Runin: Banished (Eiji Okuda, 2004)

[Sigurd]

Título: Runin: Banished Título V.O: Runin Director: Eiji Okuda Año/País: 2004 / Japón Duración: 154 minutos Género: Drama Reparto: Keiko MATSUZAKA, Kazuhiro NISHIJIMA, Mayu OZAWA, Mariya ITO, Eiji OKUDA Enlaces: Ficha de: Sigurd

[Sigurd]

The remote island of Hachijojima lies 276 kms from the mainland at the end of the Izu archipelago, swathed by clouds, the far side of an 80-km wide stretch of raging waters known as the Black Tide. In 1838, the island is serving as a penal colony, where criminal exiles are forced to eke out an ignoble existence living in self-sustaining villages and assailed by harsh winds, storms, and periodic famine, and overseen by ruthless warders who punish any attempted escape by rolling the prisoners down steep rocky cliffs in large wicker balls.

Clothed in brightly coloured kimonos, the two rhinestones amongst the rabble are Toyogiku, or Otoyo (Matsuzaka) and Hikaru, who have both managed thus far to make their sentence on the island a little more bearable by offering sexual services to the rest of the grimy convicts, despite Hikaru clearly being a man. A former courtesan from the Yoshiwara district in Edo sent to the island for the crime of arson, Otoyo is not getting any younger, and when the next shipload of inmates to the island arrives containing the younger Kisaburo (Nishijima), the two pair up and plot escape together. But before long, Kacho (Ito), a younger and prettier new internee also from Yoshiwara arrives on the island, and is soon turning the heads of the other inmates and putting herself forward as replacement for the affections of the battered older woman.

The second film to be directed by actor Eiji Okuda (who also appears in this) after the 2001 wish-fulfilment piece Shojo - An Adolescent, Runin is another work that appears to be swimming futilely against the prevailing tide of both local and international markets, one of those monumental heritage pieces familiar from the 80s that should prove popular enough with casual viewers at foreign festivals, but unlikely to find much favour elsewhere.

The cinematography and art design (recognisable as the work of Takeo Kimura, especially his previous collaborations with Kaizo Hayashi such as Zipang) are undeniably top notch, but aside from the regressive portrayals of all the female characters as either whores or as a potential source of comfort and salvation, the main thing that counts against Runin is its sheer length. This alone should be enough from shielding it from most potential audiences, but one can't help get the feeling that, served in a smaller dose, the film's general lack of humour or self-reflexivity might have not proven such a problem. As it stands, though sections of the numerous sub-stories occasionally attain some degree of emotional tug, Runin barely rises above the level of a passable, though nicely-photographed, Sunday afternoon drama.



Keiko Matsuzaka ....  Toyogiku   Kazuhiro Nishijima ....  Kisaburo

[Jose. El Luzu]

¡¡¡¡ Guauuuuuuuu !!!!! Buena cosa Sigurd, la pincho ahora mismo, muchas gracias amigo.  

[Sigurd]

¡¡¡¡ Guauuuuuuuu !!!!! Buena cosa Sigurd, la pincho ahora mismo, muchas gracias amigo.  

El saludo, Jose.

La película me ha gustado.  

[Reader]

¡Thx, Sigurd!

[kaishakunin]

Fantástico! Muchas gracias, sigurd  

[scarecrown]

Gracias Sigurd por la ficha. La película me ha gustado también