Mystery Train

A night in Memphis is replayed in three perspectives, all having the commonality of the characters staying in the same hotel with the ghost of Elvis haunting them. Kicked off with a segment featuring our friend Masatoshi Nagase and his girl friend (Youki Kudoh) seeking Graceland. Nagase's deadpan outlook which is in stark contrast to Kudoh's ebullience just adds to screenplay's punch. As the film culminates in a piece Steve Buscemi, you realize how much the film influenced Pulp Fiction.

Rating: * * +

The Sea Is Watching

Couple of short stories written by Akira Kurosawa that blend into each other in Kei Kumai's take on the late master's last screenplay. The setting is a brothel in Edo and the characters are the geisha and their lovers who occupy it and the sea that obsereves them. The film doesn't even come close to being called a Kurosawa masterpiece but it does prove to me that Masatoshi Nagase's  role in the The Hidden Blade was not just an one off.

Rating: * *

The Hidden Blade

This film has resounding echoes of the Twilight Samurai. But yet it holds it own. The film likes its predecessor is set in Japan just before the Meiji Restoration with the role of the Samurai changing drastically in Japanese society. The film centers around Katagiri Munezo, a lowly Samurai of the Unasaka clan. Rather than concentrating on the "sword is the soul" side of the Samurai, the film focuses on his inner turmoil and contemplations. The movie again highlights that Yôji Yamada too, like some of his Asian contemporaries has mastered the use of stillness to convey emotions.

Rating: * * *