The Tetsuo Trilogy

Seeing as Tetsuo: The Bullet Man has begun floating around the torrentsphere, I thought I would take a look at the Tetsuo Trilogy and hopefully push a few people to start viewing it from the beginning before their interest is decayed by its contemporary counterpart.

Tetsuo: The Iron Man (鉄男: Tetsuo) is a 1989 Japanese Cyberpunk film by cult-film directorShinya Tsukamoto produced by Japan Home Video. This, his third film, is an extremely graphic but also strikingly-filmed fantasy shot in the same low-budget, underground-production style as his first two films. Tetsuo established Tsukamoto internationally and created his worldwide cult following.

To this day the film is still recognised as one of the most visually arresting Cyberpunk movies that has ever been made. It is often referred to as the love child of Lynch and Cronenberg, but this statement forgets the level of deformity and fetish that Tsukamoto brings to the plate (quite literally, as he plays the role of the Metals Fetishist in the movie). His presence onscreen and offscreen infects the film with a severe level of absurdity and confusion. This force feeds a relationship to the viewer, as they sit there enraptured in the film’s gritty-decadence. Few films have ever managed to grab my attention so much and when I try to think of ones to put on par in terms of shock value all I can think of are films like Wiseman’s,Titicut Follies and Resnais’, Fog and Night. This comparison is a strange one, as the films in question are documentaries, whilst Tetsuo: The Iron Man is obviously a work of fiction. It seems to me that somewhere amidst the world Tsukamoto created, he manages to capture the innate fear that surrounds the ever growing relationship between man and machine. Like a bad nightmare it lingers on leaving behind a cataclysmic wave of ambiguity. At this point the true power of this film becomes apparent.

Tetsuo II: Body Hammer is a 1992 Japanese science fiction/body-horror film directed by Tsukamoto. It is a bigger-budget reworking of his original Tetsuo: The Iron Man, utilizing similar themes and ideas to the earlier film (a Japanese salaryman, played by cult actor Tomorowo Taguchi, finds his body transforming into a weapon through sheer rage after his son is kidnapped by a gang of violent thugs.) It was not as well received as its predecessor but it did win the Critic’s Award at the 3rd Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival in February 1992

Like any other movie that ends up amassing a worldwide cult following a sequel was always inevitable. Tsukamoto’s choice to do a reworking of the original movie instead of a full on sequel gave him the leeway he needed to experiment with the film somewhat. Some of the changes in the film are still argued over to this day as being responsible for its sheer banality in comparison to its predecessor, whilst at the same time being heralded as the true visual, that budgetary constraints originally restricted. The biggest of these shifts is the moveTsukamoto made from monochromatic black & white to an extensive palette of colors. This combined with the introduction of more dialogue, literally divided the camp of cult followers. I feel that the changes Tsukamoto made present us with a new world of equal visceral importance, but is one that doesn’t allow its origins to be forgotten. For this reason I feel that it is an excellent companion piece to the Tetsuo trilogy, although for the best experiene I’d recommend watching them in chronological order.

Last, but not least we have the most recent version of tetsuo that is due for general release this year. 8 years after Tsukamoto’s powerful reworking and addition to his original masterpiece, the world is now just on the brink of being introduced to Tetsuo: The Bullet Man. As alluded to in the beginning, there is an overall concern amongst fans of the series that this new film may erode and give the previous two films a bad name. One of my main concerns for it is that it is definitely in danger of falling into the same category as the movies that have been spawned by the recent trend of American remakes of Japanese horror movies. The only thing stopping this from becoming a cot death is the fact that it is only co-produced by an American company. This allows for some of Tsukamoto’s artistic integrity to remain, but many viewers feel that it is now over stylised and its production values have sanded and polished away most of the gritty edge that this series is famous for in the first place. Obviously in terms of the main character the movie now follows the *INSERT AMERICAN HERE* protocol with the introduction of an American protagonist called Anthony. At times this film really feels like something that didn’t need to be made and this does worry me. Obviously the first two films are now so rooted as the cult phenomenon that they are, that their integrity at this stage is obviously pretty much infallible, but lets just hope that this is a differentiation that future followers will be able to make. I fear that these bastardized Western interpretations or Western ‘friendly’ versions of famous Japanese movies are a form of Cultural Imperialism. This may one day be the catalyst for such cyberpunk gems, becoming a discarded artifact of a throw-away society that no longer has the time to appreciate fine cinema. Let’s hope its not…

Akira: Visions of a Future Past

When people think of Cyberpunk, alot of films tend to spring to mind, but there is one film that always makes its way onto the list. Akira is one of those types of films that is literally cooked in the fat from the genre in which it emerged. Akira is a very special and important film to the Cyberpunk genre as it not only conveys all of the conventions that make up the genre accurately, but it also manages to hone these characteristics and synch them with the world’s reaction towards a nuclear holocaust and Japan’s post-war economic revival. The realism that is brought to this movie, fused with the psychological and philosophical themes, truely allows for not only one of the most unique Cyberpunk experiences, but possibly one of the best cinematic experiences available.

Akira (アキラ) is a 1988 anime film written and directed by Katsuhiro Otomo based on his hit manga. The film is set in a futuristic and post-war city, Neo-Tokyo, in 2019. While most of the character designs and basic settings were adapted from the original 2182-page manga epic, the restructured plot of the movie differs considerably from the print version, pruning much of the last half of the manga.

One of the most amazing things about Akira is how it presents revival as something that is synonymous with complete destruction. Otomo has no qualms about presenting man as the architect of his own demise. This is evident in the opening scene where the A-bomb kindly introduces us to the world of tomorrow, but amidst all of the chaos there is a promise of hope. Thankfully this is not ever fully defined, thus leaving the viewer in a position that they should always remain in (uncertain about the future). One of my favourite things about the film is how it manages to confront the rapidly accelarating nature of technology and how like a bomb, it can just hit the world completely out of nowhere. Even though the current threat of technology is more metaphysical, we must remember that our own minds are just as abstract as the technology that we now relate to and with. Inside this mode of thought there is a fear and a curiosity that not only makes this film vital viewing, but also constitutes to the processes that make us human.

It has recently come to my attention that there are rumours about an American remake of Akira to be released some time in 2013. I’m not even going to bother writing how I feel about this being even considered. What I will do instead is post a video that I feel summarises very well how I feel about the whole subject. Lets just hope that this is one of those films that remains in-development. It really would be a shame to see such a powerful film get tainted by the irony of America remaking a film, thats powers lie in how it uses Japan’s experience of nuclear attack as a tool in exploring a vision of the future.