LFM: Libertas Film Magazine

By Joe Bendel. It is probably safe to argue the first emperor of the Later Lý Dynasty was considerable better than his predecessor, the last king of the Anterior Lê Dynasty. The latter was only the third of a short line, who had killed the second, his brother, soon after he ascended to throne. The future emperor Ly Cong Uan witnessed all that chaos and oppression first hand, learning lessons in governance to establish a new dynasty that would last for two centuries. Ly’s rise from humble roots to the heights of royal power are chronicled in Luu Trong Ninh’s The Prince and the Pagoda Boy, which screens during the 2015 edition of New Vietnamese Cinema at the Honolulu Museum of Art.

Little is known of Ly’s mother, but it is an established fact he was raised in a pagoda as a Buddhist disciple. As a result, young Ly had mad skills that he used to defend the village children from bullies. Recognizing Ly just is not ready for enlightenment yet, his master transfers him into the king’s service. The new officer cuts quite the imposing figure, so Le Long Dinh, one of three ambitious princes vying to succeed their father, makes a point of befriending him.

However, Ly still has the same sense of righteous justice, causing friction with the prince, especially after he kills his freshly crowned older brother to claim the throne for himself. Nevertheless, Ly agrees to return to Le’s service to help unify the nation and establish security for the peasantry. Of course, their new understanding will only last so long, given Le’s duplicitous nature and Ly’s ethical principles. To top it all off, they are both attracted to the same woman.

You probably shouldn’t swear by the historical details in Pagoda. Some liberties might have been taken, especially with respects to Ly’s hardscrabble origins, but they make for a big sweeping Horatio Alger epic. However, the film will have plenty of credibility with martial arts fans thanks to the involvement of action star Johnny Tri Nguyen as the fight coordinator. There are some great battle scenes, but it is tough to top young (ten-ish) Ly laying a beatdown on a trio of thuggish twelve year olds (who surely walked away from the film with only minor bruising. After all Nguyen co-starred in Power Kids, so he must have picked up plenty of child safety tips there).

Quách Ngoc Ngoan is also a pretty convincing action star and dignified enough to be a future emperor. His size, athleticism, and a speak-softly-but-carry-a-big-stick presence have the potential to breakout with international fans if they see enough of him. Alas, that could be the tricky part (as it has been for Nguyen), considering Pagoda was released in 2010 to celebrate the millennial of Ly’s founding of Hanoi as the new Capitol city.

Likewise, the young actor playing Ly while still a Pagoda Boy has tremendous moves and similarly impressive screen charisma. Understanding the demands of villainy, Vu Dinh Toán’s prince aptly chews the scenery and preens like a peacock, embodying the absolute antithesis of the ramrod-straight Ly.

Frankly, it is strange that Pagoda has not been more widely seen on the festival circuit. Cinematographer Dominic Pereira has an eye for spectacle and Nguyen coaches a game cast through some satisfyingly cinematic combat. It is a really strong fusion of prestige historical drama with crowd pleasing action. Highly recommended for martial arts fans, The Prince and the Pagoda Boy screened this past Wednesday (7/8) and Thursday (7/9), as part of New Vietnamese Cinema 2015 at the Honolulu Art Museum.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on July 9th, 2015 at 11:33pm.

By Joe Bendel. Welcome to a time long ago in a galaxy far, far away. However, instead of the Force, the warriors of Karazawa follow the Bushido way. Rather than medieval Europe, this fantasy world takes inspiration from feudal Japan. However, the southwestern sounding horned creature is the reluctant hero of Steven Ayromlooi’s short film, The Sun Devil and the Princess, which screens as part of the 2015 Comic Con International Independent Film Festival in San Diego.

For a short film, SD&P presents an unusually richly realized fantasy realm (one that arguably borders on science fiction, but the props consist of swords and daggers, not laser blasters). The floating fortress of the evil Moon Queen is especially impressive. Our title characters have left there in a hurry. To repay a debt of honor, Hirohawa, one of the last surviving Sun Devils of the Ashikage clan has rescued Princess Kyoko, the inspirational symbol of the resistance. Of course, the Moon Queen’s forces are in hot pursuit, resulting in some impressive swordplay and martial arts on Hirohawa’s part.

In some ways, SD&P really does share superficial parallels with what was known as Star Wars in 1977. There is indeed a “new hope” stemming from a daring mission that happened immediately before the film started. There is also a royal to save and a rebellion to inspire. Yet, the trappings are distinctively its own and the fight choreography is terrific. In fact, Hirohawa has one killer move that you have probably never seen before.

