I Don't Remember What Happened

I saw a couple of movies last week and they were pretty good. I remember what I meant to write because I wrote down the details on some vanity post-it notes that my aunt brought back from Hawaii. Sorry, but I'm running out of photos to add to my posts. I've asked that Foxy take less Jabba-the-Huttish photos in the future. Ali is quick to defend the photos, pointing out that the growth charts provided by Kyoto First Red Cross indicate that Foxy's size is only average. Skype Video stills function rocks, but Skype VOIP sucks.

After I watched the films, I went out with Orange Peel and J for an evening of consumption. Stupidly high levels of consumption. After leaving the greek restaurant, we went across the street. I was thinking that we were going to head up Christopher Street to catch the train back to Newark, but I must have been wrong. I stopped to pet these two wolf-cross pups that I recognized from Ali's shop and then quickly realized that I had been separated from OP and J. I panicked. I don't know how far up Chris I got, but I remember losing my footing and going down hard. I scuffed up my wedding band pretty bad, ruined my favourite pair of Mavi's, and took a nasty case of road rash. I remember sitting up and refusing assistance. I didn't want to go to the hospital because I still haven't got insurance.

The next thing I remember is singing a nasty song about security guards in the lift in my building. As I sit here listening to Frank Black's selection on BBC 6 Music's 6 Mix and balancing my chequebook, the paper trail shows quite clearly that I paid for a train ticket. That makes me wonder how gooned I really was. I couldn't have been that far gone because I would have had to remember a PIN and manage to punch it into the keypad without fatfingering it, and then recognize the correct station to get off at. That nasty encounter with the tarmac must have caused temporary memory loss, because there is about an hour's gap that I don't remember. If it was the result of intoxication, then how could I have functioned so well and managed not to get mugged, or worse?

I spent the next few days nursing various scrapes and bruises, feeling a bit like Colin from The Brittas Empire, who by the way had the best Welsh accent going on TV. I will say though, that the best Welsh speaker on the BBC in my opinion is Gruff Rhys from Super Furry Animals. Not that I listen to Radio Cymru or anything. As for OP and J, they left me at the wolf-cross pups, and went into the bar.

I think I have a new favourite director, at least for 1970s Japanese cinema. Kinji Fukasaku directed Batoru rowaiaru and is probably best known to Western audiences for that. He came from the same city, and was born at about the same time as one of Ali's grandfathers, so he can't have been all that bad. I saw Yakuza no hakaba: Kuchinashi no hana or Yakuza Graveyard. I know, the translation makes no sense, but this is only one of the English titles they used. The film stars my favourite Japanese actress Meiko Kaji as a half-Korean wife of a Yakuza leader. While her husband is in prison, possibly getting pearls buried in his bellend, she is in charge of the organization. There has been a recent rise in yakuza activity in the city, which has embarrassed officials so they have decided to crack down on gambling. They recruit Kuroiwa, played by Tetsuya Watari to broker a peace between the rival gangs. Kuroiwa is the clichéd "tough as nails" cop who has been transferred back into his unit after being cleared by internal affairs. He quickly makes friends with Keiko, played by Kaji and starts an affair with her. She doesn't mind, her husband thinks she's a whore already. She gets no respect from the organization because she is not full Japanese, but finds an unexpected ally in one of the underbosses who, although he has lived his entire life in Japan, is full Korean. The underboss makes a pact with Kuroiwa, who is now too far into the organization that he risks dismissal. The underboss is killed, and Kuroiwa feels that he has lost a brother. The cop goes through a series of internal conflicts, but eventually Kuroiwa decides that the yakuza are his real friends and resigns from his job, but not before he wastes two of his superiors who are corrupt. As he walks out of police headquarters, he is gunned down in front of Keiko. I grew up in the 1970s and this is exactly the kind of stuff they used to show on television in shows like Kojak and others. I was right at home watching this and wanted to watch more. Luckily for me, the video shop has plenty of Fukasaku's work for rent.

Now to the post-it notes: I rented Joshuu sasori: Dai-41 zakkyo-bô or Female Convict Scorpion Jailhouse 41, the sequel to Joshuu 701-gô: Sasori. Of course, this stars Meiko Kaji who curiously says nothing until the penultimate scene of the movie. Kaji plays Matsu, the incorrigible prisoner who is chained in a pit in the basement of the prison. She is released into the general population while a dignitary visits. She refuses to bend and during the confusion, her fellow inmates who hate her decide to riot. The riot is quelled, and the inmates are punished. The warden decides that he has to teach a lesson to the inmates so he tries to make an example of Matsu. He sends a group of officers to gang rape her while she is working in a prison quarry. During the ride back to the prison, the other female prisoners attack her, I guess because they hate themselves that much or something. One of the prisoners is convinced that Matsu is dead and persuades the guards to stop the van. As they open the back of the van, the females overpower the males and pretty much flee. One guy is shot to death or choked out and the other bleeds out after the inmates use his crotch as a posthole. Prolific but very unconvincing use of tomato sauce in this scene.

The group of seven inmates manage to find refuge in a shack at a coal mine. There they discover a mysterious old woman who feels that she is cause of the evil things that these inmates have done. A note on the continuity here: They find the woman in a shack that collapses in a windstorm. The next time we see the old lady, the shack has been rebuilt around her. I forget what happens to the old lady, but a police dog flushes out the inmates. They manage to flee to a town where they hide in a workshed. There's a lot of lesbian wrestling in the background in this scene, and they somehow take a hostage. When the police come looking for the hostage, one of the inmates gets shot and bleeds out later under a waterfall as they run from the police. Symbolically, the waterfall turns red. The remaining six inmates encounter a busload of tourists, some of whom chase down one of the girls and gang rape her and accidentally drown her. They toss her over the falls. When the remaining inmates discover her body, the river turns red. They manage to hijack the tour bus and take their inadequate revenge on the three guys who killed their friend. A disagreement occurs between the leader and Matsu, and they toss her out of the bus. They use the bus to negotiate police roadblocks, kinda like that Clint Eastwood movie, but eventually high-centre on the verge. The police send Matsu in to try and convince the inmates to surrender. She goes in, but promises the leader that she's as good as dead. She goes back to the police and tells them that she could do nothing. The chick with the rifle runs out of ammunition and the police take the four remaining inmates into custody.

Somehow, Matsu escapes and hunts down the warden who is preparing to retire in order to exact her revenge. She appears in her trademark black hat, and I totally forget what happened. I think she tries to blind the warden's other eye, or she kills him. Maybe she gets caught, I don't know. As the closing credits roll, the theme song plays, the very same song, and version even that Quentin Tarantino "borrowed" for Kill Bill. Another musical mention: Shunsuke Kikuchi scored original music for this film. He is apparently very adept at using the mouth organ. The film was released through Toei Company, the company with perhaps the best strip logo in the business. Best ever.