Sukiyaki Western Django Blu Ray review

The Film:

Like any famous director, when they release a new film, the film is sometimes unwisely looked at by the fans harsher than normal. Fans want another classic and anything less, feels like they’ve been cheapened. Takashi Miike is a wildly inventive, controversial director, with a hardened fan base. I bring all of this up because most of his fans were wildly mixed on his newest film, Sukiyaki Western: Django, and I do not see why. I was thoroughly entertained and damn near loved this film.

Miike has been a journey man, traveling in between a handful of different genres and this time he takes on a western, a spaghetti western at that. The film pays homage to a lot of filmmakers and ideas, but it also plays like a thematic prequel to Sergio Corbucci’s 1966 classic, Django. In that film, Franco Nero stars as a lone gunman roaming the west and dragging a coffin. He’s hell-bent on vengeance and the film became a classic for incredible brutality, Nero’s performance, and that very cool, catchy theme song.

Miike flips it a bit by having an unnamed gunman (Hideaki Ito) strolls into a town seeking that town’s treasure. He finds two rival gangs, the white-wearing Genji and the red-wearing Heiki. They both want the treasure too. That is essentially the plot, but as with any Miike there is always more. Some might find it convoluted and it borderlines it, but Miike is such a creative director everything feels like it gels. There are back stories galore for most of the key characters, told in a hyper-stylized flashbacks, there’s schizophrenic sheriff, whores, mute children, and of course, Miike’s own special brand of violence.

Despite all of the talk Miike gets for his brand of violence, he knows how to frame shots and choreography awesome action. This film is no different. Besides the fore-mentioned stylized back stories, Miike frames characters in a gorgeous widescreen frame, capturing the beautiful sets and landscapes these characters inhabit. The climax is perhaps the film’s most exquisite looking parts, with snow falling on the two left standing. But don’t get this twisted, it’s a Miike film. The film is filled with blood-splatter, guns putting holes in bodies, swords getting stuck into heads, and  even a huge wooden cross getting thrown to impale someone.

I found Miike’s reworking of the western genre, and more precisely Corbucci’s Django, to be one of the more fun westerns I’ve seen in a while. The film is weird and you sort of have to be a Takashi Miike fan. Most western fans will be horrified at the weirdness; you have a western filled with Japanese actors, talking like they’re from a John Wayne western, with comic book level action, twisted gore, and even Quentin Tarantino in the beginning narrating our story. I found it to be a blast. All I was missing was the theme song to Django. I just had to wait to the end. Pure bliss.

The Blu Ray:

Audio/Video: This is my second title I reviewed from First Look Studios and it’s another winner. The audio is booming; the bass is thick and aggressive, the surrounds are quite active and everything is clear and precise. To me, the video was superb. Miike has a keen eye for color and this Blu Ray perfectly captures it.

Making of: Nearly an hour long, this is a pretty good feature, rounding up interviews and on set footage with Miike at work, providing us with a crucial look at this bizarre director. I dug this feature a lot.

Deleted Scenes: There are some interesting bits here. This film was cut by almost 20 something minutes and while we don’t get all of that footage, it’s cool to see what the original Japanese cut was like.

Digital Copy

Trailers

A top-notch Blu Ray disc by First Look Studios and another hit by Miike. He can be dividing, hit-or-miss, but I loved this film from start to finish and can’t wait to revisit it. 

Rating: