SUKIYAKI WESTERN DJANGO
Takashi Miike is a very busy man.
Churning out more films per year than any other director I can think of - IMDB shows him as having directed no less than five films in 2005 alone - it’s hard sometimes to sit through films like 1998’s Andromedia and his latest American release, Sukiyaki Western Django, two films large in idea and style, and wonder what may have happened if he gave his wild fantasies a bit more focus, or perhaps a bit more of a tweaking after he’d allowed himself the freedom to shoot everything that came to mind. Having distinguished himself from more strictly comic, absurdist directors like Stephen Chow (whose Kung Fu Hustle will no doubt be referenced often in reviews of this film), with darker, more stylish and surreal works like Audition and Gozu, Miike has shown his range and his panache for pitch black humor. And as much as I admire and enjoy his films, there is usually a lingering question of just how much time Miike allows himself to polish his finished works before moving on to the inevitable next project.
No doubt Sukiyaki Western Django will find a fan base - and it really is a very fun, very entertaining piece of work - but it’s hard not to pick it apart a bit as a film. Perhaps it may be best to review it two ways - as a piece of spaghetti pop entertainment (what do you expect with that great title?), and as a “film”. And sure, it may be a bit unfair to criticize a film called Sukiyaki Western Django on its consistency and coherence, but I expect good things from Miike, and this film left me as entertained as it did disappointed.
As a shot of cult spaghetti cinema, the film is a blast. You want to be entertained? Go see Sukiyaki Western Django. Really, as a pulpy Western, it succeeds admirably - you’ve got your rundown saloon town, pistol-whipping cowboys, world-worn women, mysterious quiet hero in a dusty brown trench coat, stark sundrenched vistas strewn with ominously passing tumbleweeds… Add to the mix some sword play and a penchant for bizarre, near-cartoonish violence and overacting, and you’re in Miike Country, where the villains shoot incessant leers at the camera while the comic relief (in this case, a sheriff doing his best Dr. Strangelove impersonation) shuffles about like an attention-starved clown. As a work of style and just plain fun, it does its best to add a twist to two familiar genres with their familiar settings and cast of characters - the Samurai/Western, with the complete lack of thematic ambiguity that both genres portend.
As a film, this is a bit like what happens when you let a nine-year-old make his own ice cream sundae - you’ll get a bowl of ice cream with hot fudge and strawberry sauce and Gummi Bears and sprinkles and whipped cream and maybe some more hot fudge and Oreo cookies and pineapple sauce and Pepsi. Sure, individually these all taste great - heck, even mix a couple or a few together, in different combinations, and you’ve got yourself a treat! - but you get the idea. For starters, for reasons perhaps only known to Miike himself, he chose to make this an English-language film. Why? The opinion that this film should have been in his native Japanese will not be an unpopular one - there was just so much potential of impact lost due to the fact that the dialogue was spoken in such thick, sometimes indecipherable accents. I applaud the integrity of allowing the actors to do their own speaking, rather than hire more proficient voiceover talent, but if you’re audience is straining to make sense of what they’re hearing, especially when they’re trying to put an expansive story and mythos together, what’s it worth? It was hard for me not to suspect that there was a intent of added comedy in this decision - certainly the audience was howling when some otherwise innocuous lines were delivered in heavily broken English. If that is the case, it’s disappointing, because there truly is a good tale to be found buried under this mess, and more often that not I, and the people around me, were having a difficult time figuring out what the hell was going on, especially if there was gunplay afoot.
Perhaps there is a well that says it all! element to the fact that Quentin Tarantino has a cameo in this film, which is not to make the ubiquitous claim that he’s a bad actor, but what the hell is Quentin Tarantino doing in an otherwise exclusive cast of Asian talent? And what the fuck is Stuntman Mike’s hood ornament doing on his wheelchair? Was that an effort to get the audience to cheer, Hey, there’s the hood ornament from Death Proof!! A little treat for the fanboys? My moment of recognition was hardly as enthusiastic. But I suppose when you hurl the kitchen sink into your revisionist Western, anything is possible.
Perhaps what I’m getting at is that it felt like there was a lack of integrity to the proceedings. Or, more specifically, a level of integrity that I assume Miike to have, and that I hope to see again. There is an honesty and a clarity of vision to Audition, Ichi the Killer, Gozu - they titillate and challenge, they work the viscera with aplomb, but unlike similar genre tales of gore and violence, they never fall into camp or “B-movie” status. They’re not all perfect, but they are honest, as completely insane as they may get. They may lean towards the absurd, but I’d never felt pandered to before, or my investment taken for granted.
One might argue that this is all supposed to be silly - that this is a silly film, that critics should lighten up. I don’t think this is the case - I give this film more credit than that. There are many intensely poetic moments in this film, sequences of extreme gravity and beauty, and I am sure there were larger moods to evoke than the slapstick surroundings would suggest. I would have liked to see a Sukiyaki Western Django that didn’t try so hard to thrill and, what’s more, connect to a Western audience. Keep them in Japanese, Takashi, and without the pop guest stars - we promise we’ll watch them.
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