Graveyard of Honor

Shin jingi no hakaba

Japan

2002

131 Min

Color

Japanese

Currently 3.9/5 Stars.
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PROD Shigeji Maeda, Kazuyuki Yokoyama

SCR Goro Fujita, Shigenori Takechi

CAST Narimi Arimori, Yoshiyuki Daichi, Hirotarô Honda, Harumi Inoue, Renji Ishibashi

A highly prolific and controversial Japanese filmmaker, Takashi MIIKE was born on August 24, 1960 in Yao, Osaka, Japan. Under the guidance of renowned filmmaker Shohei IMAMURA (a two-time Palme d’Or winner at Cannes), Miike graduated from the Yokohama Vocational School of Broadcast and Film.

Miike’s first films were television productions, but he also began directing several high-quality direct-to-video releases. His theatrical debut came in 1995 with Shinjuku Triad Society, and its success gave him the freedom to work on more ambitious projects. One of the most successful Japanese directors currently working, he has also garnered a strong cult following in the West that is growing rapidly as more of his films become available in translated form on DVD.

Some of Miike’s most popular films include Audition, the Dead or Alive trilogy, Ichi the Killer, Gozu, Izo, and Big Bang Love, Juvenile A.

Miike has achieved international notoriety for depicting shocking scenes… read more

Some of Miike’s most popular films include Audition, the Dead or Alive trilogy, Ichi the Killer, Gozu, Izo, and Big Bang Love, Juvenile A.

Miike has achieved international notoriety for depicting shocking scenes of extreme violence and bizarre sexual perversions. Many of his films contain graphic and lurid bloodshed, often portrayed in an over-the-top, cartoonish manner. Much of his work depicts the activities of criminals, and he is known for his black sense of humor and for pushing the boundaries of censorship as far as they will go.

A talented filmmaker who dabbles in a variety of genres, in 1998, Miike was picked as one of the ten non-English directors most likely to succeed by TIME magazine. He has won almost two dozen awards in his short career, including Best Asian Film at the 2001 Fant-Asia Film Festival for Visitor Q, Best Film at the Sitges-Catalonian International Film Festival in 2003 for Gozu and 2004 for Izo, the Special Jury Prize at the 2004 Gerardmer Film Festival for The Happiness of the Katakuris, and both the FIPRESCI Prize and KNF Award at the 2000 Rotterdam Unternational Film Festival for Audition. Additionally, he was the only Japanese director selected to participate in Showtime’s “Masters of Horror” series, although his film, Imprint, could not be shown because the content was too extreme for even cable television’s relaxed standards.

Takashi Miike, without his signature sunglasses, has an uncredited appearance in Graveyard of Honor as the assassin who attempts to kill the Godfather. Fortunately for the Boss, Ishimatsu appears and bashes Miike over the head with a chair. Miike has commented in an interview that he does this to save money on casting fees. Rumor has it that Quentin Tarantino uses the same excuse. —AnimEigo

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Zach Closs

21Jan13

A self-destructive descent into madness, addiction affliction and cathartic violence, "Graveyard of Honor" is easily Miike's finest Yakuza film. The director's more stylish and surrealist touches are still employed here, though "Graveyard" has sympathy for its victims, and the savagery on display is enfolded with bottomless emotional brutality. Though Kishitani's Ishimatsu is as terrifying, and more morbidly fascinating than he has any right to be, particularly impressive to me was the development of Arimori's Cheiko. Her transition from a frail, dazed victim desperately seeking love to a confident woman willingly trapped in a terrible situation is impressive for a genre that generally sees the fairer sex doing little more than crying, smoking cigarettes, getting naked and cooking dinner.

Ryan Pearce likes this

Jake Cole

7Jan13

A dishwasher-cum-Yakuza "uncle" quickly points out to his peers how laughable their codes of conduct are. They attempt to destroy him to preserve their way, yet they do so by beating up women, cutting off thumbs, and a host of back- (and front-) stabbing. Y'know, honorable stuff. The lethargic jazz that runs under all this is a requiem for these gangsters' delusion.

Mark Garrett and HKFanatic like this

HKFanatic

4Oct12

'A Yakuza without honor isn't worth shit.' So says a Yakuza Godfather towards the end of "Graveyard of Honor," and the entire movie puts this notion to the test against a terrifying new breed of gangster that is without honor or any recognizably human emotion, portrayed by lead actor Gorô Kishitani. Takashi Miike is able to meld the traditional Yakuza film - featuring plenty of brutal stabbings and gunfights - with the kind of decadent, heroin-fueled downward spiral you'd associate with a rock star. The result is one of the most satisfying and memorable films of the director's prolific career.

Tomb Cruise and 4 others like this

Ryan Pearce, Disma, Mr. Arkadin, Lights in the Dusk

Jack Lehtonen

19Nov11

Goro Kishitani gives one of the 2000s greatest performances. Miike's cool detachment from, yet close proximity to, the film's maelstrom of violence and Ishimatsu's brutal downfall make this a work like no other. The vicious, rough flipside to the excesses of Ichi the Killer and the Dead or Alive films. One of the 21st century's seminal films, and easily one of the most brutal films ever made.

Ryan Pearce and 5 others like this

HKFanatic, Varun Anisetty, Mark Garrett, Mr. Arkadin, Leng Tch'e