Table Of Content

the cinema of TAKESHI KITANO DIRECTORS’ CUTS Kitano_pages.indb 1 19/12/12 22:15:28 Other titles in the Directors’ Cuts series: the cinema of EMIR KUSTURICA:notes from the underground GORAN GOCIC the cinema of KEN LOACH:art in the service of the people JACOB LEIGH the cinema of WIM WENdERS the celluloid highway ALEXANdER GRAF the cinema of KATHRYN BIGELOW:hollywood transgressor edited by dEBORAH JERMYN & SEAN REdMONd the cinema of ROBERT LEPAGE:the poetics of memory ALEKSANdAR dUNdJEROVIC the cinema of GEORGE A. ROMERO:knight of the living dead TONY WILLIAMS the cinema of ANdRZEJ WAJdA :the art of irony and defiance edited by JOHN ORR & ELZBIETA OSTROWSKA the cinema of KRZYSZTOF KIESLOWSKI:variations on destiny and chance MAREK HALTOF the cinema of dAVId LYNCH:american dreams, nightmare visions edited by ERICA SHEEN & ANNETTE dAVISON the cinema of NANNI MORETTI:dreams and diaries EWA MAZIERSKA & LAURA RASCAROLI the cinema of MIKE LEIGH:a sense of the real GARRY WATSON the cinema of JOHN CARPENTER:the technique of terror edited by IAN CONRICH & dAVId WOOdS the cinema of ROMAN POLANSKI:dark spaces of the world edited by JOHN ORR & ELZBIETA OSTROWSKA the cinema of TOdd HAYNES:all that heaven allows edited by JAMES MORRISON the cinema of STEVEN SPIELBERG:empire of light NIGEL MORRIS the cinema of ANG LEE:the other side of the screen WHITNEY CROTHERS dILLEY the cinema of TERRENCE MALICK:poetic visions of america (second edition) edited by HANNAH PATTERSON the cinema of WERNER HERZOG:aesthetic ecstasy and truth BRAd PRAGER the cinema of LARS VON TRIER:authenticity and artifice CAROLINE BAINBRIdGE the cinema of NEIL JORdAN :dark carnival CAROLE ZUCKER the cinema of JAN SVANKMAJER:dark alchemy edited by PETER HAMES the cinema of dAVId CRONENBERG:from baron of blood to cultural hero ERNEST MATHIJS the cinema of JOHN SAYLES:a lone star MARK BOULd the cinema of SALLY POTTER:a politics of love SOPHIE MAYER the cinema of MICHAEL HANEKE:europe utopia edited by BEN McCANN & dAVId SORFA the cinema of THE dARdENNE BROTHERS:responsible realism PHILIP MOSLEY Kitano_pages.indb 2 19/12/12 22:15:28 the cinema of TAKESHI KITANO flowering blood Sean Redmond WALLFLOWER PRESS london & new york Kitano_pages.indb 3 19/12/12 22:15:28 A Wallflower Press Book Published by Columbia University Press Publishers Since 1893 New York • Chichester, West Sussex cup.columbia.edu Copyright © Sean Redmond 2013 All rights reserved. Wallflower Press® is a registered trademark of Columbia University Press A complete CIP record is available from the Library of Congress ISBN 978-0-231-16332-3 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-231-16333-0 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-231-85023-0 (e-book) Series design by Rob Bowden design Cover image of Takeshi Kitano courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics/The Kobal Collection/ Kumagai, Tsuranuku Columbia University Press books are printed on permanent and durable acid-free paper. This book is printed on paper with recycled content. Printed in the United States of America c 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 p 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Kitano_pages.indb 4 19/12/12 22:15:29 cONTENTS Acknowledgements vii Introduction: Becoming Lost in Tokyo 1 1 Time, Space and Whatever 16 2 Flowering Blood 37 3 Intense Alterity 57 4 Starring Kitanos 72 5 This is the Sea 86 Conclusion: Standing Outside Office Kitano 98 Postscript: I Welcome the Pain of it Already 103 Filmography 109 Bibliography 113 Index 119 v Kitano_pages.indb 5 19/12/12 22:15:29 Kitano_pages.indb 6 19/12/12 22:15:29 acknowledgements New ideas and moments of inspiration emerge in the unlikeliest of places, at the most unlikely of times. I have been caught by a revelation, found the right question, or the analytical solution to something that had been puzzling me for weeks, on the evening train, after a bad dream, at the playground with the kids, or while chilling out in front of the television. My best work though is always fashioned in and around the wonderful research being carried out by my students; their ideas, freshness and hunger to find a way out of a blind alley, is just the burst of energy I need to borrow on a Kitano blue day. In particular, while writing this book, Dick Whyte, Bran Gnan- alingam, Allison Maplesden, Torben Antonsen, Kendra Marston, Brady Hammond, James Morris, Amber Johnson and Mark Ellsworth were all incredibly helpful to the journeying I undertook. Thank you. This is the sea. for Josh, Caitlin, Erin, Dylan and Cael vii Kitano_pages.indb 7 19/12/12 22:15:29 Kitano_pages.indb 8 19/12/12 22:15:29 INTROdUCTION Becoming Lost in Tokyo I will begin this monograph by way of a detour of sorts: the story of my becoming lost on the streets of Tokyo, a cine pilgrim in search of Takeshi Kitano. I will define the cineaste pilgrim as the film fan that goes in search of the art and artist they most admire and who has left an enigma or legacy of some kind for them to discover. The cineaste pilgrim may also be captivated by a ‘purer’ phenomenological desire to find experiential truth in the great art, artist or star they go in search of. The cineaste pilgrim who journeys to the East, however, is arguably a culturally or ideologically heightened example of this awe-struck travelogue since their journey is readily connected to issues and questions of Otherness, Orientalism and stranger fetishism. My own desire to write about Kitano, to journey to Tokyo to find him, is placed within this sea of trou- bling contexts. In this introduction I ask the questions: Why Kitano? Why me? I place my own (Western) subjectivity centre stage. I then proceed to explain my position vis- à-vis film authorship and my critical and conceptual take on Kitano as an auteur of loss whose discourse of atomisation speaks across the waves. I conclude the introduction with an outline of the structure of the book. The Cine Pilgrim Film fans regularly make a pilgrimage to the locations of their favourite features, or to the birthplace or resting place of their favourite director, actor or star. At these holy or charmed sites they will re-enact the key scene(s) of the film, or try to get a better sense, get at a higher truth, of the artist they have gone in search of. A spirit of carnival invests these encounters, as does an imagined spiritual or transcendental sense of place, space and personhood. The cineaste pilgrim searches for the traces of the film in the real buildings, roadways, savannahs and forests, or in the bits and pieces of set that have been left behind. They excavate the site, measure the distances and depths they first flowering blood 1 Kitano_pages.indb 1 19/12/12 22:15:29