Darkside Blues (1994)

 

Director: Nobuyasu Furukawa

Screenplay: Mayori Sekijima

Based on the manga by Hideyuki Kikuchi and Yuho Ashibe

(Voice) Cast: Akio Ohtsuka as Kenzou; Hideyuki Hori as Gren; Kotono Mitsuishi as Mai; Kouichi Yamadera as Enji; Masako Katsuki as Tamaki; Maya Okamoto as Selia; Natsuki Sakan as Darkside; Nozomu Sasaki as Katari; Shinichiro Miki as Chris; Yasunori Matsumoto as Tatsuyairector: Viðar Víkingsson

A Night of a Thousand Horror (Movies)/A 1000 Anime Crossover

 

Darkside Blues isn’t really horror, though it has plenty of supernatural and Gothic touches worthy of the season, and I am glad to have revisited this, as this is a fascinating genre hybrid between dystopian sci-fi about corrupt corporations, which is still salient as a theme, that however has magic exist as well as a titular figure who rides around on a horse drawn carriage which can fly. It is fascinating, even with less than ninety minutes to try to depict this world, and a source manga which did not last long enough either to expand it further, to see what interesting things this depicts, be it a titular figure who acts more like a supernaturally powered advisor for freedom fighters to the sight of someone being tortured by being turned to gold whilst alive with alchemy. From the same author of Vampire Hunter D, and the infamous Wicked City as per its own animated adaptation, you see the threads for those here too, but in this melancholic and fascinating one-off.

 

For the full review, follow the link HERE.

The Halt (2019)

 

Director: Lav Diaz

Screenplay: Lav Diaz

Cast: Joel Lamangan as President Nirvano Navarra; Piolo Pascual as Hook Torollo; Shaina Magdayao as Haminilda Rios; Pinky Amador as Jean Hadoro; Hazel Orencio as Martha Officio; Mara Lopez as Marissa Ventura; Noel Miralles as Father Romero

Canon Fodder

Lav Diaz from the Philippines is a director I have had an erratic relationship with. A great deal of this is, honestly, being prepared to watch a director who is very bleak in his work, which frankly is also something to emphasis with Diaz for as he has placed it upon himself to chronicle his country's history - an American colony, even after its independence it went under a military dictatorship and, referred to herein this dystopian sci-fi narrative, the future of his country - all whilst with just this film also writing the script, editing it, being a co-cinematographer, the composer and the production designer. The other issue is more subjective and an artistic issue which I do struggle at times with, that Diaz's trademarks include films beyond the conventional confines of running time. Directors, unless they devote themselves to epics or get the status of a Martin Scorsese, do not necessarily make films even up to three hours frequently anyway, but Diaz has been able, with the sacrifice a larger access until streaming, to make seven plus hour films throughout his career, to the point those under three are the surprise ones of note. The issue has been whether Diaz can sustain this length for me, but as a five hour plus theatrical film, The Halt has a worthwhile sense of expanse, over multiple characters, to work with.

Unfortunately coinciding in production just before the 2020 coronavirus outbreak, a combination of a devastating flu epidemic called the "Dark Killer" which decimates Asia, and a permanent darkness over the Philippines due to a volcanic eruption has left the country weakened in its setting of 2034. These are background to the real narrative, how in the midst of these circumstances a corrupt political leader named President Nirvano Navarra (Joel Lamangan), a mentally unstable and violent figurehead, has taken rule, bolstered by generals including one of his seconds Martha Officio (Hazel Orencio), a female second in command who leads the soldiers that execute and rid his enemies secretly. Contrasting them, in night scenes shot in regular urban areas in Diaz's trademark monochrome, are government drone bots patrolling the streets, cyborg sex workers and women like Haminilda (Shaina Magdayao), a former history teacher, working as one herself, and the underground resistance, including Hook Torollo (Piolo Pascual), a former musician who is called on to help cleave Navarra away even by trying to assassinate him.

This is still a Lav Diaz film, slow cinema drama with prolonged scenes of dialogue, picking here as much at the current day through a hypothesised world not dissimilar to the one this was made within, dealing with how one overcomes authoritarianism whilst having a very obvious but significant referrals to his nation's history and existence he has been documenting in his career, such as a female psychologist Haminilda goes to specialising in the idea that the Filipino people have forgotten their pasts in a form of amnesia, one with political ramifications. This is yet curious in how genre tropes have been broiled down to their perception within a Lav Diaz film, altered by his template. Sci-fi tropes are moulded to fragments, of mentions of sex robots but not seen, normal flying drones used for scenes alongside extras in military fatigues and staged explosions to represent the military's skirmishes on enemies. An attempted sniper assassination by Hook is a key event in his change in attitudes, questioning the true way to save people, and skirting a knife edge, Lav Diaz even has a lot more explicit sexual content here then other films as, seeing even the lives of the villains as complicated emotional people, Martha and her lover/female assistant Marissa Ventura (Mara Lopez), the later becoming conflicted by Navarra's actions and hiring Haminilda constantly, are explicitly gay.

As mentioned, The Halt even humanised the villains regardless of their moral evil. This, in contrast to a work like Season of the Devil (2018), a "musical" based on the era of Ferdinand Marcos which yet felt like prolonged anguished work which could have been more focused at a shorter length, marks The Halt with great weight especially its longer length, both in how it is willing to do this without hiding the fictional characters' evil, and contrasting the other side in Hook facing an existential crisis. Navarra is still a dangerous egotist, who claims to speak to God, but is here a more complex figure close to reality. The way Diaz and actor Joel Lamangan depicts him, even if Navarra could speak to God, the voices in his head overburden him so much in their negative views to him, maybe even as forms of all those he has had killed haunting him, that he has to put on noisy rock music to block them out. His stability is certainly to question, with a scene showing his mother in a mental health clinic and Navarra is emphasised as a child man, psychologically immature but tragically become a dangerous despot than an innocent. With his own private zoo of ostriches and crocodiles that are fed the meat of his victims, he represents the leader who, despite many eccentricities that would question their appropriateness, becomes the head of a violent institution, practical as the lynchpin for military figures who wish to gain power to support his violent impulses to lash out. Martha is arguably more evil, a sadist, and even she has a humanity in her own love for her assistant Marissa, who tragically to her own undoing develops humanity as well as a one-way emotionally connection to Haminilda after she and Martha hire her for a threesome. Criticisms can still be made, honestly, of these villainous characters, as morally irredeemable figures, being attempted to be fleshed out in a way that may prove crass in themselves - involving LGBTQ characters as evil or involved, how mental health is depicted - but at the same time the banality of these figures, the result of when people follow others on ideals regardless of whether morally good, is a really complex and bluntly honest concept for director-writer Lav Diaz which is not simplistic at all. These people are not defined by crass stock archetypes - their sexuality or their mental stability - and the scary thing is that any of these figures, as Diaz and the performers who play, could have been good human beings but, obsessed with nationality, the agenda to improve the country, the desire for power or infantile disregard for human life, all of them became tyrants.

