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With his latest film, Dream (sometimes translated as Sad Dream), Kim Ki-Duk is able to skirt the inevitable criticism his heavy symbolism and loose-ended surrealism often garners—because, hey, it’s about dreams. It doesn’t have to be rational, or even add up to an obvious conclusion. At first this works very much against the film; it’s so silly and unabashedly convoluted that it took me a couple sittings to get through. I like many of his films, and have avoided the ones that have less than stellar reputations. So, here I am thinking I’m finally seeing one of the crappy ones. I was exceedingly wrong. If you do make it past the half hour mark, and leave your cynicism temporarily at the door, you’ll be rewarded.

Dream stars Japanese actor Joe Odagiri, whom I gather is quite a big, and beloved star, but this is the first I’ve seen of him. He plays Jin, a character who speaks Japanese and is understood perfectly by his Korean-speaking fellow citizens (and vice versa) without explanation. He makes calligraphy adorned stamps and pines for his ex girlfriend. One night, a night which happens to occur at the very beginning of the film, he has a vivid dream which is acted out by a sleep walking woman in the same city (Ran, played by Na-yeong Lee). Together they take preventative measures—sleeping in shifts and later handcuffing themselves together—to stop these incidents. But they never seem to question how ridiculously insane the phenomenon is. This, and a straight-faced scene involving a therapist advising the two to fall in love with each other if they hope to be cured, may just have you rolling your eyes and checking your watch.

Somewhere along the way, almost as suddenly as waking up, Kim Ki-Duk injects the story with humor and charm long enough to regain attention and make the characters feel more or less human. And true to the auteur’s style, things become both stunningly, poetically beautiful, and (just as you’re starting to like, and care about everyone) horrific. The conclusion is, of course, a breathtaking head scratcher. As I mentioned before, some of Dream’s mysteries may be best left unlocked and allowed off the hook—for anything goes in the human subconscious, and who knows what’s what? Then again, these mysteries and contemplating them are more than half the fun. Why does Jin have no trouble understanding or being understood as a foreigner by everyone he encounters? Why do we never see the two characters with any friends or family, save for their respective exes? Is one, or both, of them a ghost or figment? What’s with the butterflies?

I don’t know, exactly, but I’d be willing to delve into this movie again. And I may even enjoy that prickly first half this time. Kim Ki-Duk seems to be getting increasingly romantic and tragic with his work (where it used to be mainly the latter), and his aesthetic suites it impeccably. What he’ll do next is once again something I will look forward to, with the same curiosity and eagerness I have for my favorite filmmakers.

After being roped in by the lyrical, lovely, and provocative teaser trailer, Lee Kang-sheng’s Help Me Eros became one of my most anticipated films at this year’s Vancouver International Film Festival. I even bumped Roy Andersson’s You, the Living off the schedule to see it–and I adore Songs from the Second Floor. Even so, I had no idea what it was supposed to be about, or what themes it would deal with (other than neon lights and naughty-costumed pleasure district workers). Now, after viewing it, I’m still not sure how I would describe the plot or issues tackled to the casual reader. It doesn’t have much in the way of either.

Lee’s film is concerned, first and foremost–if not entirely–with visual poetry. Somewhere in the haze of marijuana smoke, nude bodies and the aforementioned neon lights, there’s a wisp of a narrative. A male slacker (played by Lee) on a downhill spiral, who we’re to believe was once living the good life in a fancy apartment until his girlfriend jumped ship; he now spends his days growing and smoking weed, and calling a help line about his suicidal tendencies. There’s also the help line worker herself, an overweight, sex-starved lady whose chef husband is barely-secretly gay, and having an affair quite literally right under her nose. And, as the Elizabeth Shue to Lee’s Nic Cage, a pretty yet personality-devoid girl who mans the betelnut stand (in various skimpy, sex-fantasy outfits) he frequents. Together they drift through a gorgeous, dreamy wasteland–by turns entwined in a messy, acrobatic threesome with designer label logos projected onto their bodies, sharing a three-pronged pot pipe, or submerged in a bathtub full of live eels.

Sure, it could be said that “urban loneliness, drugs and oversexed culture never equals a happy ending” is the film’s theme, but I’m standing by my whole excuse-for-iconic-imagery interpretation. Help Me Eros may be all that meets the eye and nothing more, but maybe that is the point. With the Louis Vuitton references, and the depictions of our generation’s obsession with image (and I don’t just mean the oft-attacked superevil media–I mean egotistical myspace or facebook photos, fashion trends, etc.) as evidence–Lee’s film could almost be viewed as a moving, elaborate example of the image-is-everything mindset of today.

Every single frame here is painstakingly thought-out, as well as every outfit worn, and every sign or poster shown. Even more than the most superficial, easy-target Hollywood movie, or Warholian art piece, Help Me Eros is simply all image. Maybe this is what happens when that’s the only thing film is concerned with. And if that was the intention, it’s a brilliant experiment.