SD&P certainly looks like a proof of concept for a proposed feature film, but Ayromlooi packs it with enough action to give genre fans a warm, happy glow. His cast is also polished and professional. While the Sun Devil makeup could perhaps use further refinement, Evan Parke’s Hirohawa has big-screen presence and big-time action chops. For the film’s spiritual side, Mandy Amano portrays Princess Kyoko, the Sun Goddess worshipper, with impressive sincerity and conviction. Plus, cult movie aficionados will get a further kick out of hearing Tony Todd as the voice of the malevolent Baron.

In just half an hour, Ayrmooloi establishes a great deal of Karazawa mythology and hooks the audience on his main characters. It is an intriguing world, with first rate fight scenes, which should be more than enough to get fans psyched for a return trip. Highly recommended for sword & sorcery and martial arts fans, The Sun Devil and the Princess screens this Friday (7/10) as part of CCI-IFF ’15 at San Diego Comic Con.

LFM GRADE: A-

Posted on June 9th, 2015 at 11:09pm.

By Joe Bendel. Even in middle school, the cover-up is almost as bad as the crime. One fateful morning, Ryoko Fujino discovered a classmate’s body lying dead in the snow. The police and the school declared it a suicide and that was that, until someone started sending anonymous letters accusing the school bully of murder. The grown-ups in authority will try to paper over it again, but Fujino and her classmates will have none of it. They are determined to reveal the truth, even though they have no lofty hopes that it will set them free in Izuru Narushima’s gripping two-part, four-and-a-half-hour-plus film sequence, Solomon’s Perjury Part 1: Suspicion and Solomon’s Perjury Part 2: Judgement, which both screen as part of the 2015 New York Asian Film Festival.

On the Christmas morning in question, Fujino and a classmate trudge to Joto No. 3 Junior High School, to feed the rabbits. They are filling in for the recently absent Takuya Kashiwagi, whose body they are about to discover Fargo style. After a perfunctory investigation, the juvy division detective Reiko Sasaki concludes it was suicide and closes the case. However, a few weeks later, Fujino gets a mysterious missive claiming the thuggish Shunji Oide murdered Kashiwagi and imploring her to have her police detective father reopen the case.

Fujino is not the only person to receive such a J’accuse. Copies were also sent to the principal and Kashiwagi’s home room teacher, but the fate of the latter will become a source of great contention too complicated to explain here. Much to the frustration of the two bullied letter-writers, the police seem more concerned with ferreting out the accusers than investigating the accusations.

Of course, no matter how hard the authorities try to keep a lid on the affair, word still leaks out to the student body—and the effect is poisonous. When the ensuing paranoia leads to the death of one of the not so anonymous letter-writing girls, student outrage reaches critical mass. Resolved to discover the truth, Fujino and her friends will stage their own trial of Oide, complete with a student jury, in a deliberate departure from Japanese jurisprudence. To fairly represent the defendant, they enlist Kazuhiko Kanbara, a former primary school acquaintance of Kashiwagi, who clearly has his own murky agenda.

Without question, Solomon’s Perjury is the event of this year’s NYAFF. It starts out as a twisty turny mystery and mushrooms into a moral treatise on the nature of guilt and responsibility. In many ways, it delivers an emotional walloping similar to the original first season Broadchurch, but in contrast, it leaves the audience with a feeling of empowerment. In film terms, think of it as something like one part Tetsuya Nakashima’s Confessions and two parts Edward Yang’s Brighter Summer Day, but it has its own distinct tone.

Wisely, screenwriter Manabe Katsuiko retains the tail-end of the 1990 bubble economy setting of Miyabe Miyuki’s source novel, which is a blessing in several ways. While the perceptive kids’ jaded opinions of their ethically compromised parents retains all its bite, the lack of semi-literate text messages cluttering up the screen is a welcome relief. In fact, the existence of phone booths, now practically extinct, plays a critical role in V. 2.

The writing is smart and scrupulously realistic throughout both installments, but the way the young ensemble breathes life into the narrative is truly remarkable. If you want to see youthful actors putting on a clinic, this is your ticket. Up and down the line, they put the Harry Potter franchise to shame, led by the extraordinary Ryoko Fujino, who adopted her character’s name as her professional nom-de-guerre. Words like poise, nuance, and vulnerability do not do her justice.

Still, she does not do it alone. In particular, Mizuki Itagaki, Miu Tomita, and Haru Kuroki have moments of quiet devastation as the mysterious friend, the ill-fated accuser, and the harassed home room teacher. For the sake of our souls, Yutaka Matsushige also nicely lays down some crusty comic relief as the cooler-than-he-looks gym teacher, Kitao.

