recognize his style immediately. Fantastic cinematography, digitally assisted effects, hyperkenetic fights, and story lines that at best can be described as complicated. He seems to weave a mythology into most of his work, and it all seems very new and interesting.

In any case, Sky High really got to me because the world he spins here has really defined rules, and they are played to the best of their limits. We know that the death of one character will cause a chain reaction in both the living and spirit world, and that was really intriguing.

The film has flaws, to be sure. It's a little long, and sometimes you can predict what's coming next, but it's still very good. This is the kind of movie that looks good enough to have a very wide theatrical release (except for the demon at the end, what was with that?) and do well once word of mouth got around.

Anyway, highly recommended viewing. Can't wait to see what Kitumura will do with Godzilla: Final Wars.

As with many of Ryuhei Kitamura's film, Sky High displays plenty of great ideas (a serial killer ripping people's hearts out, the gates of Rage, where murdered people go and are given three choice - heaven, earth, or hell), an genre bending story (sword play, horror, sci-fi, love story, serial killer) and plenty of visual style. However, Sky High also fall foul of Ryuhei Kitamura's usual faults. For this type of film, and the way it is shot, it is just too long, running at over two hours. Kitamura tries to give the story depth and meaning (failing most the time), when it should be a great popcorn flick with less depth. Take his two major success - Versus and Azumi. Here there is very little plot, just great action. Alive, another of Kitamura's films, which is very similarly themed to Sky High, also suffers these faults. Given the right script, Kitamura will make a genuinely great film (he almost did it with Versus), but until then, he need someone to come and cut his film down.

I'm a big fan of Kitamura Ryuhei and he ain't disappointing anyone with this one either, all though this one probably ain't my favorite by him. What you get here is as usual an original plot who at first, reading on IMDb, seemed a bit difficult but as soon as the movie went on it weren't hard to keep up with the plot development. I saw someone who really ranted about this piece, but I guess it was another Hollywood fan because Kitamura is, as always, bending the borders a bit and I do understand if the inveterately Hollywood fans will find this "controversial", by judging the camera work, plot, scenes e.t.c. The scenery in "Sky High" is lovely! What I perhaps lacked here was the more "diffuse" plot development, it was a bit too straight for me (yet good but I wanted more). It's a 7/10 and any Kitamura fan should see this!

Kanzaki is a detective searching for a serial killer who is killing young women and keeping their hearts. On his wedding day his wife becomes the killer's next victim sending Kanzaki on a quest for revenge to murder the person who killed his wife. But there is so much more! What starts as a grizzly murder mystery/revenge film opens up to become a truly epic masterpiece. Part love story/supernatural ghost story/action movie. Sky High has it all. Superb cast and terrific acting. Cinematography is amazing, and I love the special effects. Sets are great and the soundtrack really gets you into the action scenes. My only complaint is that the movie does get a little long near the end. If you are looking for something different see this movie. You won't regret it. *** out of ****

I like Ryuhei Kitamura movies. He makes a decent effort trying to be cool and I really appreciate it. There is something in his vision, in his artistic decisions, in his whole approach to cinema as art, that makes him ... I don't know ... more then just a film creator. No wonder he is already a cult phenomenon.

"Sky High" is a Ryuhei Kitamura film, alright. The cinematography is clean and aesthetic, art design is pretty impressive, and kind of alienated, the swords are long and fast, the blood is red and hot, and the Japanese women are beautiful and dangerous as hell. (Check out Kimika Yoshino as the White Witch, mmmm... sweet).

And the story, well, its really boring, stupid, and just not interesting enough.

Some supernatural and magical reality, some lame characters with immature behavior, some tedious fights that could make you fall asleep and some other totally unexciting piles of crap. So if you really want to see this film, if you feeling that you don't want to miss one of Ryuhei Kitamura experiences, watch it, but don't expect for masterpiece.

Don't bother yourself with this slow, melodramatic and infantile movie, with bad directing, really bad acting, awfully bad dialogs and with surprisingly bad ending.

** P.S: "Kung Fu Hustle" by Stephen Chow, is my favorite choice anyway.