the yokai war

[zenithblue]

Once upon a time, there was a wee lass in a small city in Alaska by the name of zenithblue. This was that halcyon decade known as the eighties, when Jim Hinson still strode the earth as a mortal man, when the Goonies hijacked a defunct pirate ship, when aliens ate Reeces Pieces and twelve-year-old Navigators flew through the air with wisecracking Paul-Reubensesque alien technology. Zenithblue, a daydreaming and overly imaginative child, afraid of the ghosts in the closet but strangely drawn to them, was made for this decade, or at least for this decade's fantastic cinema. Movies like The Neverending Story or Return to Oz lived in this era, movies ostensibly made for children, but movies that (unlike any children's movies made after 1995) did not pander to children, that respected children as small beings with aesthetic sensibilities and rich and complex internal lives. Labyrinth created an unshakeable lifelong attraction to cruel men in eyeliner. The Dark Crystal, with its Froudian gelflings and terrifying Skekses, introduced her to an evil profoundly black and bottomless, an evil she had always suspected to be there all along, that explained the vast hollow darknesses of the world better than any Christian hell could. Even Willow, good solid fluff from Lucasfilm, was a satisfyingly violent and scary adventure that allowed for real danger and drama without being overly sanitary.

The eighties fantasy films were often surreal (the oracle in the Neverending Story, for example, or the Escheresque staircase in Labyrinth, or the men with wheel hands in Oz), frequently terrifying (the Nothing, the headless empress, the concept of having your essence removed from your body, etc.), and often heartbreaking (I will never forget Atreyu pleading for like ten minutes as Artax, his beloved horse, dies slowly in quicksand, or the rock man looking at his hands after his friends' death, saying: "They look like such big, strong, hands."). These movies took children through fantastical allegories of courage and devastation and loss. Frequently they were incredibly artistic--German expressionism, for example, was obviously an influence. And they saved my little life, gave me an imaginative world to overlay over a world that was sometimes much more scary and much less battle-able than the movies my mother thought possibly too scary for me.

And now, no one makes movies like this anymore. No one except the Japanese. This is why it is imperitive, if you pine for these films as I do, to go and see The Great Yokai War.

The Great Yokai War, directed by Miike Takahashi, is the story of Tadashi, a twelve year old chosen as the "Kirin Rider" in a village festival. The storyline is blissfully familiar--young boy is chosen, young boy receives magical sword, young boy meets ragtag bunch of yokai (spirits), and together they fight to save Tokyo. Unlike more recent Hollywood attempts at this sort of juvenile saga (Harry Potter, for instance, or the Narnia mess), Miike does not rely on slick and seamless CGI to create a visual aestheic--there is a blend of puppetry, incredible movie make-up, CGI, and stop-motion animation to achive a more surreal look. Possibly this is only my eighties movie hang-up, but in my opinion this forces the dirctor to create believabitlity in other ways, forces him to be creative in his storytelling. 

This movie also exploited a lifelong dream of mine: to encounter a small, cute, magical animal sidekick. People who have talked to me for like five minutes will not find this a surprise.

The yokai are all really cool looking, the movie is funny and dangerous and sad, and as far as I'm concerned this is the best fantasy adventure I've seen in ages. Miike is known as a disturbing, strange filmmaker, who typically directs for adults. This makes him the perfect person to show off the weirdness of the spirit world, and makes him a man willing to throw a small child into truly horrible and violent situations that said small child can nonetheless battle. Also: I don't want to spoil anything for anyone, but if you have a long-cherished unicorn fantasy, you should probably see this. Seriously, dude, check out this movie poster. How can you resist this? 

Thanks so much, te_amo_azul, for inviting me along (and tolerating my, uh, "spastic charm," we'll call it). 

Comments

[punkybrister69.livejournal.com]

Oh, man... the greatness that is 80s era fantasy film! You mention all of my 80s favorites here... I'll have the check out this flick.
Good call on "after 1995." My sister was watching Jumanji on Cartoon Network this morning and I ended up getting absorbed in it. It really was--more or less--the last really good fantasy film to come out of Hollywood. It uses CGI, but it also incorporates puppetry when called for; it doesn't make use of the CGI just because it can. I think that's a lot of the problem with more modern movies, because the CGI is available, they just use it, even if another method might be more realistic or more convincing.

[zenithblue.livejournal.com]

You said it, sister.

That's why I love Hinson so much. Muppets don't look "real," and they don't emulate the "real" world, but they create their own interesting and bizarre one. Like in Labyrinth, you can tell sometimes Ambrosia is a muppet dog and sometimes she's a real dog, and it's kind of funny, but it's also all right because the overall look of the movie is so bizarre anyway it fits right in.

Have you seen Mirrormask? I think it didn't get the attention it deserved--it was quite a bit of CGI (with some other techniques), but the storytelling was really satisfying--it was a bit like an updated Labyrith. Con: no David Bowie in spandex. Pro: Sexy goths and cute Scottish boys with accents.

[punkybrister69.livejournal.com]

Amen.
I haven't seen Mirrormask, but I just put it in my Netflix queue. Thanks for the recommendation.
My roommate used to do a comic strip for our campus newspaper and one time she had a pretty esoteric David Bowie in spandex thing going on. I wish it was available on-line, but I'll break it down anyhow...

Two characters sitting at a table. One is the protagonist, Marla, and the other is her friend the Christian (I'm blanking on the character's name).

Panel one: Marla flipping through a magazine...

Marla: "Who would you do? David Bowie as Ziggie Stardust or David Bowie as Jareth the Goblin King?"

Panel two: Marla still flipping through magazine. Christian girl outraged.

Christian girl: "I can't believe you would ask me something like that. I've devoted my life to God and would never have pre-marital sex, much less trivialized sex with some fictional character! You've thoroughly offended my sensibilities!"

Panel three: Marla still flipping through magazine.

Marla: "Yeah. I'd bang Jareth, too."

Le fin.

Much funnier in the illustrated form, but you get the point.

[zenithblue.livejournal.com]

That man is responsible for creating more fetishes in women of our age group than any other character I can think of.

Although I was also pretty impressed, as a child, with the sexy personality change of Princess Lily in the unbelievably silly but also kind of hot Legend. You know, she's all innocent and sweet and then is tempted by evil and puts on some black lipstick and becomes wanton. That was awesome.

But yeah. Jareth. Me too.