Why Does Japanese Action Suck So Hard?
My Japanese friend M has long given up on cinema from his own country, and watches exclusively movies from abroad, mostly of US origin. More specifically, he watches non-Japanese action and comedy films, and with such enthusiasm that you’d be hard-pressed to peg him for a 50-something Japanese dude living in a converted restaurant in rural Tokushima. If you ask him why he entirely ignores homegrown cinema, you’re likely to hear some variation on the theme of “cuz Japanese cinema sucks hard.”
Now, Japanese movies happen to be a great way to learn Japanese, and while I prefer using TV serial dramas as study tools, I’ve spent quite a bit of time with Japanese films on DVD over the past few years, watching and re-watching with and without subtitles. I must admit, there are a lot of bad ones out there. But there are bad films in any country, and I am still a little stuck on what it is about Japanese cinema that so often leaves a lackluster impression.
Let me be clear, they don’t all suck, and some are actually amazing works of creative genius and artistic expression. The serious goodies of Japanese cinema are to be found in drama and animation, as demonstrated in this year’s Oscar winner Departures and pretty much all the Miyazaki films. But more about the good ones some other day. This post is about the suckage. Let’s talk about M-san’s genre of choice: action.
Today I watched Dororo, a movie based on the manga of the same name by legendary artist Tezuka Osamu. The film as a whole wavered between mediocre and pleasant, with some raging scenes of unadulterated suckage slipped in the middle, like a piece of raw bacon that made its way into your BLT. Despite being a major cinematic release in 2007, the special effects are just laughable. Ever seen Ultraman? Or perhaps Power Rangers? Then you’ve already experienced the extended raw bacon battle scene from the middle of Dororo, in which Hyakkimaru and Dororo herself slash it up with the vicious tongue demon. The tongue demon is, quite obviously in fact, a dude in a tongue demon suit filmed to look larger than a dude in a tongue demon suit. Far more times than necessary (mind you once is more than necessary in this case) we are treated to a cut of the tongue demon’s 30-meter tongue snaking out after the feet of his assailants, and with stunning accuracy, it recreates the image of crepe paper on the end of a stick brandished by a rambunctious 8 year-old.
To Dororo’s credit, not all of the special effects in the movie are as terrible as the tongue demon scene, and I’m willing even to give the producers the benefit of the doubt and say that there is some cultural dynamic I’m missing out on here, some bizarre nostalgia regarding the good ol’ days of Ultraman and dude-in-a-suit monsters. Everything in perspective, right? It’s totally possible to enjoy a movie like The Lawnmower Man, even today, despite the fact that the special effects are seriously dated and when he lights up on fire it looks as if the flames were drawn in with Microsoft Paint. But not even a healthy dose of perspective can justify effects like Dororo’s coming from today’s Japan. This is the country of technology on the cutting edge, for crying in the night. Even the good effects in Dororo would look more at home in the mid-90’s than in 2007. Not to mention the aspects of an action film that are less dependent upon technology, like fight choreography, are still lousy.
It can’t be that they don’t have the resources, as other countries across the economic spectrum have put together some heart-pounding action flicks with cutting edge effects, or at least put together flicks that kicked royal ass without a lot of technology (I’m thinking of Thailand’s Ong Bak in particular here). It also can’t be that there isn’t enough demand, as a robust domestic market awaits new releases, not to mention the untold millions in sales that would surely follow a Japanese action film as impressive as China’s House of Flying Daggers. What’s going on here?
So don’t rush out and rent Dororo, or any other action film from Japan for that matter, unless you’re in it for the language and want to learn some phrases that don’t come up very often in other genres. It’s the only reason I rented Dororo in the first place, and why it will shortly make its way to my iPod in mp3 format so I can be assured of never forgetting how to curse like a Japanese thief from an imaginary feudal world of 1000 years in the future. You never know when that will come in handy.
Addition: Trailer available here, though you only get a blink of the tongue demon.