For a director who wishes to have these long form documents of his country's scars, The Halt is a surprise in how it effectively a dystopian drama but he is being more upfront in even questioning how those who fight the morally evil should do so as well, where even Hook, a diehard radical, ultimately finds his own original ideas, or the notion of violent rebellion, as ultimately useless when helping the victims, especially children, grow up well and wiser than those before is a harder yet morally more powerful weapon he considers better to use, one that may actually break the cycle he is part of. This film was made in the late 2010s when a series of reactionary cult of personality figures were elected across the globe, including Philippine's own Rodrigo Duterte, a controversial figure whose decisions and opinions, including his approval of extrajudicial punishment (and execution) of drug dealers and criminals, does make him a figure whose influence on Lav Diaz, if there, becomes one of tiredness, a sense of an endlessness parade of figures who claimed for a greater path for their country under their ideas only for many deaths to happen, regardless of if justifiable or not. The Halt, for all the dystopian content and his history of documenting the worse in his country's history, has Diaz showing some hope, even if exasperated, for the ordinary person wanting a solution that breaks the cycles and constant deaths in real life even he has documented. The poignancy is found early on when a Christian priest Hook is friends with, a true hero in his empathy who will be crushed by Navarra's forces, wishes there were people playing angry metal songs to exorcises their frustrations. Diaz here even feels sick of the constantly dethroning of dictators, who can still be replaced, when growth of humanity to save people, to connect and learn from the past, is what he clearly wishes for. From Diaz, the philosophy from The Halt is as wise as you can get.

His filmmaking, as can be previously seen in other films before, are glacial still scenes between actors, almost always shooting in black and white in his career, which here adds emphasis to the nocturnal world, not hiding he shot in the streets (with real advertising around the locations) but playacting a scenario of the Philippines just a few years ahead being stuck in darkness. As a result, there is more verisimilitude and realism in a dystopia where cafes still exist for characters to dine within, but ever a chance of the military to stop your car and take you to your tragic end. Really only accessible by streaming due to the lengths of his films, I split viewings of Diaz films up, and yet never was there a director, whether he actually succeeds in each film or has had one that has not worked for me, where the novel structure really makes sense. When he succeeds as here, the lengths are for a good reason for numerous characters to be fleshed out. This is a shorter film for him, and even in five plus hours this feels as if there is nothing which feels like an expansion but still as concise as he could be with the narrative. Even how this resolves its narrative, where this concludes not through a revolution but Navarra trying to return a ball to children, adds a sense of greater weight in reality. This ends with a new beginning, but with an election talked of an radio, the end is open to suggest nothing changes and, even in mind to real life, killing for the sake of killing even if to punish enemies of the country will still happen, already too much as Lav Diaz has covered in his career. That there is a semblance of hope, and the final image is of a young boy dragging Navarra poster alongside a rural road, is not mainstream closure to the narrative, but instead looking on, as before, to those hopefully as for Hook in this narrative has wanted who will have a better life. The Halt is optimistic for the director-writer, but still is not going to ignore the bleakness of its ideas.

Genocyber (1994)

 

Director: Koichi Ohata

Screenplay: Emu Arii, Koichi Ohata and Shou Aikawa

Based on the manga by Tony Takezaki

(Voice) Cast: Akiko Hiramatsu as Elaine Reed/Diana Reed; Kaoru Shimamura as Rat; Kazuyuki Sogabe as Grimson Rockwell; Kouji Tsujitani as Ryuu; Kumiko Nishihara as Mel; Masako Katsuki as Myra; Seizo Katou as Kenneth Reed; Shigeru Chiba as Radneck; Toshihiko Seki as Sakomizu

A Night of a Thousand Horror (Shows) #37 / A 1000 Anime Crossover

 

Either film or television, straight-to-video anime depending on the title could have multiple episodes, to which the following is one of the most infamous of its era. Sci-fi cyberpunk with a layer of extreme gore and body horror, Genocyber is a mess to be honest, which I get into with all five of its episodes, but for what is a lurid and dark production it nonetheless had a lasting impression I have nothing but admiration for, at least for the first episode. For the full review of mine, following the blog link HERE.

Death and the Compass (1992)

 

Director: Alex Cox

Screenplay: Alex Cox

Based on the short story by Jorge Luis Borges

Cast: Peter Boyle as Erik Lonnrot; Miguel Sandoval as Treviranus; Christopher Eccleston as Alonso Zunz; Zaide Silvia Gutiérrez as Ms. Espinoza; Pedro Armendáriz Jr. as Blot; Alonso Echánove as Novalis; Eduardo López Rojas as Finnegan; Alex Cox as Commander Borges

Canon Fodder

 

Let's just say I'm looking for a more rabbinical explanation.

[Major Spoilers]

Death and the Company, first of all, has a very unconventional production history which influences the final theatrical release. That, originally, the cult filmmaker Alex Cox was commissioned as part of a series of adaptations of the work of Argentinean author Jorge Luis Borges to adapt Death and the Compass for an hour long story, part of a series which was shown on the BBC in Britain called Cuentos de Borges (1992). This show, which is obscure, is fascinating as a concept for a series, especially as notes reference an episode with Antonio Banderas and another called El Sur, an episode by acclaimed Spanish filmmaker Carlos Saura.

Alex Cox's episode however would be expanded to feature length with Japanese co-funding, leaving Death and the Compass having a curious expanded nature to consider alongside being canonically part of his filmography as a big title as a result. The really interesting thing about this, in mind to the source material and how faithful this is in places, is that Borges' source material is practically a skeleton. A compelling little short story but it is a short work, more an outline to a longer piece, but itself masterful. Borges, in what I have read, is a truly unique voice. His is the ability to start with pulp or genre beginnings in his work, or sometimes from one idea, this effectively a pastiche of detective narratives, and enter abstract/fantastical logic able to use the ability of the written word to have no limits. The Garden of Forking Paths is a spy story where the protagonist accidentally encounters the notion of infinite multiple directions, multiple dimensions, to every movement or act of his which fork off in different directions. One narrative in a short story is a man dreaming his form. Another a library of infinite books which gets into details like a cult surrounding finding one specific book in an infinitely expanding space of them. Another was a man writing a copy of Don Quixote without reading the original book to find its meaning. Borges' literature is unique and emphasises what the written word can do that other mediums cannot.