Or I’m giving it too much credit, and any depths it actually was shooting for were mostly lost in the gloss for me. But hey, it looked good. Did I mention that?

I–for reasons including: Shiina Ringo’s score, liking Anna Tsuchiya, and seeing positive buzz–expected great things from the manga-based Sakuran. Regrettably, while I was defensive of my husband’s “this looks kinda like Memoirs of a Geisha” opinions at first (they’re Oiran, not Geisha!), it turned out to be only marginally better than that by-the-numbers piece of frivolous girl power/love story confectionery. And without Tsuchiya’s wild child persona and charisma as the title character, it wouldn’t even have that going for it.

First time director Mika Ninagawa has a rich visual pallette, but squanders it on a dozen too many goldfish-in-a-bowl metaphor shots, and lovely but highly unoriginal sequences of cherry blossom petals, falling poetically to the ground. I haven’t read the manga, but I would venture a guess, going off the movie’s myriad cliches, that she followed it very faithfully. It seems the biggest, if not only, risk she took was having Shiina Ringo compose the film’s score. And, I must admit, hearing “Gamble” blaring over Sakuran’s coronation was perfect in execution and song use. Unfortunately, the pros end here.

Sakuran‘s ending can be guessed within the first ten minutes of the film; all that’s left to do is sit back and (try to) enjoy the imagery, whilst ignoring the many genre trappings Ninagawa and co. fall into. Though it’s been compared to Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette in its excessive costume fetishism and modern touches, that film felt fresh and approached a story we all knew from an interesting angle. Sakuran takes a story most of us didn’t know, and made it one that was painfully familiar. And when all is said and done, no matter how captivating the lead actress is, or how breathtaking the cinematography, that makes for a mediocre movie at best.

The many American studios vying for remake rights to Bong Joon-ho’s masterful blockbuster, The Host, seem to be missing a big part of the picture here. The film—while on the surface an old-fashioned King Kong-esque monster movie—is very unforgiving to U.S. foreign policies (and otherwise), to the point of bordering on being anti-American. Despite this, it’s managed to gross over a million here, in limited theatrical release. This is one I pray opens in my area, because (Canadian that I am) seeing it with a crowd of the flick’s targets would be quite an experience.

Right off the bat, Bong refuses to mince cinematic words by having a creepy, cartoonishly unreasonable American man (played by the dad in Junebug) instruct his nice, sensible Korean assistant to dump a whole lot of formaldehyde down the drain—knowing, and acknowledging, that it will ultimately end up in the Han River. It’s a moment that would be scoff-inducing and cheesy in its bold-faced unfairness, if it weren’t clearly done in satirical humor.

A few years later, those actions have produced a massive mutant sea (well, river) monster hell-bent on chowing down at the all-you-can-eat buffet local onlookers and unsuspecting tourists. The story narrows its focus (storywise) from here, onto a hapless ragtag family: an immature father, working for his own father at a small food stand, to support his preteen daughter, and said immature father’s brother (a college grad) and sister (a professional archer). They band together, in a touching display of bickering loyalty and constantly thwarted heroics, when their daughter/granddaughter/niece is snatched by the creature.

Unfortunately, authorities—by way of received orders from the U.S.A—are saying anyone who comes in contact with the mutant-fish needs to be quarantined in order to contain a deadly, highly-contagious (and highly-suspicious in its lack of details) virus. Before long, the entire family finds themselves forced to break out of a government hospital because no one believes that they’ve got a girl to save. The Kafkaesque absurdity on display as the surgical-mask sporting doctors shuffle around, administering anonymous medicine, and giving insincere reassurances, is nightmarishly gutsy—and executed awfully well.

The sometimes metaphorical, sometimes literal political commentary here is viciously funny, and more than a little disturbing. It’s this—even aside from the exhilarating, authentically thrilling popcorn fun at hand—that makes The Host deserving of the praise its been honored with, and then some. It’s the sort of film that gets me, at the risk of sounding extremely dorky and Ebertish, excited about movies. And relieved to be Canadian.

Between the frenetic quick-cuts, oversaturated, hyper-stylized visual language, and exaggerated, zany characters in Kamikaze Girls lies a thoughtful, affecting female friendship piece. The film also serves as solid evidence that director Tetsuya Nakashima can actually handle women much better than sophomore effort Memories of Matsuko would suggest.

Singer/actress Kyoko Fukada (the object-of-obsession pop star in Kitano’s Dolls) plays a disaffected teen living in rural Japan, and conveying what little personality and self-worth she has through her favorite style of dress: Lolita. For those unfamiliar, Lolita (usually paired with a Gothic in front) fashion is, more or less, frilly Victorian dresses and bonnets, most famously found in internationally known shops like Baby, the Stars Shine Bright (featured in the movie), and Metamorphose. Fukada’s Momoko asserts that her fascination with the decadent lifestyle of the similarly-outfitted Rococo period is the reason she wears the get-ups. At 17, she’s the right age to pull it off without being creepy or pity-inspiring, but is still an outcast in her farming village surroundings.

