Falling Skies
Release Date: OUT NOW!
2014 | 18 | Blu- ray/ DVD Director: Sion Sono Cast: Tomoko Karina, Akihiro Kitamura, Ryôhei Suzuki, Shôta Sometani, Riki Takeuchi
Japanese
dystopian rap opera. Those are four words we bet you never thought you’d hear together. But that’s exactly what Japanese cinema’s enfant terrible Sion Sono ( think Quentin Tarantino with fewer inhibitions) has concocted here.
In a crumbling near- future Tokyo a huge number of rival gangs of rappers are in a constant turf war. They rap constantly too. This isn’t a musical, it’s opera, sung throughout.
The plot… well, it hardly warrants summarising, as it’s virtually non- existent and near incoherent, about as pure an exercise in style over substance as you’ll find. Often it’s more stylised than stylish, but there are moments when the blend of music and visuals becomes the primal, driving power of the movie.
It’s bonkers in a way only Japanese films can be. It’s lewd and crude and has a level of toilet humour that makes Viz look like The Spectator. The main villains overact like it’s an Olympic sport. The action is unapologetically cartoony. The result is very nearly a live- action anime. With rapping.
While it’s clearly not lampooning rap culture – many of the cast are famous Japanese rappers – when it so readily embraces the misogynistic and gun- culture excesses of US rap the result leaves a sour taste.
One thing ’s for sure – you’ve never seen anything quite like it.
An hour’s- worth of behind- the- scenes footage from the shoot, four deleted scenes and a trailer. Dave Golder Sion Sono’s next project is a documentary on the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster… with the help of art collective Chim- Pom.
Fly Me To The Moon
Release Date: 6 July
2014 | 15 | Blu- ray/ DVD Showrunner: David Eick Cast: Noah Wyle, Moon Bloodgood, Drew Roy, Connor Jessup, Maxim Knight
Four years in,
the Spielbergspawned show about humans resisting alien invaders continues to be a solid, modestly entertaining series that may dress itself in the rags of post- apocalyptic drama but has far more faith in the essential decency of humanity than most.
The formula’s now cosily familiar: expect speeches about the importance of family, big hugs, and even bigger explosions. But the production team have found a reliable way to spray on some narrative Febreze: once again, the season opens by leaping forward several months, fracturing the family of the Second Mass as they split into three story strands.
It’s not the most subtle show: one new innovation is an alien academy brainwashing kids; it’s painstakingly explained that this is a bit Hitler Youth. Nor always the most credible: the Espheni can transmit electricity across space, but the forcefields around their prison camps are still powered by a really big cable.
Still, there are enough new developments to keep you involved, and the anti- heroic Pope adds welcome friction. Plus the finale, which sends rebel leader Tom Mason on a mission to the flippin’ Moon, is entertainingly barking.
Featurette “Tom Mason: A Man Of Tomorrow”, the 2014 Comic Con panel and short “Inside The Episode” pieces, cast interviews and “prequels”. Ian Berriman Falling Skies’ ten- episode- long fifth and final season starts airing on Fox in the UK on Tuesday 30 June.