Jeremy Clarke 17
Pulse (Kairo)
by Jeremy Clarke. Pulse aka Kairo (2001) has long been considered one of the key J-Horror films of the last generation, along with Ring (1998) and The Grudge (2002). It remains one of the two films for which director Kiyoshi Kurosawa is most highly regarded, along with his earlier Cure (1997).
Tampopo
By Jeremy Clarke. This so-called ‘Noodle Western’ always sounded somewhat off-the-wall. It impressed when it first appeared in 1985 and viewing it again on Criterion’s new Blu-ray, Tampopo has stood the test of time well. “This’ll be famous in the history of cinema” says cast member Fukumi Kuroda in director Juzo Itami’s 90-minute edited diary […]
Lowlife Love
By Jeremy Clarke. Lowlife Love is the first film production from Third Window Films, which for just over a decade has been distributing movies from Japan and the Far East through UK cinemas and home video. For this opening foray, founder-turned-producer Adam Torel has chosen to work with writer/director Eiji Uchida whose earlier Greatful Dead […]
The Life of Oharu
by Jeremy Clarke. Originally released to international acclaim in 1952, this live-action drama chronicles the slow decline over a lifetime of an imperial lady-in-waiting, step by horrible step, to the level of a street prostitute. It’s based on the novel The Life of an Amorous Woman by Ihara Saikaku, first published in 1686 and set […]
The Handmaiden
by Jeremy Clarke. Weighing in at a lengthy two and a half hours, this lavish, sexually-explicit, South Korean pot-boiler is based on Sarah Waters’ 2002 novel Fingersmith, but moves the location from Victorian England to Japanese colonial-era Korea.