Eventually Momoko burns through her resources and finds herself too broke to feed her “happiness” (i.e. Lolita clothes). She remedies this by selling her dad’s old Versace bootlegs to a local, rough-around-the-edges girl biker Ichiko (Anna Tsuchiya). So grateful for the discounted price Momoko charges her for the junk, Ichiko starts to hang around. Little by little—through soul-baring confessions, favors, scooter trips, and head butts—Ichiko wears down Momoko’s indifferent exterior and the two become, yes, unlikely friends. This development is handled subtly, and with minimal cheese. The two leading ladies make it all very believable, and very adorable, right up to the mildly badass ending showdown.

Coincidentally, I’d recently revisited two of my favorite extreme/thriller films (Japan’s 2LDK, and Hong Kong’s Koma), which also happen to deal with the unreasonable love/hate nature of many (if not most) female relationships. While in the former two, the girls express their ‘hate’ phases much more violently, Momoko and Ichiko’s bond still fits perfectly next to them as an excellent depiction of the xx/xx dynamic. And they didn’t even have to fight over some man to get there.

One of the marks of a great director is, of course, the ability to try—and effortlessly succeed at—doing something wholly unexpected of them. With the lighthearted samurai satire Hana Yori mo Naho, usually cinematically-somber Hirokazu Kore’eda (After Life, Maborosi) accomplishes the former. True, his films have never been depressing (they’re the opposite, if anything), or heavy-handedly serious; but I doubt anyone, least of all me, saw this coming. From slapstick to shit jokes, to gentle romantic comedy, Hana’s closer to Kitano’s Zatoichi than anything Kore’eda himself has done.

Our hero Soza (played nicely by Okada Junichi) is, to those around him, anything but: he’s residing in a tiny village, half-heartedly searching for his father’s killer (in order to avenge him via doing away with the perp), but mostly just wooing a local widow (Rie Miyazawa, of the loosely comparable Twilight Samurai) with a cute 8 year old son. Poking fun at samurai culture (more specifically, the 47 Ronin legends and such), and the senseless violence found in its “honor system,” the film is free of glamorized—or otherwise, for that matter—fight sequences. Kore’eda’s protagonist has as little interest in glorified revenge as the director himself. He even, along with fellow villagers, participates in a play parodying the rogue warriors.

It all sounds good on paper. Hana’s concept and values are certainly worthy of admiration. Kore’eda, however, doesn’t quite find his footing here: in spots where the comedy shines, the drama and realism are being overlooked—and vice versa. The film’s tone rarely resembles anything that could be called “even.” It also happens to be overlong (yes, it’s a period piece, but a lighthearted farce as well, and this length is unnecessary), lacking in the satisfying-conclusion department, and—perhaps an unfair criticism—it’s nowhere near as good as any top form Kore’eda film.

All of that aside, Hana is just the sort of film you could never hate. Unless you’re completely soulless, or something. If nothing else, it’s a charming diversion, and a captivatingly flawed experiment from an already established master. Underwhelming as it may be, it somehow makes me respect him even more.

Proclaiming itself a “fairy tale tragedy,” Memories of Matsuko is one of the more morally ambiguous flights of musical fancy I’ve come across. Director Tetsuya Nakashima (Kamikaze Girls) imbues this novel adaptation of a hapless girl’s decade-spanning existence with flourishing colors, show-stopping tunes, and a flawless cast—but the position the film holds, the message it’s trying to give, is hard to read.

The title character begins the film as a box of ashes, in possession of her formerly estranged brother, after being beaten to death near a river. Said brother hands the task of emptying Matsuko’s apartment to his son Sho, her nephew. As Sho fishes through his late aunt’s filthy, unlivable apartment, he unravels the details of her life after leaving home and being disowned by her family. Nakashima does a bang-up job with the visuals, the music, and the way both fit into their respective time periods. For the first half of the 130 minute runtime, it’s an utter delight.

Unfortunately, as Godlike figure Matsuko, the incredibly impressive Miki Nakatani is screwed over by nearly everyone she meets, while drifting from one abusive relationship to the next. She remains loyal, loving, and forgiving to the men who treat her like trash—an unpleasant trait that seems meant to provoke admiration. Too often her suffering is accompanied by zany music and comedy-scene camera angles. It’s a shame, because there are genuinely hilarious, touching moments here that are cheapened because of it.

Oddly enough, the film is nearly redeemed entirely by Asuka Kurosawa as a tough, smart, sexy pornstar/business woman friend of Matsuko’s—one of the few characters who never hurts her, physically or otherwise, and encourages her to leave her current Yakuza-member boyfriend. She breezes into the movie just as it’s starting to feel icky from the barrage of black eyes and Stepford Wife mannerisms our heroine displays, and steals the show, without even having a musical number.