The Festival--The Films part 2

Deaspo Naughty Girls
(2006, Korea)
Dasepo Naughty Girtls is a South Korean pop-culture explosion—a cheeky, irreverant meditation on teen sexuality, STDs, gender identity, a celebrartion of youth culture and puppy love. Borrowing from genres as disperate as musicals, sci-fi, melodrama, theatre of the absurd, queer cinema, and animae, Lee Jae-Yong’s raunchy romp is a pean to acceptance and tolerance. The chaotic plot involves girls “re-virginated,” an outcast character called cyclops—and awkward boy with only one eye, Poor Girl, teen virgin who carries an animated Kieth Herrinlg like puppet of shame around with her like a backpack, and Big Razor Sis, a powerful business leder who likes to dress up like a school girl and gossip. The decideddly dijoinrted film contains moments of absolute brilliance, like an opening musical number, in which the eponymous Naughty Girls parade in and out of high school classrooms in a beautifully orchestrated, high produciton value musical number (the effect reminded me of a high concept Spike Jonze music video), mix with head scratching scenes. Other sequences are less fulfilling---like the (ahem) climax, in which the entire male student body metaphirically jack-off to repel the advances of an evil supernatural transgendered god(dess), forcing her to evolve some sort of she-deragon.

Go Master
(2006, Japan)
A medidtative biopic by Chinese master Tian Zhuangzhuang (The Blue Kite, The Horse Thief ) chronicles the life of Wu Qingyuan, a Chinese national who became the world master of Japan’s national passion, Go. Tracing the journey of so stoic and contemplative a figure as Wu proves a challenge for Tian, who embraces the Zen-like concnetration of the contests to methodically tell his story Enigmatic, eccentric, and sometimes erratic, Wu faced challenges throuhgout his life—from a painful decision to remain in Japan during the Second World War, to the time when he abandoned his pursuit of Go altogether, and joined what appears to be a cult. As a consunmate outsioder in Japanese society, Wu’s sense of alienation is ever present, lingering throughout. His quest for truth, and knowledge seems only sated when he’s seated in front of the Go Board. Indeed, like chess, the pursuit of Go requires intense concentration. In one of the film’s best moments, two masters sit, unflinchingly the ferosious white flash blasts of the bomb dropped on Nagasaki enveolops them. The moment passes. And play resumes. The resulting film is more akin to 32 Short Films About Glen Gould than a standard paint by numbers biopic.

Spider Lilies
(2006, Taiwan)
Winner of the Teddy at this year’s Berlin Film Festival, Spider Lilies tells the complicated love story between Takeko, a reclusive tattoo artist, and Jade, an internet girl who’s been harboring an unrequited crush on her since childhood. At the behest of an online clinet, Jade opts to get a tattoo. Sparks are rekindled when Jade, discovers that Takeko owns the shop. Flirting shamlessly with her old acquaintance, Jade invites Takeko to visit her online. Performing that evening for her Web devotees, Jade shares details about her first true love—convinced Takeko has logged on to watch. While their lives continually intertwine, their love seems destined never to blossom. Each time they are drawn together—fate tears them apart. A tragic earthquake many years earlier left Takako orpahned, and in charge of her brother, so tramautzied by the earthquake he requires constant care. Furthermore, Jade has become the target of a vice-squad sting—yet she believes her new mysterious online friend to be Takeko. Moments of tragedy, shame, and longing define this story of two women in search of love amindst a world that has left them increasingly alienated from the tendernous of human contact.