Death and the Compass is pretty simple, but I have to immediately spoil the ending to get an idea of what the point here is. That Detective Erik Lonnrot, played by Peter Boyle, in the short story and the adaption finds himself at a murder scene of a Jewish mystical scholar in a hotel room, finding a typed piece of paper saying "The first letter of the name has been uttered", and believes this is all connected to a Jewish mysticism alongside other murders and events that follow on. They are proven a trap, his folly to over think the obvious and fall into a deception of a larger meaning to a series of crimes than what is presumed. He is trapped in a liberty designed for him by his nemesis, Red Scharlach, played by Christopher Eccleston, as much improvised from an accident to get revenge on Lonnrot.

Alex Cox himself is a fascinating figure to come into this. Repo Man (1984) is his most famous film, and in a combination of bad luck and having to work around what films he could make, which he has been able too, his is an eclectic and idiosyncratic world of films that are unpredictable. Compass immediately stands out before the film even begins with an eerie carnival piano with industrial groans in the first moments of the score, the music by Pray for Rain going to make itself known and a pronounced part of the film adaption's character. Death and the Compass is very faithful to the source, actually adding content, and Cox as the screenwriter is making this material his own as much as a faithful Borges adaption.

It is a fascinatingly odd pastiche of a pulp crime narrative, expanded even in the short story into an extended template such as The Garden of Forking Paths, here a Kabbalistic related string of murders, of rabbis and Kabbalah researchers, which worms into Detective Lonnrot's obsession just from a piece of paper in a typewriter at a murder scene. The most interesting thing about the adaptation, alongside how Cox adds his own unique flesh to the original text, is how this version feels unlike the original. The short story was penned in 1942 and feels a work of the era, of Argentina (or an unknown melting pot fed from reality) as a diverse environment of people and religions, whilst this film's world is openly (shot in Mexico) a dystopia in the future. Some of it is in danger of being gauche - how the three leads are colour coded in bright primary colours, Lonnrot in blue, Red Scharlach in his namesake red, the conservative and ultimately gutless Treviranus (Miguel Sandoval) in yellow. Here in Cox's world, including in a theatrical cut a bank heist with a prowling one take camera movement, and a cameo for himself as a blind detective, there is a dystrophic feel of a rundown city, of political corruption, a civil war brewing and the police (under Treviranus) becoming more of a thug unit.

This is apt, despite not being needed in the source text, knowing Borges would only pen one film screenplay in his career, co-writing the Argentinean one-off Invasión (1969), a work set in pulp mystery structure that, alongside feeling inside a dystopia, was suppressed by the Argentine dictatorship of 1976–1983, and effectively lost until its rediscover decades later. If anything, Alex Cox's work in this is entirely in mind of adding his own flavour to the production, even changing the text at times into a new personality. Peter Boyle's Lonnrot is a mystically interested figure here, practicing Buddhism and fascinated by religion, a figure in danger of his own persona being an ego and his trap, such as insisting on using a non-regular police car in favour of one which has to be constantly repaired. Treviranus, in the adding footage shot post-narrative as an old official, was barely a character in the source story; here he is not a likable character at all, clearly corrupt or problematic as a member of the police force, but when the narrative is shown was at least right in Lonnrot falling for his own trap. Red Scharlach is not really fleshed out, looking here like a cartoon strip villian, but in the source material, he was just meant as a stock antagonist. Christopher Eccleston gets a lot more from other aspects of his role which are very obvious in who is playing who. It is interesting to known Eccleston, who many will know through the first Doctor Who reboot in 2005 and the likes of Shallow Grave (1994), had a brief moment of these Alex Cox films, getting a lot more to work with in Revengers Tragedy (2002), an adaptation of a Jacobean revenge tale from the seventeenth century, set in the future, where he got to flex his acting muscles but also play a scene of acting deranged talking to his wife's skull.

Technically the film is fascinating, though its origins as a production rebuilt to be longer does present a curious touch. I think out of all its aspects, the one which might prove an issue for many, depending on how its watched, is the sound design, which intertwining the great music from Pray for Rain with the dialogue and sound effects is a chaotic mix at moments. It manages, without falling off the rails, to be a chaotic film in tone in many ways yet adapt the source material. Treviranus' scenes in the future reflecting back could be excised but even they add to the character of a melancholy to the scenario from the least expected source. The long takes with the camera are impressive, especially as Cox fleshes out this dystopian version of the world of pure chaos, where autopsies are performed in the middle of the police station entranceway, and that the opening bank heist, set at a foundry to dispose of old money, is a grimy industrial labyrinth for the camera to weave through. The sense of the flamboyant even is to be found in how phone calls are depicted, superimposing shots within shots or even having the scene shot in darkness, only to illuminate a set in the background with the other person in the phone call involved.

The resulting film is a fascinating production. It is unique even next to the original text, which is an admirable virtue for Death and the Compass. It's appeal will entirely depend on the viewer's reaction to the narrative - where even if you have read this far and had the spoilers, the journey and the meaning were the most important aspect for Borges as it was for Cox, entering a sombre conclusion here in a haunting mansion location. It reaches a profoundness aimed for that, whilst very different, does evoke the messy production that was The Winner (1996), a film effectively disowned by Alex Cox due to tampering, but following in its own idiosyncratic direction with Las Vegas literally being turned off in the end, here the discussion of the most perfect labyrinth and past lives, with more dialogue than the source text added by Cox's script, leaves on a spiritually heightened mark.

Immortal (Ad Vitam) (2004)

 

Director: Enki Bilal

Screenplay: Enki Bilal and Serge Lehman

Based on the comics La Foire aux immortels and La Femme piège by Enki Bilal

Cast: Linda Hardy as Jill; Thomas Kretschmann as Nikopol; Charlotte Rampling as Elma Turner; Yann Collette as Froebe; Frédéric Pierrot as John; Thomas M. Pollard as Horus; Joe Sheridan as Allgood; Corinne Jaber as Lily Liang

Ephemeral Waves

 

What the hell, it's a naked guy with a bird's head!

