TAG
TAG is the latest from Japanese director Sion Sono. It is equally poignant and batshit insane, and will be a huge treat for anyone with a love for Japanese What-The-Fuck-ery. It opens on a bus as a class of school girls is en route to a field trip. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a vicious wind rips the bus and its passengers apart. The only person left alive is Mitsuko (Reina Triendl), a shy girl, who, moments before, was more interested in writing flowery poetry than she was in goofing around with her classmates. Shocked and disoriented, Mitsuko stumbles away from the wreckage, only to find the wind following her down the road, tearing apart everything in its path.
She flees, safely avoiding the path of destruction as it takes out several other vehicles, cyclists and pedestrians, and eventually comes to an unfamiliar school, where everyone seems to know her. She knows she has never been to this place, yet she seems to occupy a space here. She has classes, she has friends, and she has a life here that she is unaware of. As she tries to make sense of her situation, she is befriended by Aki (Yuki Sakurai), a kind, outgoing girl who claims to know Mitsuko and helps her to navigate her surroundings as she tries to understand exactly what has happened. This is just the first in a series of increasingly bizarre situations that find Mitsuko thrust into new settings, identities and lives, unsure of how she came to be there and where she is going.
TAG is a dark, twisted fairy tale for a modern age. Without giving too much away, through Mitsko’s journey and the lives of her counterparts, the film examines notions of dimensions, possibility, choice and fate, while also incorporating themes of feminism, ownership, entitlement and self. As Mitsko continues her journey through this deranged Wonderland, she finds herself in new and increasingly bizarre places and scenarios that seemingly have nothing to do with her former life, yet all seem to be somehow connected. Every place seems unfamiliar, yet they all seem to have a purpose.
As the characters are introduced and tied together through this shared experience, the film begins to explore notions of self and being and free will. The characters find themselves in a world where they have no control over their lives or the events that befall them, and even begin to question just who they are at all. It all culminates in a trippy, shocking revelation that undoes everything that Mitsuko and her counterparts think they know about who they are and where they come from.
The film is another great entry in Sono’s oeuvre, following SUICIDE CLUB and WHY DON’T YOU PLAY IN HELL. It’s funny, thought-provoking, and utterly insane. You have absolutely no idea where this story is headed at any given point, and the ride is fully a part of the experience. From flirtatious schoolgirls to wedding mayhem to flipping pigmen, the best you can do here is hold on.
PARALYTIC
PARALYTIC is a crime thriller that hides a complicated puzzle within its multiple story arcs. It opens with Diane (Darlene Sellers), a small town Washington sheriff, being called deep into the woods to investigate a report of a disturbance at a lakeside cabin. When she arrives, she finds all manner of weapons, alarms, surveillance devices – along with a dead body. She also finds a suicide note, explaining that the man in question had come to this cabin in the hopes of wrapping up a few professional loose ends, and then killing himself, dying freely on his own terms after having enacted revenge upon the men who tortured and murdered the love of his life - a woman named Clarissa (Angela DiMarco).
As Diane begins to investigate, we flash back to the life of the deceased man, Carson Empman, (David S. Hogan) a gunman for hire known as The Ghost. He flawlessly takes out his targets and doesn't leave a shred of evidence - including no bodies. He has spent the last decade doing a lot of work for a large drug cartel. His latest job, under the new leader (The Patrón) went south and ultimately brought him here. With little hope of escaping the cartel long term, he will settle for the moral victory. His revenge for the murder of Clarissa is to offer up as much information as he can about the cartel’s dealings, deeds, crimes and history to the press and the authorities as he can, before finally ending it all and leaving the world having made things at least a little right. Diane is left with a cabin full of puzzles pieces and scraps of information, which she works to put together to understand exactly what transpired and the resulting fallout.
Joey Johnson's script is ambitious in its complexity. Our story is being told from three different points in time, with each storyline converging into a central plot. We see Carson’s final job for the cartel, wherein he meets Clarissa and the other members of his team, Carson enacting his final revenge by coming to the cabin and plotting to spill the secrets of the cartel’s business to the press, and Diane trying to solve the puzzle left in the aftermath. It’s certainly a bold approach, but ultimately a little too far-reaching, as it struggles to keep these three plot lines in check. There is so much going on in each of the stories that they fail to come together smoothly.
The cast does decently well with their respective roles, but the script seems to be written in a very detatched style, making it difficult for the actors to really reach into their characters and procure any honest, deep emotion. The story keeps us at arm's length, and doesn't seem to want us to get into the characters' psyches. Instead, we are there to watch them react, rather than experience the moment with them. It is an approach that can work, but here, it comes off as a little stilted, largely due to the complexity and the rocky execution of the plot.
Ultimately, PARALYTIC feels like a decent effort that can't make good on its promises. The plot sort of unravels as we near the end, throwing twist upon twist and backstab upon backstab in a rush to get to the final scene. The many layers and turns are never fully absorbed by the audience as the story is always in a hurry to get to the next scene and doesn't allow enough time for any of the plot turns to hit in a way that makes the meaningful, which ultimately just makes the story feel bloated and a bit confusing. A noble effort, but ultimately one that doesn't fully succeed.
