The Happiness of the Katakuris (2001)
Average Rating: 6.3/10
Reviews Counted: 27
Fresh: 18 | Rotten: 9
If nothing else, Happiness of the Katakuris scores points for its delirious, over-the-top originality.
Average Rating: 5.2/10
Critic Reviews: 8
Fresh: 4 | Rotten: 4
If nothing else, Happiness of the Katakuris scores points for its delirious, over-the-top originality.
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Average Rating: 3.9/5
User Ratings: 8,358
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Movie Info
One of an amazing seven features directed in 2001 by Japan's prolific shock auteur Takashi Miike, The Happiness of the Katakuris is a gleefully morbid musical comedy about a family of oddballs who open an inn in the mountains. Unfortunately, through no fault of their own, none of their guests leave their rooms alive. In order to protect their business, the family resorts to burying the corpses in the backyard, but this only leads to a zombie problem. Meanwhile, the daughter falls in love with
Jan 1, 2001 Wide
Feb 25, 2003
Cast
-
Kenji Sawada
Masao Katakuri -
Keiko Matsuzaka
Terue Katakuri -
Shinji Takeda
Masyuki Katakuri -
Naomi Nishida
Shizue Katakuri -
Tamaki Miyazaki
Yurie Katakuri -
Tetsuro Tanba
Nihei Katakuri Masao's ... -
Naoto Takenaka
Reporter -
Kiyoshiro Imawano
Richard Sagawa -
-
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All Critics (34) | Top Critics (11) | Fresh (19) | Rotten (9) | DVD (7)
It's weirdly -- and often wonderfully -- entertaining.
Top CriticBy the second hour, Miike's story fails to punctuate its powerful setup, and the work, much like the family itself, ends up a tangled mess.
There are so many moments in Happiness of the Katakuris that beg us to walk out on the movie, it's hard to pick just one.
A kind of strange, existentialist comedy.
It's a ball when it works, which is why fans of Lars von Trier's Dancer in the Dark, Francois Ozon's 8 Women, and other darkly inspired, genre-bending musical fusions must introduce themselves to the Katakuris.
None of this is nearly as hilarious as surely it was meant to be.
Love it or hate it, such a feat of highly demented cinematic imagination simply must be seen.
The Katakuris may not be your typical innkeepers, but the family that sings together and buries dead bodies together, stays together...this is hilarious, macabre, and entertaining.
It's shot and acted in a way that's hastily, amateurishly theatrical, through digital photography that tries to look beautiful but just plain can't.
Happiness of the Katakuris is probably the film best equipped to fill that black-camp-karaoke-musical-horror-claymé-domestic-dramedy void in your DVD library.
...for all the black humor of this deliriously bizarre fantasy Happiness is a warmhearted film about sacrifice, support and four generations of family togetherness in face of mounting corpses.
It's freakishly interesting and even outright hilarious at times, but, then again, so are most funerals.
Audience Reviews for The Happiness of the Katakuris
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Foreign Titles
- The Happiness of the Katakuris (Katakuri-ke no kofuku) (DE)
- The Happiness of the Katakuris (Katakuri-ke no kofuku) (CA)
