MAREBITO
d: Takashi Shimizu, 2004

26 July 2009

Asian horror demands spoiler-free discussions, and we're glad for that, because we haven't got a clue as yet how to write about them. We've seen fewer than a dozen, from Japan, Korea, Thailand, and HK, and are still getting to know the regional and cultural differences as well as the commonalities.

Our favorites by far at this point are Takashi Miike's AUDITION (Japanese) and Ki-duk Kim's THE ISLE (Korean).

Having watched MAREBITO only two nights ago, it is fresh in our memory and yet at the same time only a hazy impression. It's not difficult to recall the simple facts of the story, and individual images linger in one's mind, but what's missing is a sense of having lived the lives of the characters. There's a way in which that's important to the themes of the film, and in some broader way to the sensibilities of the Asian horrors we've seen so far, but it'll take a lot more viewing before we'd be willing to generalize about it.

The images here do not particularly represent the film as a whole, but show off an aspect which is starting to feel familiar - video-mediated imagery. An awful lot of MAREBITO is seen through the protagonist's viewfinder, varaious monitors, and even his cell phone screen. There's probably a techno-erotic-sociological essay in here somewhere, which we're happy to say is not our responsibility to write.

Would we recommend MAREBITO? Sure. But if you've never seen any Asian horror, keep in mind that MAREBITO is typical but not the finest example.