Immortal is a difficult movie to deal with. For the most part, this is actually catnip even with its weird creative decisions for me, the creation of Enki Bilal, a Yugoslav emigrant to France and comic book artist who, alongside his prolificness, was making films before Immortal already. In terms of a set-up, Immortal is clearly indebted to a world of science fiction, let alone The Fifth Element (1997), alongside Bilal's own work, which if you see stands out exceptionally. The film, a complex mess to unravel, had enough in terms of a bizarre scenario to stand out but also has too many things to factor in why this is a difficult film to recommend.

Staying with the good, this is 3095 in New York City. A giant floating Egyptian pyramid is inecplicably floating above in the skyline. The trope of a dystopia of corrupt corporations, here literally a medical group called Eugenic, exists, this one partaking in illegal medical experiments. There are non-humans, deemed dangerous, stuck in Level 3, where humans are warned to avoid, whilst Central Park has become an "Intrusion Zone", a frozen winter environment where people attempting to enter usually die, spat out as bones when they attempt to enter, and penguins are wandering about for no reason. In terms of world building, Bilal's eye is deliciously weird. Science fiction, I will be honest, is more interest if vivid in world building and/or bizarre. Here a side character, the most beloved for me called Willie, sets up how idiosyncratic this can be as they are a sentient phantom dispenser in a hotel bathroom, one who can provide a handgun as he can, in his cute way, toothpaste from a wall he is stuck to.

In seriousness as well, even the clichéd bleak dystopia of flying cars and artificially generated lungs made in China is not an issue, as it feels immersive, allowing for the stranger details to contrast, the bleak grey and CGi created world a prop to allow the more idiosyncratic content to stand out. That the Egyptian God Horus has to sire a child in seven days, entering the human world, to keep his immortality, which becomes the main crux of the narrative; that a mysterious blue haired woman named Jill exists who is completely alien in form, who weeps blue tears that can even fill a bathtub; that flying monstrous hammerhead sharks, blood red, exist as a species that once were a threat, here appearing as a humanoid one and the regular flying variety.

Here we get to the first immediate issue with Immortal however, even if for me this is not an issue, as it is an aesthetic concept other viewers would not be tolerant on. This probably should have been animated - it almost already is. Most of the side cast, including major characters like the corrupt senator Allgood, are digitally animated models. The main cast however are real actors. Jill as played by Linda Hardy. Horus' final host, after causing seven to explode when their bodies are too sick or full of implants to host him, is Nikopol, a man whose influence is responsible for the anti-Eugenic holographic signs appearing everywhere in the city, abruptly woken from his cryogenic imprisonment when the tub falls from the sky, played by German actor Thomas Kretschmann. The legendary British actress Charlotte Rampling plays Elma Turner, a doctor who becomes fascinated with Jill and takes her in from the police; made to wear an unfortunate headpiece, she can nonetheless act her way around it.  

The contrast to almost everyone else being animated, and with a limited budget despite the ambition, is strange but I can still appreciate its curious mishmash of content. Where the issues come around, which I and other viewers will agree is problematic, is the plot. Specifically in regards to Horus' goal first. Alongside the ultimate reveal that this is a plot never properly told, Jill for obvious reasons is a unique entity who cries blue tears and exists from another dimension, becoming more and more human but of an unnatural form which makes her ideal for Horus's plans. Obviously, Horus' goal is problematic, to want to conceive a child quickly, in that we are dealing with rape as a subject. You would presume the idea is that, near death originally missing a leg from his awakening, Nikopol is stuck in an unfortunate situation of playing host to an entity, like Gods in mythology, who has no concept of modern morality. This is still morally dicey, but it is a premise you can tell in how, if you dealt with it right, this is about of gods involving themselves in the human world but committing acts thinking they are above us or in part of a goal which however the humans will argue against, such as the tale of Leda and the swan¹.  

Nikopol himself is one of them objecting to this, especially as he falls in love with Jill and does not want to be a willing participant, and that would be part of the narrative if fleshed out that would make this a compelling film even if one some would understandably feel uncomfortable to want to watch.  Adding to the issue is that, improvising him a leg from a subway train rail, Nikopol has an additional factor alongside the fact Horus can control him on will that he cannot move said leg without the God within him, so he is a trapped host having to argue against an entity doing things he does not want. Immortal would still be dealing with uncomfortable subject matter, which jars against its stranger content and jokes, such as the Egyptian Gods up in the floating pyramid playing Monopoly in one scene, but tackling the conflict between God and human would be fascinating, with Jill the unfortunate stuck between this on her road in fate.

However is it indeed uncomfortable, despite Nikolai not being a willing subject, how much rape plays a part in this as it does, even if mostly dealt with off-screen. It happens but the repercussions are never dealt with. It was more the fact Nikolai and Jill begin a romance soon into this, with a surprising amount of time "rape" and "the rapist" in himself being in the dialogue, that we are in really uncomfortable and undefendable content. In general, Jill is used in a way that, come least a decade later, would not be defendable at all, in that she is just a cipher. An idealised figure, played by a former model, who eventually to become human loses all her memories, and has erased at opportunistic times when involved with a botched kidnapping. Despite being a character to sell the film, in her distinct pale white face and blue hued features, is honestly a prop, even before you have to deal with the problematic content of sexual violence that is explicitly here.

What makes this worse, and a much more problematic film then when a film merely includes rape, is that Immortal's biggest problem is that none of its plot points ultimately have a point, making those decisions in how to handle gender politics and Jill worse. This very hastily wraps up with a bland romance, deeply problematic in context, and not really using its enticing points at all. There is no point to Central Park being frozen over barring as a final location. Charlotte Rampling's character has no real point at all, wasting a legendary actress, nor the CGI character of a detective, a figure who, alongside a previous history with the floating red sharks when one bit part of his face off, is seemingly to follow the trajectory of being involved in the main plot, including finding about Allgood's corruption, and contribute. He does not have a point, the red shark is dispatched hastily, and Allgood and the entire Eugenic Corporation is never really of importance. Even in mind this is based on stories in a world of Bilal's, this feels hurried and slight. It of course feels a bad position for Bilal to have left himself, when for the most part this film is an elaborate sci-fi film, that the main plot involved the rather unsavoury content it does and rushes all the interesting ideas after so much set-up.

It is fascinating, undoubtedly so. Immortal however becomes less than the sum of its parts by its finale, becoming far less interesting then the film it was beginning. One really tasteless plot aspect does derail the film horrifically, and it is weird to find a film which has so many strange ideas, and an aesthetic most would call ill advised but I found compelling, only become padding and ultimately resolve itself in the blandest way possible. Two of the worst things you can be are predictable, and be tone deaf in objectionable content, and Immortal's interesting features are sadly lost within both.

