South Korean Kim Je-woon' made his feature debut with the 1998 The
Quiet Family (Joyonghan
gajok/Choy onghan kajok) a black
and quirky horror comedy with future big South Korean film stars as
Song Kang-ho and Choi Min-sik in the cast.
1998 The Quiet Family
Takashi Miike made his unique and very entertaining
re-make in 2001 with The
Happiness of the Katakuris (Katakuri
ke no Kofuku)
where he added clay animation stop motion and musical
numbers to the mix. 2001, aaah, one of Miike's most creative years where
he
exploded with wild versatile filmmaking and made a whole bunch of films.
Surely the Miike decade 1995-2005 must be one of the most
impressive decades any film director has ever had.
A japanese family, The Katakuris, has bought an isolated
Guest-house up in the mountains because they've heard a rumour that
a
major new road will be built close by and they expect a lot of guests
will turn up because of that.
The Katakuris are Grandfather Masao (Kenji Sawada), Grandmother Terue
(Keiko Matsuzaka, Mother Shizue (Naomi Nishida), Uncle
Masayuki, the ex-criminal (Shinji Takeda), Great Grandfather Nihei (Tetsuro
Tanba), the little girl Yurie and Pochi The Dog. A big family
that help each other with running the guest-house, working together,
staying together and singing together. A Miike Ode to the Family.
There's only one problem .... they've NO guests.
Finally their first guest arrives, a quiet mannered
middle-aged man. He takes a room and he's found dead the next morning,
having
committed suicide. No-one will stay at their guest-house if it's known
that their guest has died, so they bury the body.
Their next guest is a Sumo wrestler and his little girlfriend .... and,
yes, you guessed it, they die too when having sex in a bizarre
way. The big guy has a heart attack and crushes his girlfriend and the
family has to use their shovels again digging a grave.
The story is interrupted by musical numbers performed by the Family
and the dead bodies rises from their graves as Zombies.
My favourite scene from both films when a miserable
looking family turn up and wants the cheapest room. Suspected deaths
are
a coming, and in Miike's film the girl is playing her flute and acts
very ominously looking sickly.
The film is presented in widescreen 1.78:1 with japanese
audio LPCM stereo and with english subtitles, region B
Extras: An audio commentary with Takashi Miike and actor Tokitoshi Shiota
(he played the first suicide guest) in japanese with
english subtitles, Another audio commentary by Tom Mes, a Making Of
THOTK (31 minutes, japanese with english subtitles),
a very fine Interview with Takashi Miike (2015 Arrow Video 39 minutes
in japanese with english subtitles), Archival interviews
in japanese with english subtitles with Takashi Miike (5 minutes), Kenji
Sawada (5 minutes), Keiko Matsuzaka (2 minutes),
Kiyoshiro Imawano and Shinji Takeda (4 minutes), Naomi Nishida (2 minutes)
and Tetsuro Tanba (4 minutes), Animating the
Katakuris, Dogs, Pimps and Agitators - Tom Mes narrating a visual essay
on Takashi Miike's career (24 minutes, 2015), Trailer
