Usagi Yojimbo DojoBoard

Paprika reached a somewhat local theater for me last week, so I took a chance and went to see it (in Japanese with English sub-titles). Has anyone else seen this? Here are two reviews I noticed:

SciFi Weekly:
http://www.scifi.com/sfw/screen/sfw15845.html

Arizona Republic:
http://www.azcentral.com/ent/movies/art ... a0706.html


I think the first one is a little too enthusiastic, while the second one is a little harsh (perhaps the reviewer was annoyed at having to review a "cartoon"). I can see where both are coming from though depending on mood.

I do, however, agree with the reviewer that the R rating might be a bit strict, except for one thing: I don't think it got the R for the scene that reviewer suggests. There's a scene with some slight sexual content he doesn't mention. On balance though it is plenty less disturbing than the tons of violence that passes for PG-13 these days.

There's one song from the soundtrack I enjoyed, and I think it is called Mediational Field, so maybe I'll track that tune down one day.

I can't wait to see this! I live near Dartmouth college and they're going to screen it soon!

I watched Paprika on DVD this afternoon, and I enjoyed it for the most part, but I felt like it sort of evaporated once it was over. I think that Satoshi Kon is a very skilled animator and a talented pop filmmaker, but I don't think that he's really made a great film yet (I would say that the closest he's come so far is the miniseries Paranoia Agent).

There were some things I liked about the film, such as a character wearing the same type of cap and sunglasses as Akira Kurosawa explaining the "180 degree rule" (However, I would have liked it a little more if he pointed out that some filmmakers, such as Yasujiro Ozu, have more or less ignored this rule).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/180_degree_rule

Kon included some other things that were kind of interesting, such as Paprika dressed up like Monkey from Journey to the West and flying around on a cloud, but they sometimes felt a bit random and pointless.

People who are interested in Japanese cultural artifacts like the Maneki Neko and Daruma Dolls (thanks again to Stan for giving me information about the latter) might be interested in this film since they show up in the "parade" scenes.

Even if I think it fell short of being an entirely successful movie, I would still recommend this movie to anime fans. It runs a brisk 85 minutes or so, and it has pretty nice visuals. I would warn potential viewers that the song in the opening credits will get stuck in your head for a day or two.

I found the movie's opening credits sequence on YouTube. Even if I was slightly lukewarm on the movie as a whole, I liked the opening credits a lot:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=xqg3Sw3s9Wg

Jet_Jaguar wrote:
There were some things I liked about the film, such as a character wearing the same type of cap and sunglasses as Akira Kurosawa explaining the "180 degree rule" (However, I would have liked it a little more if he pointed out that some filmmakers, such as Yasujiro Ozu, have more or less ignored this rule).

I found a screencap from this scene:





I've looked around for a cap like the one Kurosawa always wore while directing movies, anyone know where I can get one? According to the English Wikipedia page on Akira Kurosawa, the cap and sunglasses were a gift from John Ford:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akira_kurosawa