 

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1) Leda, an Aetolian princess, who the Greek god Zeus turned into a swan to seduce or rape depending on the telling of the myth; the blurring in that last part may come off as some as problematic, which is entirely understandable, and is only upon reflection that, becoming a subject depicted in countless paints of classical art alone, making it still a contentious myth, least in reminding you how adult and dark Greek mythology was in talking about complex concepts even with its Gods, that has been interpreted in a variety of ways

Anatomia Extinction (1995)

 

Director: Yoshihiro Nishimura

Screenplay: Yoshihiro Nishimura

Cast: Kisei Ishizuka as The Man; Jun Sasaki as The Engineer in Subway; Chikako Tone as The Man's Girlfriend; Tomoko Haseyama as The BCG News Anchorwoman

Archival Review

[Author's Note: Almost good enough to have published, this was unfortunately just lost along the way in my writings. Reading this review to publish does entice me to want to revisit Anatomia Extinction. Once an obscure title, an American company Error4444 had a limited edition Blu Ray released in 2021, so people are more aware of this production. Tokyo Gore Police (2009) is one that needs to be returned to as well, as whilst my views here have not really changed at all with my issues with later mid-2000s onwards films from the likes of Sushi Typhoon, as discussed in the review, there is an interest in seeing if my views change a little. Like other archival reviews, the review has been tidied up and even re-written in terms of grammar, but none of the content has been removed or altered from when it was written, even if my tone and views have changed in places.]

 

If there is a fascinating comparison to be made between two different eras, Yoshihiro Nishimura's same premise - where in a bleak futuristic Japan, a figure wanders it turning people into bio-mutants - between the more well known Tokyo Gore Police (2008) and Anatomia Extinction from the decade later is a great example. Anatomia Extinction is superior, as much because, under the Sushi Typhoon label, Nishimura's feature length version has an erratic, frankly tedious third act of mindless practical gore with no cause to truly cheer. Anatomia Extinction has the virtue, beyond only fifty minutes in length that before you shot in warehouses and stages, within the vibrant indie filmmaking era of Japan, Nishimura had to shoot this sci-fi/body horror/splatter work in actual streets and subways stations.

The world, ironically, is more fleshed out and elaborated on here than in Tokyo Gore Police. The later feature film tried to show itself as a fully fleshed world through RoboCop inspired fake advertisements, but with sparse sets with few people. Here, likely stealing shots in the street, the crowds of bystanders going about in their daily lives stands out, as is real night time locations and dark subway corridors. It's ordinary life is fleshed out, like nineties Japan but with the details tantalisingly shown - one, ran with in Tokyo Gore Police of a privatised police force which is merely hinted at in radio and audio, the second which adds so much more here in that there is an overpopulation issue and a string of inexplicable massacres, even of children, constantly taking place. The later makes the mutants in Anatomia Extinction have a reason to exist, that they are creations of a cult wishing (horrifically) to cull the populous by creating monsters.

The work, not very long and as much a practical effects demo, still has this as a simplistic plot where one person finds himself drawn to this cult out of chance, which becomes grotesque and as freakish as you would expect, what with a loved one in a sewer left limbless yet in orgasmic ecstasy and a mutant frenzy that even references Death Race 2000 (1975). Some of it is darkly humorous in a sick way, all with icky and immensely accomplished practical effects, but never distasteful. Knowing Japanese pulp cinema has a gross underbelly I wish never to encounter, there is thankfully as a balance this era of transgressive pulp which yet has a higher bar of creativity and for intelligence. In an era which coined the term of Japanese cyberpunk, whilst not of the genre, there is an intense atmosphere here of claustrophobic crowded streets, tiny moodily lit rooms and a hell of a lot of primal bold colour lighting. Yes, there is CGI visually equivalent to a Playstation One cut scene, starting the film off no less, but as someone who likes dated CGI, that just added to the material.

There is also, in vast contrast to many genre films from the West, a greater sense of being able to tell the stories through aesthetic and mood even in a gory work like this. There is always a danger of exoticising Japanese culture but, whilst a lot of sluggishness and emphasis on conventions is found in Western genre films, there is (even with clichés) a greater emphasis on mood and a gut "visceral" experience, a lot of Anatomia Extinction atmospheric or, picking up the pace such as a midnight hit-and-run escapade, with a sudden volt of energy inbetween.

At this point it is worth saying I had softened to Tokyo Gore Police more but the ending, a mess of randomness, spoilt it alongside the noticeable sense of being shot within a limited environment or available locations rather than ordinary places. Anatomia Extinction still has a pace, an ebb and flow of progression where the latter film did not, alongside a huge factor that there was no irony in the text at all. Instead, the short version has an incredibly grim sense of world building, a sense of constant congestion and melancholy, over ripened within this world to the point people go mad and kill crazy. There is of course the body horror, which was more elaborated in the 2009 film, but here in its limitations it is still appropriate, as arms lost can merely be grown back as guns, and everything (including how mutants are created) having a nightmarish quality. A lot of the problem with Tokyo Gore Police, and these later films aware with targeting Western audiences, was that shot in bright crisp digital camera and all about the spectacle, many of the virtues of mood and the grotesque materials building to the tone, rather than for itself, was lost.

Rubber's Lover (1996)

Director: Shozin Fukui

Screenplay: Shozin Fukui

Cast: Nao as Kiku; Norimizu Ameya as Hitotsubashi; Yôta Kawase as Shimika; Mika Kunihiro as Akari; Sosuke Saito as Motomiya

Re-Review

[Review contains some plot spoilers]

Set in the claustrophobic world of an unknown urban Japanese city, between the back alleys there is an underground basement accessed by a massive industrial lift, where experiments are transpiring that cross the line to violent scientific malpractice. Rubber's Lover follows alongside 964 Pinocchio (1991) as one of two of Shozin Fukui's films that may be known about in the West, entirely due to Unearthed Films releasing them in the United States in the DVD days. They are an interesting company in that their stock in trade in very transgressive cinema, be it releasing the notorious Japanese Guinea Pig films or something as notorious as Philosophy of the Knife (2008), only that among some odd curveballs* they also released these films, very much in the transgressive side of cinema but also very alien to it at the same time. That alienness comes from the fact that Shozin Fukui, working as an assistant director on Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989), he is less fixated on the transgressive but a kinetic intensity in these films.

