Description: Yuichi is in the 8th grade and worships Lily Chou-Chou, a Bjork-like chanteuse whose music is lush and transcendent – the perfect tool to escape the pain and anxiety that fills his brutal life in Japan. At home, Yuichi rarely leaves his room, spending all his time in the chat room of Lily Chou-Chou’s fan website, but little by little, the reality of Yuichi’s offline life becomes unbearable when he is ensnared in a nightmare of teenage prostitution, petty theft, and possible murder. A hauntingly poetic story in the vein of Battle Royale, All About Lily Chou-Chou is a disturbing look at the terror and isolation that characterizes today’s youth of Japan.
Amazon.com: The pain and suffering of junior high is always good movie fodder, and in All About Lily Chou-Chou the topic gets an unfamiliar and moody airing. Director Shunji Iwai takes a discursive, sometimes baffling look into the life of a bullied kid whose misery is broken by his worship of a pop star, Lily Chou-Chou. Internet chat room exchanges punctuate the film's narrative, as Yuichi and his anonymous Lily-philes share their intoxication with the "Ether"--the mystery of life that Lily's voice somehow illuminates. The film's style (and length) offer little in the way of traditional movie-watching pleasure, and the mystifying storytelling will have some viewers giving up in exasperation. Still, the portrait of adolescent loneliness rings true, and the ferocity of school bullying is laid bare. On the latter subject, this film is a little like the kill-or-be-killed apocalypse of Battle Royale, without the fantasy overlay. --Robert Horton
A 21st century classic, but poor DVD transfer To get it out of the way, this DVD by Home Vision is a poor transfer which does a great injustice to a beautifully shot classic. It's a grainy, blurry travesty... BUT, it's the easiest way to see the film in English.
As for the movie itself, All About Lily Chou-Chou is a Japanese film portraying the lives of Japanese high school students engaged in, well, the darkest and worst aspects of human behavior. This came out amidst a wave of Japanese "teens gone wild" films, the most notorious being Battle Royale, but Lily is the intellectual crown of the genre (if that's what you want to call it). It's long and confusing (you should watch it twice), but infinitely rewarding for someone willing to enjoy the gorgeous cinematography while being patient with the plot.
It's the magnum opus of director Shunji Iwai, who was already famous in Japan and throughout Asia for intelligent romances such as Love Letter and more arty films like Swallowtail Butterfly. The film stars the best young actor in Japan, the fiery Shugo Oshinari, and the soundtrack is a near-classic unto itself.
I like to compare Lily to the great novel, One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, in that they are both works of art that encompass the absolute entirety of human experience: power, defeat, suicide, transcendence, revenge, vindication, pride, murder, rape, justice, victory, acceptance, happiness and utter misery. Lily can be interpreted as a metaphorical history of mankind, told in two and a half hours... or at least that's my take on it!
One of the greatest Japanese films of all time (in company with Kurosawa or anyone else you'd care to name) and the first truly great movie about the Internet (not like there's much competition on that one... anyone gonna argue for You've Got Mail?). Lily is one of those rare films that gets people *obsessed*-- small but dedicated online communities thrive to this day-- which is usually a sign that it's at least worth a watch.
Simply put... ...this is a wonderful film. Fanstastic music, cinematography, acting, and story. A brilliant piece of work from director Shunji Iwai. My favorite film of all time. Buy it. Now. ;)
Mostly about nothing Compiled mostly from the internet stories of Japanese kids, ALL ABOUT LILY CHOU CHOU is as visionary as it is excsssive, and equal parts riveting and excruciatingly dull. The fact that we're talking abou the same film suggests that there's a wild inconsistency in Shunji Iwai's story.
The story, as such, is remarkably simple: a bullied teenage boy in rural Japan retreats into a fannish love for pop idol Lily Chou Chou, whose ballads embody his isolation and hopelessness. The onus of bullyiing is spread on this framework - a kind of social Darwinism from which some do not escape. The details of the film cover fairly mundane, everyday life of its young characters, conveyed through a range of film techniques: wide-screen, jerky video, narrative...even a computer screen. As such, the film may come off as a technical tour de force for some.
The subject matter can be brutal, and it's up to the viewer to determine whether courage or excess is in evidence. If you're not adverse to watching scenes of gang-rape and torture, you'll to contend with stretches of the film that require a great deal of patience; certainly, the fast-forward button may be an agreeable middle ground for most viewers. But even fans admit the film's inconsistent storyline and pretentiousness. You may find yourself saying, "Do I have to sit here and watch this?" ALL ABOUT LILY CHOU CHOU offered me nothing I hadn't seen before, better, and really quite often.
Powerful, mesmerizing, and perhaps one of the most nostalgic movies around. Simply put, this is a new favorite of mine. It's gone to the top of my list, and will for surely stay there for quite some time.
Everything about the movie is fantastic. The acting, the directing, the story... Especially the use of light and natural beauty. Really, somehow Shunji Iwai has conquered the impossible: he's captured some of the most beautiful images I've ever seen on film. And the best thing is, those images have meaning. The film's other highest point is the soundtrack: it's absolutely amazing. Of course, there's the instrumental music here and there, which is high quality, but the REAL meat of the soundtrack is the songs from Lily Chou Chou, the singer Yuichi worships and finds solace and peace in (despite his wretched life). The tracks we get to hear (I think there's only about four or five) are just amazingly... beautiful. They're so poetic that it's hard to describe, but Lily's voice is so... magnetic and strong. I could listen to the tracks over and over again and not get bored of them AT ALL (they're that absorbing).
The movie shows so realistically growing up is, and to quote the dvd cover, it's "viciously" honest, and they're not lyin.
If you want a true visual and emotional masterpiece, don't dare miss this film.
Incredible movie; terrible DVD That's 5/5 for the film itself and 1/5 for this edition. First off, this is one of my favourite movies, and while it's not for everyone, I would recommend it unreservedly, because if it works for you then the payoff is tremendous. However, I must warn against this Home Vision version for a first taste of the film. The transfer to DVD in this version is so awful that it goes beyond mere misjudgement, and debate continues about how Home Vision -- a company with an excellent track record with Asian releases -- could have allowed its release. These aren't subtle differences only noticed by fanatics and cinemaphiles; they're huge. It actually looks like it was booklegged from a theatre with a hand-held handicam. But apparently it wasn't, and that's scary. With regard to the video, the least serious problem is digital artifacting and loss of detail caused by squeezing a 2.5-hour movie plus special features onto a single DVD. That's a marketing decision, and somewhat understandable. What's not understandable is the incredible graininess that has somehow been introduced into the film. Or the great reduction in contrast and brightness -- the vivid colours of the original were a trademark, yet now everything looks like it was filmed in late afternoon on an overcast day. Even the colour balance has been changed, so that skin tones have a greyish-blue look -- there are no pure whites left (another trademark). And finally, the picture actually shakes -- this is most noticable during the many scenes of typed text. For most, this would be bad enough, but for me, the audio is even worse than the video -- the worst attempt at dynamic compression I can remember hearing in a film. Yes, the parts that are supposed to be quiet are way too loud, and the parts that are supposed to be loud are way too quiet, but most annoyingly, whenever there's a song playing it sounds like there's some 5-year old kid rapidly flicking the volume knob up
Anything Goes Trivia
Megaton Man
Not Available Comics
Tony's Online Tips
Trevor
