As a long time Sono Sion fan, this movie has been on my to watch list for a very long time until today when I decided to restart my Netflix subscription and give it a go.
The Forest of Love is a movie about two girls who were going to be in an all girl Romeo and Juliet play in high school, a sleazy conman Murata Joe played by Kippei Shina and three guys wanting to shoot a movie and submit to a film festival who get involved with the girls and Murata Joe.
The Forest of Love feels like Sono Sion in his element but it also feels like a Sono Sion greatest hits movie because there are so many elements from his previous movies thrown in. However after the disappointing Shinjuku Swan 2 which I should have written about its good to see Sono Sion on top form.
Sono Sion is probably Japan's best director along with Koreeda Hirokazu. He knows how to frame shots and create great dialogue scenes that you can't turn your eyes away from.
If I have one complaint its that the movie did not need to be 2 and a half hours. A good editor could have easily trimmed it to 2 hours and the story would have been more impactful.
I am glad Netflix gave him all this money to make a movie but I wish they had given him a shorter leash in terms of runtime.
A word of warning: The Forest of Love is a sick and disgusting film and not a movie you want to watch if you want to feel good. I actually thought about stopping halfway because I thought it might be too heavy after a stressful day at work.
The Forest of Love is Sono Sion near the top of his game and could have been a must watch with better editing. There is a tv series version of this on Netflix which might play better or it might not.
I was actually worried about which one to watch first and decided to go with the movie because it came out first. I still have not watched the tv show version of Love Exposure yet.
Please support and watch on Netflix so Sono Sion can make more movies for them!
Very watchable movie that is not on the level of Love Exposure but is very Sono Sion and every memorable. For fans of Ryu ga Gotoku 7 aka Like a Dragon, Kamataki Eri from the game is in the movie!
I agree, it was not an easy movie to stomach!
ReplyDeleteI also watched this cut, only later they released the extended version.. maybe it has some more exposure time for some characters.
Some time ago I watched the extended version of Love Exposure (just a good reason to watch it again!) but honestly I can't remember any particular detail about the extra ~30 min.. but maybe it's just my memory fading away ;)
Last Sion Sono movie I watched was "Red Post on Escher Street", it has some charm but not one of his best, imho.
I didn't watch yet, but if you thought the movie was too long, they even released 'The Forest of Love - Deep Cut', which is apparently the movie stretched out in to a serialized drama.
ReplyDeleteI watched the series version and try to like it, but its such tiring experience. Kind of weird why they give the budget for the series just to put unnecessary stuff in it and bogged down the entire story.
ReplyDeletethought movie was a mess since i read the nonfiction book sono sion read to inspire parts of this. korosareta ikka - kitakyuushuu kankin renzoku satsujin jiken
ReplyDeletedid you read about the atrocious crimes committed by matsunaga futoshi/ogata junko? half the movie is just the director reenacting stuff from that nonfiction book while changing all the circumstances/settings which makes it so that the characters act illogically etc/
i cringed at the part where he literally copy-pasted text from the nonfiction book for the dialogue ie when murata is telling them how to take care of the dead bodies. it felt so unnatural... the book is excellent btw and i recommend it if you read japaense on the kindle or the something. if not go check out the wiki etc
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