Rubber's Lover is meant to be a prequel to 964 Pinocchio (1991), though it is best to imagine that co-existing in the same world, the future of that earlier film (of a brainwashed male sex toy who gains his consciousness again) is built from the fall out to this, Motomiya (Sosuke Saito) and Shimika (Yôta Kawase) two male scientists who are being backed in experiments to use psychic powers, having progressed to human test subjects. Their tools are "ether", not the gas used in early surgery as an anaesthetic (but an apt choice of name for symbolism) but a drug that is highly addicted, alongside the "Direct Digital Drive" technology. Motomiya has become a body building sociopath which has not helped matters, with Shimika easy to manipulate into this work, between them having a habit of killing their test subjects with their nurse assistant Akari (Mika Kunihiro). Their breaking point comes when an about-to-be-wedded secretary to their benefactor Kiku (Nao) comes to them informing the pair the project is going to be shut down. Things do not turn out that way as Motomiya snaps and she is held hostage.

Both films for Shozin Fukui transpire on the idea of the extremity of physical and mental agony eventually leading to a transcendental, and usually violent, power. The experiments here also involve the titular rubber, BDSM full rubber costumes which block out external stimuli as subjects wear them, are injected with ether and have their minds blasted out with noise until psychic power is induced. The film originates from both Fukui's fascination and research into psychic powers, having met people claiming such powers, and the connections he found when he also started talking to people in the burgeoning BDSM scene in his homeland¹. Among his research, including trying one for himself¹, was the use of rubber outfits and the fact that, yes, the material blocks the ability of the skin to sweat and breath, making them both dangerous to wear as a costume for a long period of time, and in context to this film the costume is used by the scientists to induce a further state of mental agony.

With one of their last subjects being a potential success, Hitotsubashi (Norimizu Ameya), the pair has made the unfortunate decision to use someone who was researching this subject matter and they stole his work from, all alongside erased memories proving an ill advised idea especially as he has nothing for contempt for the scientists. That Kiku is an open conduit for his mind as two people glad to take revenge on their torment, set up in hints early on, proves where this will lead to. The latter plot point is of note as, whilst I am an admirer of the film, I confess that there is at least one moment of extremity which has dated even if it is treated as the uncomfortable scene it should be, named that the kick off for Motomiya snapping and holding Kiku captive is the evil scientist committing sexual assault, uncomfortable to witness though it fits the darkness of the premise.

I will, having been an admirer of the film, confess that there is a least one moment which does not hold up as a good choice even for a film which is dealing with extremity, namely that the kick off for Motomiya snapping and holding Kiku captive is the evil scientist committing sexual assault, uncomfortable to witness though it fits the darkness of the premise. It is the one moment in a film, which does deal with explicit kink and titillation, which does jar in the modern day. Thankfully, it is depicted as horrifying, as it should be, and doesn't mar what Rubber's Lover escalates to in terms of a visual and audio assault worthy of being seen. That Kiku does have that plot point, which in this world where people have some semblance of confirmed psychic power, helps soothe the scene. It at least means, whilst it could have been done differently, there is a sense that it will be building to something of worth, she connecting literally to a male test subject who has been left a drug addict and tortured for a prolonged amount of time, Hitotsubashi once a talented chemical scientist reduced to this, and thus two damaged figures getting their revenge in a literal devastating power.

Shot in extreme monochrome, this is not a "pleasant" film but it is a thing of a vile beauty, compelling from the get-go in its deep black and white visuals. You can feel the dankness of the environments, even in a DVD standard release, just for the grain in the scenes. It was, humorously, due to it being perceived that the rubber suit would look terrible in colour¹, but that little change helps the film have a distinctive style which adds to it. One scene later on, which actively hurts the eyes as Hitotsubashi awakens with his new powers and lashes out, has flashing imagery and turns into a combination of Peter Kubelka's notorious advert for a beer Schwechater (1958), of black and white figures in flashing edits,  and Paul Sharits' short film T,O,U,C,H,I,N,G. (1968).

For the most part, this is a kinetic mood piece, which as a result means that any theme for the film, as talked of, is told through the action. The effect, the experience, of the film is through pulp storytelling where the atmosphere takes you in and pummels the viewer. Even when the film returns back to society, Shozin Fukui likes to depict an urban reality through grime and the lived in environments he probably lived in himself, particularly as between this and 964 Pinocchio he has an obsession with Japanese supermarkets and their septic white decor, a location with their paths and shelves which is very cinematic in its own way.

Rubber's Lover is a great example of how, for me, Japanese locations in their genre cinema, from wasteland behind wire fences to ordinary stores, have an inherently unique mood that is inherently cinematic, even if you do not take into consideration the distinct cultural aesthetic behind their public environments like their pedestrian utility signs to crossing light systems having a specific sound when people can cross that have poor eyesight. This could all stem merely from watching so many films from Japanese that had to shot on existing locations, but never was there an environment usually ignored in cinema, ordinary public environments, which even in their animation (as replicating real locations is common) Japanese film and television filmmakers have breathed a life into. In other country's cinema, like mind, there was always a danger of it coming off cheap; probably because films like this use them in resourceful ways, one back alley could lead to such peculiar sights like those you witness in Rubber's Lover.

The film also manages to carve its own distinction in the tiny subgenre of Japanese cyberpunk, creating its own startling imagery. The full rubber suit, with a head set obscuring the entire area above the neck and two cameras on each hip showing the wearer's eyes, is startling, and once the physical and metaphysical nature of the piece comes about, the style of the film which was already extreme even becomes poetic in its extremity, when such incidents like it "snowing" inside an apartment transpires. Tragically, Fukui's career whilst continuing onwards became obscure in terms of access.  This is a shame as, together with 964 Pinocchio, they are very idiosyncratic films by themselves, worthy of rediscovery and startling experiences separately.

Abstract Spectrum: Atmospheric/Intense

Abstract Rating (High/Medium/Low/None): Medium

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1) The Unearthed Films release offers a small interview with the director-writer which provides these interesting titbits.

Delightful Water Universe (2008)

Director: Trent Harris

Cast: Bill Allred as Vicious; Sina Amedson as Sheriff Butler; Kim Armston as Sassy; Dan Morley as Franklin; Stefene Russell as T.T. Swackhumma; Liberty Valentine as Lisa

To be honest*, Delightful Water Universe is an acquired taste. Some filmmakers enter a period when they are older where they make films or work that are low budget, even homemade, taking advantage of the newest technology when they become outsiders to the industry. This is not a bad thing, and is in fact an ultimate form of auteurism, these people happier making films without restrictions in ideas even if they could be restricted by resources. Ken Russell, for example, eventually went from helming expensive Warner Bros. films to making films in his garage, and Jean-Luc Godard arguably has been doing the same for the 2010s. The only potential issue is that of indulgence, which for me is charming if you follow the idea like I have that cinema should be viewed as part of human communication. It can also be idiosyncratic to say the least, in a way that is potentially off-putting.

