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Takashi Miike

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Horror Fuel

Blu-ray Review: Sukiyaki Western Django (2007)

1880’s Japan, but it’s like the American old West. That’s the main conceit of the blazing insanity that is Takashi Miike’s Sukiyaki Western Django… a picture that has about as much to do with Sergio Corbucci’s 1966 epic Django as anyone of the four billion sequels-in-name-only that followed it. Along with that lil’ elevator pitch up yonder, the plot of this frenzied flick concerns two gangs; one coded red (the Heike clan), the other white (the Genji clan)… both lead by mentally unstable maniacs… who have a wild hair up their ass about having the biggest dick in the ol’ East, and to hell with the town caught in the middle. Enter: a mysterious unnamed gunman (Hideaki Itô) who’s none too thrilled about the gangs, or their effect on the community… hell, he’s just plain ol’ none too thrilled, and it doesn’t take long for the tensions and body count to rise… all in some of the most ludicrous ways

Continue reading →
DanXIII
Jul 26, 2020
Horror Fuel

Blu-ray Review: One Missed Call Trilogy (2003 – 2006)

Those rascally rascals over at Arrow Video have gone and collected some choice cuts of J-horror and put them in one handy dandy creepy collection with the new One Missed Call Trilogy set and your’s cruelly is going to go through that shizz step by step! In 2003’s One Missed Call, Yumi (Ko Shibasaki) and her gal pal Yoko (Anna Nagata) experience a phone call from the future featuring Yoko herself sounding like she’s in some dire fuckin’ straits! to make matters worse, ol’ Yoko finds out she can’t fly when she takes a flying leap off an overpass on the date the call originated from, and more of Yumi’s pals fall victim to a similar fearsome fate! It’s soon up to Yumi to try and end this evil business while dealing with her traumatic past… but can she do it before the curse catches up to her? Directed by that madman maestro Takshi Miike (Audition, Gozu, Ichi The Killer),

Continue reading →
DanXIII
Feb 22, 2020
Horror Fuel

Blu-ray Review: Terra Formars (2016)

In a very Blade Runner influenced future; a group of humanity’s rejects (including the likes of a serial killer, the leader of a child prostitution ring, Yakuza members etc.) are loaded onto a spacecraft and sent on their (un)merry way to Mars where they are to eliminate a roach infestation that is the result of a terra-forming project 500 years previous. In exchange for their service they will have their records wiped clean. Sounds like a breeze, right? Well as fate and sci-fi comic book tropes would have it, those roaches have rapidly evolved into humanoid creatures who are quite able to kick some ass. To combat this situation, our “heroes” are given injections that turn them into super-powered half-human/half-insect hybrids…and then the war for Mars is on in earnest! Directed by the master of disturbing Japanese horror Takashi Miike; Terra Formars is a violent, over-the-top- comic book come to life (not surprising as it is adapted from one). You

Continue reading →
DanXIII
Mar 30, 2019
Horror Fuel

Blu-ray Review: Audition (1999)

Audition is a classic fright flick that catapulted the absolutely insane mother fucker that is Takashi Miike in to the hearts of gonzo cinema lovers worldwide (though he was already el hombre in his home turf of Japan thanks to some rather bloody fare such as Fudoh: The New Generation) and most of you gore hounds have certainly laid your eerie eyeballs on it at some point since it’s release 20 fuckin’ years ago (holy shit…). Anyway, if you haven’t here’s a brief sinister synopsis before I get into why this new Blu-ray edition comin’ your way from Arrow Video and their beastly bedfellows MVD Entertainment is worth your hard earned dough… Shigeharu Aoyama (Ryo Ishibashi), a middle-aged widower, is catching static from his 17-year-old son, Shigehiko (Tetsu Sawaki) to get back on the dating bicycle and join the Tour De Trim (so to speak). At the urging of a pal, Aoyama begins hiding auditions for a new wife, and