Even though it was released as separate installments in Japan it would be preferable to see Solomon’s Perjury as a complete package. Be that as it may, NYAFF is showing it over two nights, but it is worth the inconvenience and extra admission. It grabs the audience right from the start and pulls them in deeper with each revelation. Yet, it might be even more exciting to witness the arrival of so much new talent. Very highly recommended, Solomon’s Perjury Part 1 screens this Sunday (7/5) at the Walter Reade and Part 2 screens on Friday the 10th at the SVA, as part of this year’s NYAFF.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on July 3rd, 2015 at 12:53am.

By Joe Bendel. State lotteries are often called a tax on stupidity. Evidently they are quite a hard sell in Vietnam, but peddling them is the only work a naïve single mother can find. However, it seems like Thom’s tickets have an unusually high chance of winning. Naturally, that only leads to trouble in Dustin Nguyen’s Jackpot, which screens during the 2015 edition of New Vietnamese Cinema at the Honolulu Museum of Art.

Thom is sweet as she can be, but she has a hard time providing for her young daughter. Her ex-husband is not totally out of the picture, but his new wife is definitely the jealous type. Fortunately, Tu Nghia will always buy a set of tickets when she most needs help (even though his sensible wife usually protests), while Ba Muoi provides day care on credit. The older woman’s conman husband Tu Phi has just been released from prison, but she is hardly thrilled to see him. Yet, Thom will broker a rapprochement between them. Soon, they settle in rather peacefully together. In fact, when she discovers she has purchased a big winner from Thom, she allows the old fast-talker to claim it as his own.

In retrospect, this will be a mistake. True to form, as soon as Tu Phi feels some money in his pockets, he starts making bad decisions and falling in with the wrong crowd. Frankly, a sudden windfall might make matters worse rather than better for all involved (not so subtle take-away warning). Yet, just as things look desperate for Thom and her extended family, providence might just provide again.

Vietnamese-American expat Nguyen will be recognizable to some for his TV work as a cast-member on 21 Jump Street and V.I.P., but he has since reinvented his career as Vietnam’s top box-office draw. Rather logically, in addition to directing, he also appears in Jackpot, as the rugged, salt-of-the-earth farmer, Tu Nghia. However, there is no question Ninh Duong Lan Ngoc outshines everyone and everything as the earnest Thom. There is something refreshing about her guilelessness and indomitably sunny disposition. However, as Tu Phi, the old reprobate, a little of Chi Tai’s shtick goes a long way. Similarly, the less said about Thom’s man-stealing rival, the better.

Jackpot definitely extolls the value of provincial village life and discourages capital accumulation, which surely pleased the current regime. Still, there is nothing inherently wrong with celebrating community and compassion. Despite his more action-oriented resume, Nguyen displays a light, skillful touch for comedic fare. As a result, American audiences will probably relate to it more easily than the broad, slapsticky Lost in Thailand franchise. Rather enjoyable in an old fashioned way, thanks in large measure to the radiant Ninh Duong, Jackpot is recommended for fans of light comedy when it screens this coming Sunday (7/5) and Tuesday (7/7), as part of New Vietnamese Cinema at the Honolulu Museum of Art, one of the country’s leading venues for Asian cinema.

LFM GRADE: B-

Posted on July 3rd, 2015 at 12:52am.

By Joe Bendel. Approximately 300 films were produced during the “Golden Age” of Cambodian cinema, but only thirty survived the barbarity of the Communist Khmer Rouge. That means one missing reel of an otherwise intact Cambodian feature is as maddeningly and tantalizingly significant as the legendary lost bits of The Magnificent Ambersons. One young Cambodian woman sets out to find or recreate such footage, but her search will bring her face-to-face with history both national and personal in Sotho Kulikar’s The Last Reel, which screens as part of the 2015 New York Asian Film Festival.

Sophoun is at a crossroads. Disinterested in school and disinclined to submit to her military father’s arranged marriage, she has been avoiding home life as much as possible. Unfortunately, that also means she has neglected her increasingly age-addled mother. Having fallen in with a delinquent crowd, she is forced to take refuge one night in a decrepit old movie theater. Much to her surprise, she finds a movie poster with her mother’s face prominently displayed.

As she learns from the standoffish proprietor, her mother was once a movie star, known as Sothea and he has the only print of her final film. In fact, he compulsively screens it every night, but alas, it is incomplete. Yet, that initially adds to its allure for Sophoun. Did her mother’s character choose the prince she was betrothed to, or the peasant who saved her from a jealous nobleman?

Even with the former-filmmaker/projectionist’s help, Sophoun has no luck tracking down either the missing reel or the original screenplay. However, her bad boy boyfriend and the university film department will help recreate the conclusion. At this point, they head into the field, which turns out to be part of the Killing Fields. As her reluctant movie mentor’s memories come flooding back, things start getting interesting for all concerned.

