Product Description

Despite his outrageous mockery of facsist ideology by linking it to the raging hormones of a frustrated male adolescent, Fighting Elegy is the most serious of maverick director Seijun Suzuki's (Gate of Flesh, Youth Of The Beast) delir

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #69485 in VHS
• Released on: 2000-06-06
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Formats: Black & White, Letterboxed, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of tapes: 1
• Running time: 86 minutes

Amazon.com
Nanbu Kiroki (Hideki Takahashi) is a typical schoolboy with an extreme reaction to adolescence. Smitten with cute-as-a-button Catholic schoolgirl Michiko (Junko Asano) but repressed by social convention and religious teaching, he finds fighting to be the perfect outlet for his bursting sexuality. Joining a gang of school toughs (whose rule to swear off girls makes him even more conflicted), he soon transforms himself from a shy underclassman to a brazen school tough whose motto is "All school rules must be rebelled against." Leaving Michiko's attempts to tame his savage heart unheeded, Kiroki completes his new identity when, transferred to a rural school, he leads his followers against a militarist gang in a brutal, no-holds-barred battle. Adapted from Takashi Suzuki's novel by fellow director Shindo Kaneto (whose own films include Onibaba and The Island), this satirical jab at the fascist uprisings of 1930s Japan finds the roots of juvenile delinquency in raging hormones (Suzuki's outrageous sexual metaphors suggest Kiroki exists in a perpetual state of arousal). The political and historical references will likely mean little to American viewers (the tape's liner notes help somewhat on this account), but the connection between sexual frustration and ritualistic fighting crosses all cultures. Suzuki's style, while less defiantly rebellious and narratively jagged than in his gangster thrillers, such as Branded to Kill and Tokyo Drifter, is just as energetic and forceful as his best work in the mix of tough guy clichés, frenzied fighting scenes, and quiet moments of tender beauty. --Sean Axmaker

Customer Reviews

Brute Comic Satire on the Rise of Japanese Fascism
After watching "Fighting Elegy," I'm convinced Suzuki, little known here in the states, is one of our living masters of film. Suzuki is incomparable, though if an analogy is appropriate, he might be considered the japanese counterpart to Scorsese. Fighting Elegy, a coming-of-age film set in the prewar years, is a deft, dazzling, fast-paced satire on the rise of fascism amongst the teen set. According to the code of militant asceticism and self-denial that has swept the the all-male schools of Japan, "Love is for sissies," leaving the film's hapless protagonist torn between his love for a local girl,... and the bully code of school yard warrior glory. Suzuki moves with a breathless, freewheeling ease between the farce of youth violence with its absurd quest for honor and the tender, humbling comedy of painful first love. Inundated with samurai fare, american audiences will find this early sixties b&w film an astonishing leap into 20th century japanese social history that they are rarely given an opportunity to see. Exceptionally rewarding!

another rare find
mr. suzuki has done it again. not as visually wild as his other outings (branded,tokyo drifter) but neither the less its seijin and you can tell. lots of symbolism and intricate camera movements. I wish for more suzuki classics to be released here. the tamer visual flare on this one works, if fits the subject, if it were shot as wild as his other films i think it would be over stylized. a perfectly shot film and well paced.