Continue reading →
DanXIII
Jan 26, 2019

More from Takashi Miike

Horror Fuel

Blu-ray Review: Sukiyaki Western Django (2007)

1880’s Japan, but it’s like the American old West. That’s the main conceit of the blazing insanity that is Takashi Miike’s Sukiyaki Western Django… a picture that has about as much to do with Sergio Corbucci’s 1966 epic Django as anyone of the four billion sequels-in-name-only that followed it. Along with that lil’ elevator pitch up yonder, the plot of this frenzied flick concerns two gangs; one coded red (the Heike clan), the other white (the Genji clan)… both lead by mentally unstable maniacs… who have a wild hair up their ass about having the biggest dick in the ol’ East, and to hell with the town caught in the middle. Enter: a mysterious unnamed gunman (Hideaki Itô) who’s none too thrilled about the gangs, or their effect on the community… hell, he’s just plain ol’ none too thrilled, and it doesn’t take long for the tensions and body count to rise… all in some of the most ludicrous ways

Continue reading →
DanXIII
Jul 26, 2020
Horror Fuel

Blu-ray Review: One Missed Call Trilogy (2003 – 2006)

Those rascally rascals over at Arrow Video have gone and collected some choice cuts of J-horror and put them in one handy dandy creepy collection with the new One Missed Call Trilogy set and your’s cruelly is going to go through that shizz step by step! In 2003’s One Missed Call, Yumi (Ko Shibasaki) and her gal pal Yoko (Anna Nagata) experience a phone call from the future featuring Yoko herself sounding like she’s in some dire fuckin’ straits! to make matters worse, ol’ Yoko finds out she can’t fly when she takes a flying leap off an overpass on the date the call originated from, and more of Yumi’s pals fall victim to a similar fearsome fate! It’s soon up to Yumi to try and end this evil business while dealing with her traumatic past… but can she do it before the curse catches up to her? Directed by that madman maestro Takshi Miike (Audition, Gozu, Ichi The Killer),

Continue reading →
DanXIII
Feb 22, 2020
Horror Fuel

Blu-ray Review: Terra Formars (2016)

In a very Blade Runner influenced future; a group of humanity’s rejects (including the likes of a serial killer, the leader of a child prostitution ring, Yakuza members etc.) are loaded onto a spacecraft and sent on their (un)merry way to Mars where they are to eliminate a roach infestation that is the result of a terra-forming project 500 years previous. In exchange for their service they will have their records wiped clean. Sounds like a breeze, right? Well as fate and sci-fi comic book tropes would have it, those roaches have rapidly evolved into humanoid creatures who are quite able to kick some ass. To combat this situation, our “heroes” are given injections that turn them into super-powered half-human/half-insect hybrids…and then the war for Mars is on in earnest! Directed by the master of disturbing Japanese horror Takashi Miike; Terra Formars is a violent, over-the-top- comic book come to life (not surprising as it is adapted from one). You

Continue reading →
DanXIII
Mar 30, 2019
Horror Fuel

Blu-ray Review: Audition (1999)

Audition is a classic fright flick that catapulted the absolutely insane mother fucker that is Takashi Miike in to the hearts of gonzo cinema lovers worldwide (though he was already el hombre in his home turf of Japan thanks to some rather bloody fare such as Fudoh: The New Generation) and most of you gore hounds have certainly laid your eerie eyeballs on it at some point since it’s release 20 fuckin’ years ago (holy shit…). Anyway, if you haven’t here’s a brief sinister synopsis before I get into why this new Blu-ray edition comin’ your way from Arrow Video and their beastly bedfellows MVD Entertainment is worth your hard earned dough… Shigeharu Aoyama (Ryo Ishibashi), a middle-aged widower, is catching static from his 17-year-old son, Shigehiko (Tetsu Sawaki) to get back on the dating bicycle and join the Tour De Trim (so to speak). At the urging of a pal, Aoyama begins hiding auditions for a new wife, and

Continue reading →
DanXIII
Jan 26, 2019