DVD REVIEW: Izo

Wow. Where to begin. I don't know how to say anything about this movie. But I'll give it a shot. First off let me say something about the director Takashi Miike. I love this sick mother f'er. If you have never seen a Miike film, then you are missing out on the most insane imaginative director working since Fellini. He was cranking out 5 to 6 films a year. I still can't keep up with the guy, and I'm only watching them. Check out Audition or the Dead or Alive trilogy for starters. And that's the normal stuff. I finally got around to watching his '04 film Izo. Oh my God.

I have never seen anything like this in my life, and I've seen a lot film. I don't even know if I understood it. In fact I'm pretty sure I didn't, but I couldn't stop watching this thing. The story is as much as I can tell is about Izo Okada (1832-1865), the historical samurai and assassin in 19th century Japan who met a tragic end: he was tortured and crucified. Miike's portrayal of the character (or rather his spirit) transcends reality (and time and space) and is more of a surrealist expose of Izo's exceedingly bloody yet philosophical encounters in an afterlife heavy on symbolism, occasionally interrupted by stock footage of World War II accompanied by acid-folk singer Kazuki Tomokawa on guitar. Kazuya Nakayama plays Izo, and the countless characters he encounters on his journey include for instance Takeshi Kitano and Bob Sapp.

My interpretation of it was this, Izo is trapped in this infinite hell loop of time and space for all his crimes. He is a killing machine that would make Jason or Freddy Kruger run for cover man. He cannot be stopped. I don't think I'm kidding here, but he must kill at least 300 people in this movie one by one. His punishment in hell is to just keep killing and killing to the point where he can't think of anything but killing to where he's mad at himself for not being able to stop. Along the way he starts wearing a batman type mask, has sex with his mom, and chops off a chicks head who shot an arrow in his eye, and as her decapitateded head lies on the ground butterflys fly out of her head and through a door up to the moon. Oh it's that kind of special folks. This is a very surreal movie that I defy anyone to explain to me. These types of movies are not always a good thing mind you, but Miike is so far out there and unafraid to do anything, that it's almost like jumping off cliffs. I found this film strangely invigorating.

Miike did a short film for Showtime Channel's Master of Horror series called, Imprint. They screen all the episodes to the Showtime execs before they air them. Apparently the execs freaked out to the point where they said that this cannot air even on pay cable. So it's supposed to come out on DVD sometime this year. I watched this in two parts over two nights, and Towards the end I thought i might be smart and make a huge leap of faith in my opinion of the film. Maybe Miike is trying to say, look I am capable of making other types of film, but all anyone pays me to make are these violent films, that I am so sick of making but for some compulsive reason I can't stop. Maybe Izo represents him in some way. I don't know but it bears further investigation. So go check this one out. It kicks from another planet.