The loss of Cambodia’s cinematic heritage is a true tragedy, especially since those Angkor costume epics look so amazing. The Long Way Home, the film-within-the-film, gives us an enticing hint of what they were like. However, Sotho and screenwriter Ian Masters incorporate Sothea’s film into the narrative in even deeper ways. Structurally, Reel is a very ambitious work—and they largely pull it off. There are a whole heck of a lot of third act revelations, but rather than feeling forced, they organically represent realities of post-Pol Pot Cambodian life.

Any film that brings Dy Saveth (considered the only living survivor of the Golden Age) back onto the silver screen earns its props right there. She is downright haunting as Sothea, especially given the meta-significance of her character. Nevertheless, it is Ma Rynet who must carry the film, being on-screen almost every second. Fortunately, she has more than the necessary energy and presence required. There is a certain unpolished naiveté to her performance that works quite well in the context of Masters’ narrative. Yet, it is prominent filmmaker Sok Sothun who really lowers the boom as the physically and spiritually scarred projectionist.

At times, Reel feels overstuffed with subplots and side-characters, but Sotho manages to tie them all up neatly enough to satisfy the demands of cinema. This film was necessarily a learning experience for many trying to rebuild the Cambodian film industry, so it is rather exciting to see it all come together down the stretch. The final product is sort of like a profoundly serious Cinema Paradiso. Highly recommended for those who care about the preservation and advancement of cinema as an art-form, The Last Reel screens this Sunday (7/5) at the Walter Reade, as part of this year’s NYAFF.

LFM GRADE: B+

July 3rd, 2015 at 12:32am.

By Joe Bendel. This is not your father’s dystopian rap musical. If you had ever wondered what The Warriors or Wild Style would have been like if Sion Sono had made them, well friend, wonder no longer. Control over the streets of a near future Tokyo is divided between a number of gangs or tribes. Kai’s Musashino Saru tribe is super-chill and peace-loving. Lord Buppa’s Bukuro Wu-Ronz is belligerent, Satanic, and cannibalistic. That pretty much guarantees conflict in Sono’s Tokyo Tribe, which screens as part of the 2015 New York Asian Film Festival.

Buckle up sports fans, MC Sho will be our rapping guide through this dystopian jungle. He quickly introduces us to the various gangs on what seems to be an average night. However, amongst this night’s batch of prospective sex slaves (or human furniture) picked up by the Bukuro lackeys is Sunmi. This woman can fight. So can the ten year-old Yon, her self-appointed break-dancing protector. She also happens to be the daughter of Lord Buppa’s ally, the malevolent High Priest, who had been saving her and her virginity for a human sacrifice. Therefore, it is imperative Bukuro Wu-Ronz recapture her when she inevitably escapes.

As it happens, Mera, Buppa’s favorite lieutenant is also launching a long planned sneak attack against the other gangs for control of the city. With Sunmi’s help, Kai must unify the rival tribes against Buppa’s secret shock troops, the Waru, all while maintaining a steady stream of rhyme.

Tokyo Tribes is technically based on Santa Inoue’s manga, but it is its own bizarre Sion Sono animal. There are elements of Why Don’t You Play in Hell and Bad Film, but Sono cranks up the lurid Pink exploitation elements right from the start. Frankly, he is just begging for a professionally outraged feminist’s apoplexy, so it would be foolish to fall into his trap. Transgressive violence simply cannot get anymore cartoonish, over-the-top, candy-colored, and defiantly silly.

Frankly, the best comparison for Tribe might actually be Bollywood at its trippiest, because it is a genuine spectacle. We are talking massive street fighting, with all sorts of crazy costumes and lethal hardware. Much of the cast hams it up relentlessly, just to avoid drowning in the madness. However, Nana Seino displays considerable poise and impressive action chops as the quiet but resourceful Sunmi. NYAFF special guest Shota Sometani is also quite an effective rapping Rod Serling as MC Sho. As Lord Buppa and the blond-and-bronzed Mera, Riki Takeuchi and Ryohei Suzuki absolutely gorge on the scenery, understanding a Sono film is not the place act all twee and mannered.

Even by Sono’s standards, Tokyo Tribe is pretty berserk, but it tries to warmly embrace the audience in its own lunatic way. It also proves once again Sono is the best in the business when it comes to staging a massive Kung Fu street war. Unmissable for his fans and a heck of a baptism-of-fire for newcomers, Tokyo Tribe screens on the Fourth of July at the Walter Reade and on Saturday the 11th at the SVA, as part of this year’s NYAFF.

LFM GRADE: B+

Posted on July 3rd, 2015 at 12:31am.