hraether

This movie is truely a puppet show: If I remember correctly the camery doesn't move even once - just a dozen or so cuts, each depicting one scene with a different set-up, each scene remaining for several minutes. Persons move through the scenerey: sometimes you see someone doing something, sometimes you even recognize what he is doing. After a while you realize the same persons appear in different scenes. Even later you start picking up the story. Yes, there is a story, even though noone explains anything, hardly any word is said (was there a word at all? Maybe even not). all your concentration is needed to find out what is going on. The audience finds itself in the situation of an ethnographer meeting for the first time some unknown group of people, trying to find out something about them. The scenes, which initially seemed to keep on forever suddenly appear to change much too fast - you might be able to understand more, if they kept on longer.

Once you get into this movie, it is pure gold. If you want action, even one minute of The Puppetmaster will bore you to death.

This is by far Itami Juzo's best movie. The search for the perfect noodle soup includes some extremely funny scenes as well as one of the most powerfully erotic images I've ever seen on screen: A pair of lovers playing with different foodstuff in their hotel room. She eats a raw egg and they pass over the yolk from one mouth to the other through kisses, until finally the yolk breaks and runs down her chin.

Another highlight is the group of 5-star-tramps (specialized in leftover foodstuff from gourmet restaurants, they know everything about haute cousine) singing some opera piece while saying goodbye to their "master" who is an expert in preparing noodle soups.

Then one guy fantasizing about sausages made by shooting wild boars after they have eaten wild potatoes. Then the bowels which are full of the potatoes are just taken out and fried. The strange thing is that this guy is actually dying because of being shot. His girlfriend tries to keep him alive by reminding him of the coming season of wild potatoes - the special sausages will be available soon. Still he dies but his mind is set on paradise ...

I knew that food and sex are related, but this was never shown so beautifully as in this movie.