Uneven but worthwhile.
Tokyo! (2009)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:60
Fresh:45
Rotten:15
Average Rating:6.3/10
Consensus: An imaginative, if uneven, love letter to a city that signals a great creative enterprise by its three contributing directors.
Rated: Not Rated
Genre: Foreign Films
Theatrical Release:Mar 6, 2009 Limited
Box Office: $221,597
Synopsis:
In Tokyo!, three visionary directors (Michel Gondry, Leos Carax and Bong Joon-ho) come together for an omnibus triptych examining the nature of one unforgettable city as it’s shaped by the...
In Tokyo!, three visionary directors (Michel Gondry, Leos Carax and Bong Joon-ho) come together for an omnibus triptych examining the nature of one unforgettable city as it’s shaped by the disparate people who live, work (and run amok) inside an enormous, constantly evolving, densely populated Japanese megalopolis -- the enchanting and inimitable Tokyo.
Interior Design (Michel Gondry).
A young couple tries to set themselves up in Tokyo. The young man's ambition is clear -- to become a film director. His girlfriend, far more indecisive, cannot escape the vague feeling that she's losing control of her life. Directionless, both are beginning to go under in this vast city until the young woman, utterly alone, becomes the object of a bizarre transformation...
Merde(Leos Carax)
A mysterious creature spreads panic in the streets of Tokyo by means of his provocative and destructive behavior. This man, dubbed "The Creature of the Sewers" by the media, arouses both passion and repulsion...until the moment he is captured...
<>
Shaking Tokyo (Bong Joon-Ho)
For more than 10 years, he's been a hikikomori. He lives shut up in his apartment, strictly limiting all contact with the outside world to an absolute minimum. When a pizza delivery girl faints in his home during an earthquake, the unthinkable happens -- he falls in love. Shortly after, he learns that the girl has in turn become a hikikomori. Will he dare cross the threshold that separates his apartment from the rest of the world?
Rhapsody, psychogeography, urban valentine, freak show, mindwalk and many other things, Tokyo! is a fantasy in three movements that will make you see one of the world’s greatest cities -- if not any city -- with a new point of view.
In the tradition of such films as New York Stories, Night on Earth, Paris Je T'Aime and its forthcoming sequel New York I Love You, Tokyo! addresses the timeless question of whether we shape cities, or if cities shape us -- while in the process, revealing the rich humanity at the heart of modern urban life.
--© Official Site
Starring: Yuu Aoi, Jean-Francois Balmer, Julie Dreyfus, Ayako Fujitani
Starring: Yuu Aoi, Jean-Francois Balmer, Julie Dreyfus, Ayako Fujitani, Ryo Kase, Denis Lavant, Nao Omori, Teruyuki Kagawa, Naoto Takenaka, Satoshi Tsumabuki, Hiroshi Yamamoto, Yoshiyoshi Arakawa
Director: Oh Bong-Joon, Leos Carax, Michel Gondry
Director: Oh Bong-Joon, Leos Carax, Michel Gondry
Screenwriter: Oh Bong-Joon, Leos Carax, Michel Gondry
Studio: Liberation Entertainment
Reviews for Tokyo!
The entries aren’t equally strong, of course, but each comes from a sharp outsider’s perspective, approaching Tokyo as a strange, mysterious organism that infects the populace.
If you've seen Paris, je t'aime or New York Stories, you know the rate of return on these urban omnibuses is variable, and so it is here. Go in expecting minor pleasures and you'll be fine.
Taken as a whole, the three parts of Tokyo! provide a challenging picture of contemporary Japan.
Three directors, three films, three reasons to rethink moving to Tokyo.
Unfortunately, the weirdness is not always entertaining - in some cases it is merely boring - but there is enough going on to make this interesting for fans of art house cinema.
Though I adore all three directors in the new Tokyo!, I found little worthwhile here, except for some empty exercises in strangeness and discomfort.
Surrealism is on vivid display in this series of three shorts that form an ode to the city of Tokyo.
Only Bong's project transcends its limiting, carefully calibrated stylistic mode to achieve something substantive.
Tokyo!, in lineage with (the yes, middling) New York Stories, however actually manages the exceedingly rare accomplishment of getting all three of its episodes right.
More of a curiosity than a cohesive sampling of cinematic visions, "Tokyo!" fails to impress.
Like most anthologies, Tokyo! is artistically uneven and only mildly diverting, but it gives each of its three cult directors a foundation for personal takes on this fascinating city while using such genres as sci-fi and horror.
Two out of three ain't bad for an evening's (very) light entertainment, set in the world's most modern, jangling metropolis, but beware Leos Carax's "Merde."
At its best, the movie is a stylish spin through the Tokyo universe, a play on the psychology and realities of one of the world's most urbanized societies
This triptypch of short flicks about the Japanese capital by non-Japanese filmmakers is wildly intriguing to me, as someone who has never been there but would like to visit...
There has yet to be an anthology film made where all of the shorts are of equal quality and that's certainly the case with Tokyo!.
Latest News for Tokyo!
March 05, 2009:
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February 10, 2009:
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