Delightful Water Universe is charming if anything, even in its moments of titillation being merely actresses in exotic under garments but never explicit beyond this. It probably realises its plot, effectively a remake of Plan 10 from Outer Space (1995), but with a washed up male news reporter in a dystopian world and Bigfoot being a left wing political subversive, is a bit ad hoc at points and stretching its low budget. It probably finds joy in that too, and bless the production for thinking like this.

Made in 2008, when Barack Obama would become President of the United States soon after, the film feels of the George Dubya Bush days, now so remote in comparison it is amazing we once held that in some quarters as the end of civilisation. Films from that era, like this or a big box office failure like Southland Tales (2006), were probably right to deal with it with a cartoonish nature, suiting the tone of the era nowadays as we look back and see how absurd it was in real life. Harris to his credit hits ideas that are not that removed from the criticisms of the real first world even decades on, that there is a continuous barrage of advertisements and that the news is a puff piece for corporations, to which the protagonist is a washed up journalist who cannot pay his bar tabs and misses important events, like an American football star going insane and kidnapping a busload of Mormon schoolgirls.

The acquired nature of the film, structured like Plan 10, is that it is very determined to follow its plot with few tangents, mostly following our lead meeting someone, gaining new details and wandering on. It never really moves beyond this and the plot itself is very eccentric and loose to say the least. Between the title, a soda drink which is an Aldous Huxley approved soma, and a corrupt politician who fails at public arguments but still gets ahead of the polls^**, this is the low budget take on the likes of Southland Tale which are over the top and absurd.

Barring the explicit detail (curious and dropped) that Bigfoot rogered a male politician, which is technically a rape joke and another in the bizarre obsession in American culture being obsessed with the Cryptozoology  specific being randy for humans¹, there is always a sense of whimsy even when it is being serious. Even Harris' clear attraction to women is quaint, beautiful figures but contrasted by the second lead, a figure with a speech impediment who follows the reporter and is more assertive, a follow up from protagonist Lucinda in Plan 10 as a charming, downright lovable female figure who is not objectified or demeaned.

Harris works with what he has, which means this is a very eccentric sci-fi tale which does not try to look like the future in the slightest. That is to his advantage even if the viewer is not as fond of the indulgences, entirely because every idea I mentioned is something that transpires in real life and there is never any tech that has drastically dated in the slightest. Even the addictive soda drink is like sugar rich foods we warn children not to have and the film nearly turns into a low budget Chinatown (1974) as it involves politicians buying up land and access to water supplies. The difference too is that all of this has a sense of humour. That Bigfoot is real and is savvy enough to put windshield wipers and a giant kitchen sieve together to make a head garment that can pick up signals, used to promote his Dada-like political comments against consumerism. This, for all the padding in the film, is why I am glad to see a film like this, because even the semblance of the idea is wonderfully absurd.

I have not mentioned that this is a story-within-a-story, as Delightful Water Universe is actually a tale being written by another figure in his own story. A man in a mental institution, watching by a single male guard, he continues on the typewriter he is allowed to have whilst society outside is crumbling under a violent revolution. Said writer is shown to be an egotistical figure who thinks he is a literary genius, even the instigator of profound revolution, in spite of the fact he is neither and that the world (shown in stock footage) is burning down already around him.

This is the most interesting part of Delightful Water Universe, where this is Trent Harris showing how interesting he is as a creator, because we have to process that the absurdities of the plot inside the bookends are influenced by his clear incompetence and egotism, and that there is an unexpected sadness too. Namely that this figure is still pining for a female figure, entering the story as a member of those Mormon schoolgirls who comes to the lead, providing him the McGuffin of the windscreen wiper transmitter helmet and leaving the reporter pining for her after a one night stand, a love sick puppy onwards. It is this whole aspect, these complications, which bring up some additional questions, whether we are to question this entire main story in terms of bias or not. It does provide also an emotional connection as, with even his utter ignorance of himself, he is still someone to follow, where even his guard is just there to have someone to talk too, making the final with him stuck in the room and memories coming to haunt him a surprise change of tone to the film. That makes any indulgences with the film acceptable as they pay off eventually.

Abstract Spectrum: Eccentric

Abstract Rating (High/Medium/Low/None): None

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* And in mind that this particular review was made possible because the director Harris was kind enough upload his films to YouTube temporarily through 2020 for the public to see, which can feel like biting the hand of a benefactor.

** Trent Harris to his credit, again, pointing out something we only come to realise happens in the 2010s and 2020s a lot.

1) From softcore like Sweet Prudence and the Erotic Adventure of Bigfoot (2011) to actual porn in The Geek (1971), this is surprisingly common. That is not including the literary genre of monster porn, which was surprisingly prolific and with a surprising amount of female authors.

Steel Justice (1992)

Director: Christopher Crowe

Screenplay: Christopher Crowe and John Hill

Cast: Robert Taylor as Detective Lt. David Nash; J.A. Preston as Jeremiah J. Jones; Roy Brocksmith as Col. Edward Rollin Duggins; John Finn as Lt. Bill Somes; Neil Giuntoli as Jerrod; Geoffrey Rivas as Sgt. Julio Melendes; John Toles-Bey as Detective Steve Totten; Season Hubley as Gina Morelli; Joan Chen as Nicole Loa

If you want evidence of how strange television could be, NBC financed a dystopian sci-fi drama in which a grizzled police officer, who lost his son tragically, encounters an ageless wizard who teaches him how to grow a toy dinosaur robot possessed with his dead son's soul into a giant fire breathing, car crushing one to deal with an illegal arms dealer whose cover is an ice merchant. This was a TV pilot, left as a TV movie which managed to get a release in the Oceanic territories on video, and clearly costing a lot of money.

I will be upfront that the film is bizarre but not abstract. The show shrouds itself as a neo noir tale with atmosphere, but director-writer Christopher Crowe and the film still shots the production with a pedestrian, static style. Crowe and his co-writer John Hill at this point were veterans of television, though with the fascinating caveat that Crowe himself did write Michael Mann's The Last of the Mohicans (1992). That does not however stop the TV film from being what it is, nothing structurally experimental or unconventional like the material itself, so the work can only be seen as a curious oddity.

