Uzumaki

Uzumaki is the film adaptation of Junji Ito's very awesome Spiral (Uzumaki) manga. It came out in year 2000 and never really caught on in the west. Its got elements of fantasy and absurdity that makes it atypical in its genre.

Summary/Spoilers:
A quiet little town in Japan is haunted by an abstract spirit: the spiral shape. Kirie is a nice girl living in the town with her potter father. One day she spots her boyfriend Shuichi's father filming a snail. When asked Shuichi tells her he's been depressed lately because his father's been infected by spirals. He implores Kirie to run away with him, believing the entire town to be possessed by spirals. Kirie dismisses him, but soon the spiral curse begins to manifest and the town becomes consumed by it.

From there on the film follows the generally linear storyline of Shuichi's family, his father's descent into madness and his mother's breakdown. There are many small side stories, like in the original manga.

Here are some spiral manifestations:

A boy infatuated with Kirie throws himself in front of a car and gets spiraled up by the wheels.
A girl begins to have spirals in her hair, and attracts positive attention because of it. The spirals get more and more ridiculous and big until they touch electric wires and kill her.

Hairgirl in Manga

hairgirl in movie

A classmate who liked staring down the central school staircases (because they spiral) is drawn in and jumps to his death, smearing his brains right in the center of the spiral.
Snail people. I'm rather sad they cut out the hermaphrodite scene. It was a gross-out in the manga.

In the end Shuichi is taken by the spiral curse and twists towards Kirie like a long noodle. The film ends with Kirie's voice intro, leaving it unclear whether she escaped.

Thoughts:
As a film adaptation (or live action of sorts) of a manga, its very impressive. Other than Shuichi's unnecessarily pasty Hitler hair, all the other characters are straight out of the manga. Granted this isn't a manga with exaggerated characters and crazy hair styles, still, I felt the directors took some care in casting and everyone fit their roles perfectly. A lot of scenes were straight out of the book. Its regrettable the film wasn't a complete adaptation, as the last parts of the book were all-out insane. I would've loved to see masses of tangled spiral people writhing about, not to mention the hilarious 'Hair-off' between Kirie and spiralhair girl.

Shuichi whyyyyyyyyyyyyyy?

straight outta the source material. props!

Don't expect to be scared senseless. Though Junji Ito's works are labeled as horror, there are only a handful that are truly frightening. Most are of the deliciously twisted category and all are very very interesting. Spiral has its moments, but its really just a demonstration of Junji Ito's talents at making crazy, creepy tales out of the most random subjects. This film isn't the sort of Japanese horror that leaves the viewer paranoid and dogged by nightmares for weeks, months, and years(maybe its just me). There is no real after effect. All those with a morbid fear of Asian horror cinema (like yours truly) can watch in peace and enjoy some very imaginative horror imagery.

Things that Struck Me:
I thought a film about spirals would make me motionsick. It didn't. In fact this film had the slowest, most drawn out camera pan out I've ever seen, and it didn't even amount to a scare scene!

Lots of green. I think its suppose to be eerie, but instead just reminds me of Goosebumps.

The film featured some really gross-out scenes. It was disturbing, but I interpreted it as absurdist humor.

The scariest & most ridiculous scene of the whole film

TL;DR
A quirky, non-scary Asian scary movie with a Spiral theme. Anyone who read the manga should give this a go. Anyone who hasn't should read the manga, and then give this a go. Its only three volumes. I finished it in one sitting in the public library.

Spiral film readiness test: if you're scared of this don't watch the film

Watch Uzumaki:

The Thing

1982 'Horror' movie by John Carpenter. One of those cult classic must watch things if one is a supposed horror fan, or something.

Spoilers:


I didn't bother following the plot, hearing 1/3 sentences, and still managed to get pretty much the whole story. It follows the tried and true classic formulas of alien/isolated group of people movies. Some alien thing crash into the frozen tundras and sneak into a nearby scientific base. A convenient snow storm then cuts off the base from the rest of the world. The alien has the ability to shape-shift or take over any body. It takes on the form of a dog first(I totally called it), then proceed to possess various men. The scientists go haywire second-guessing each other. The details are not important, whats important is the glorious flesh horror filling the screens. The Thing has some pretty gratuitous gore: its debut as an inside-out dog with intestinal tendrils, its melted twisted two-headed face, its chomping stomach..the list goes on. All in all, it was lovely to beheld. Bonus points for Kurt Russell's lion's mane.

Lion's Mane

Thoughts:


The Thing just seems like an unapologetic excuse for wacky gore. The whole thing is filled with 80s bad horror campy goodness, and watching it on a dingy hotel room TV really topped it off. One thing I did notice was the lack of any female characters. Maybe some of the dogs were female, but otherwise there was not a lick of feminine touch to this movie. It was refreshing, no contrived romantic subplot, which never has a proper place in horror movies. No low-topped blondes running through the screen screaming their heads off, which begs the question of who were the target audience for this flick? I suppose it could be due to the fact its that 'other' category of horror films, the sci-fi gone wrong sub-genre instead of the slasher-murder sub-genre, which usually have lower requirements of female influence. I honestly enjoyed this one.

So gross and yet, so artistic

Things that struck me:


Stomach-churningly good effects. This Carpenter guy's so awesome, doesn't afraid of anything! For all the cheesiness of the storyline and characters, the acting wasn't over the top. The ending was pretty bomb too, with the philosophical ambiguity, the resigned determination to die with The Thing. It went instantly from thoughtless horror to intriguing sci-fi in my book.

Upside down head spider-thing

TL;DR:
Shape-shifting meat blob vs. scientists with flame throwers. On ice!
Fun! Funny! Ridiculous gore to satisfy all your campy 80s horror needs.

Here's The Thing on youtube!