Midnight Eye.

As Todd noted yesterday at Twitch, Late Bloomer is slated for a screening at the New York Asian Film Festival and it happens to feature prominently in the new issue of Midnight Eye. Nicholas Rucka interviews director Go Shibata and reviews "his phenomenally energetic and exciting new film."

Even taking into account that Rucka's a friend of Shibata, that review certainly does spark interest.

Tom Mez turns in the other major feature, a good long look at the hows and the whys behind the swift popularity in Japan of genre director Rokuro Mochizuki (more) and the sad consequences of the dry spell that began with the 00s. Even so: "While his career back home has been flailing since the dawn of the new millennium, outside Japan Rokuro Mochizuki is only just taking off, thanks to a wave of DVD releases of his best work."

There's no overriding theme to this issue's Round-Up, just a collection of astute reviews from Mes and Jaspar Sharp. More reviews:

• Sharp on The Face of Another, one of two films released in the Masters of Cinema series by Hiroshi Teshigahara, the other being Pitfall: "These first two releases from Teshigahara are especially welcome, as much for the films themselves as for the significance of those involved in their production. Often lumped in as part of the Japanese New Wave of the 60s, director Hiroshi Teshigahara stood apart from the movement, if indeed it ever was a movement."

• Mes on The Soup One Morning, an indie that's been making the festival rounds that's "solidly written, extremely well acted and generally handled with great sensitivity and empathy."

• And a book review, Sharp on Noel Burch's To the Distant Observer: Form and Meaning in Japanese Cinema.

Posted by dwhudson at May 12, 2005 9:06 AM