That does not belay however that this is as mad as a box of frogs in terms of a premise. How this would have followed the feature length pilot, in a series that was cancelled and never seen, adds a lot of the aura with the experience of watching the production, attempting to meld a high profile superhero premise to a gritty sci-fi dystopia. The sense that this was not even deliberately trying to be surreal, merely part of an era of television where many high profile premises like this never succeeded to get off the ground, adds a greater context. This is of course the same era of Poochinski (1990), a failed thirty minute pilot about Peter Boyle as a cop being killed and resurrected in the body of an English bulldog.

The world itself is strange already without the magical aspects. A post-Blade Runner (1982) work, this is a dystopian world of severe ozone layer damage, surprising relevant to the modern day if by different means about the potential calamity that could behalf the environment. Here the ozone layer been destroyed so badly the climate is permanently warm, and that ice is now a commodity, both with legal ice bars and also the hint that it is also illegally shipped. A multi-ethnic community (mainly Asian) lives in this American metropolis due to severe global conflicts as well, and there are slums everywhere alongside rampant crime. Sounding like a cyberpunk world, this is also the world where drive-by shootings now use rocket and missile launchers even in crowded streets, which is arguably as strange as veteran actor J.A. Preston as an ageless wizard, born from the Macedonian era and who helped grow a wooden horse into a Trojan Horse, now in a world where no one considers the aftershock of using explosives in such tight streets.

Now, I' am game for game for peculiar genre bending, which this is a delight for, whilst also admitting the pilot does comes off as merely a prologue, only taking until the end for our lead Detective Lt. David Nash (Roger Taylor) to finally grow a giant toy robot into a fire breathing dinosaur. The juxtaposition is perplexing. Clearly Robosaurus was the get, a real life creation built in 1989 by inventor Douglas Malewicki, a prolific figure in aerospace engineering and game design as well, able to link in his career both co-designing the Skycycle X-2, a rocket Evel Knievel had to jump the Snake River Canyon in Idaho in 1974, and table top card games like Nuclear Escalation that clearly follow an obsession with the idea we would blow each other to kingdom come in the eighties with nukes, as the games all follow a similar nuclear theme. Robosaurus, who exists to this day, was hired clearly with the idea of being a pre-existing piece of spectacular production that would be big even in a theatrical Hollywood film, an impressively ridiculous creation that inspired the Truckasaurus parody in The Simpsons as a fire breathing car crushing set piece for public shows.

How we got to this breakout role for the vehicle is the question requiring some mental gymnastics, especially as for the most part Steel Justice is a bleak tale, part gritty cop drama and part grounded dystopian drama, with some exaggerated and kitsch futurism but still grounded in the cesspool of crime. This is a tale about a police officer who can only come to his power by channelling his grief, with the unexplained issue that the toy Robosaurus is clearly possessed, likely by the soul of his dead son. Further complications arise as, whilst a bullet proof tank-like monstrosity, you have the concern that the emotions might be in there especially as there is at least one confirmed kill it is responsible for. Even in terms of a television series, this premise raises questions due to what the big production get is. Robosaurus is a very big creation to stalk the streets of this world, which would make him easy to spot, and it would requiring a bigger antagonist each time to be able to make up one full season of television, let alone if this every became a success.

The aesthetic, which I found the most rewarding in spite of the conventional composition of the series, is also dank. Many fog machines were used alongside neon lighting, TV budget sci-fi where even the immortal wizard has a part time job playing a saxophone in a night club to make sure he does not stick out like a sore thumb aesthetically. Quite a bit was clearly spent as you also have big names even in the tiniest of roles. Alongside character actor Roy Brocksmith as the villain, a weapons merchant who likes blowing up the competition so he can show his customers the worth of his products, you have a post-Twin Peaks Joan Chen as Nash's neighbour and potential love interest, a woman who may be a sex worker in the little we see of her life but would have likely grown in role if this had continued. R. Lee Ermey is also in the film, but in a cameo only consisting of two scenes, which is surprising as this is some time after the impact of his role in Full Metal Jacket (1987).

Most of this failed pilot is predictable in terms of structure, but it is amazingly lavish, an expansive production full of large crowds of extras, large metropolis sets and a big explosions budget which yet, in spite of its illegal weapons/revenge plot, has a lead hero from a superhero story or an episode of The Tick parody franchise. The result is not helped by how generically it is presented, but the combination is still peculiar. The question earlier worth repeating is trying to figure out how this premise came to be. The other is where would have it all gone in Episode 2. The show is not as talked about as other infamous failed TV pilots like Poochinski, but they exist in the area of conventional mainstream television when someone spiked the coffees, were so desperate to try something different regardless of logic, or were so exhausted in production idea meetings that accidental surrealism like this happens. Or all the above for all we know.

Even in terms of what we get, many questions are left unanswered. Our wizard character, who is following Nash to unlock his abilities, suggests that eventually a wider level of magic would appear in this city if the production had gone on. The issue mentioned earlier of what to do with Robosaurus also springs to mind as, having to juggle a weekly schedule and smaller budgets than films, this series if it had succeeds would have to cut costs or would still be cancelled for being too expensive, something which has happened a lot even with successful work but did not get big enough numbers into the modern day, the type of numbers Game of Thrones gets.

Thinking about it, I would like to see a cleaned up version and a proper release of this, even if it is pure cheese, considering how much trashy theatrical cinema is dug up and given 2k and 4k restorations since the mid-2010s. In an alternative world, we could have had this bizarre premise have a series and even a big blockbuster reboot, where you could imagine Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson channelling the ghost of his dead son from a tiny robot into a giant CGI one. Admittedly this is not that dimension, so we just have this TV oddity in a fuzzy rip out there on the internet. It is not a great work, just from how stilted director Christopher Crowe does shoot it. That is a shame as, bad premise or not, the TV budget sci-fi noir look is a style the production team should have been appreciated for. Even if lead Robert Taylor is very generic, an Australian actor whose career has lasted into the modern day in television and cinema both in his homeland and outside it, it is only because he is stuck with a generic grizzled cop role. There is the advantage of J.A. Preston as the secondary character, even in the generic exposition and magical helper role getting to be playful as a man who views everything as a lark, even in someone as interesting as Joan Chen in her little role who is tragically underused. Definitely, as someone who believes that everything including material I hate should be preserved and made available, Steel Justice should be available, but just in knowledge of such a curiosity even existing, it would get a bit of interest if you brought up its entire premise. Sounding like the premise concocted from a child's imagination on one hand, the other trying to be serious and sombre at the other, it's a contradictory mess but never boring.

Abstract Spectrum: Psychotronic/Weird

Abstract Rating (High/Medium/Low/None): None