7.3 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
A young boxer and a call girl get caught up in a drug-smuggling scheme over the course of one night in Tokyo.
Starring: Masataka Kubota, Nao Ômori, Shôta Sometani, Jun Murakami, Sansei ShiomiForeign | 100% |
Crime | 4% |
Romance | Insignificant |
Action | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.39:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
Japanese: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 16-bit)
Japanese: Dolby Digital 2.0
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 16-bit)
English: Dolby Digital 2.0 (384 kbps)
English
Blu-ray Disc
Two-disc set (1 BD, 1 DVD)
DVD copy
Slipcover in original pressing
Region A, B (C untested)
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 0.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
There’s an old, almost meme like, joke that goes something like, “Have you ever seen [Person A] and [Person B] together?”, in what is a reference to how similar two people can be, with a suggestion that maybe, just maybe, they’re the same individual if indeed you haven't ever seen them side by side. While I’m not certain if they actually share any screen time together without going back and checking, Takashi Miike and Quentin Tarantino might have been able to evade that query due to their collaboration in Eli Roth’s 2005 horror opus Hostel. Tarantino also appeared in Miike’s gonzo Sukiyaki Western Django, and both film titans evidently received “acknowledgements” in the credits listing for Bring Me the Head of the Machine Gun Woman (note that the link points to a UK Blu-ray release). That said, while it's perhaps debatable as to whether or not anyone has ever seen them together, there are undeniable links between Miike and Tarantino, and for a potent example of at least some of those links, one need look no further than First Love, another crazy quilt offering from Miike that is both deliriously funny and often quite spectacularly graphically violent, often at the same time.
First Love is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Well Go USA with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.39:1. Kind of frustratingly given its recent provenance, I haven't been able to dredge up any technical information on the shoot, other than that cinematographer Nobuyasu Kita evidently has a preference for Arri cameras, for what that's worth. This is another Miike effort that is long on style, including tons of weird lighting and grading, and as such detail levels can kind of fluctuate depending on those elements. A lot of the yellow or yellow-green drenched material can look just slightly blanched, with arguably slightly less fine detail at times, while some of the darker choices, notably a lot of the blue or blue-green material, actually provides some surprisingly consistent levels of fine detail. Some outright stylistic flourishes are included, as indicated by screenshots 3, 10 and 15.
First Love features DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 tracks in either the original Japanese or English dub. In doing a little toggling, I didn't notice any major difference in mixes or amplitude levels between the two, other than the obvious difference in language being spoken. I'm an original language purist, and so stuck with the Japanese track for most of the film, and it's a rather boisterous, often hyperbolically active, affair, with a ton of low end throughout and a whirlwind of fun immersive effects in some of the showdowns especially. A lot of the film takes place outside in a crowded city environment, and there's what I'd almost call "an urban wind" rushing through as general background clatter a lot of the time. Dialogue, score and effects are all presented without any problems whatsoever on this enjoyable track.
The fact that it's taken until the closing words of this review to get around to mentioning the fact that Monica is chased for much of the film by a grimacing ghost of sorts who dons a sheet and is otherwise clad only in a kind of Sumo wrestler diaper (see screenshots 12 and 18) may indicate as well as anything just how off the wall First Love often is. My personal advice is that if you're acquainted with Miike and tend to like his more outlandishly funny films like The Happiness of the Katakuris, you're probably going to love First Love. Others may want to consider the fact that this supposed "love story" is stuffed to the gills with a lot of violence and killing, though much of it is played for laughs. Technical merits are solid, and First Love comes Recommended.
2000
8時間の恐怖 / Hachijikan no kyôfu
1957
1999
Jigoku de naze warui
2013
醉いどれ天使 / Yoidore tenshi
1948
南方车站的聚会 / Nán fāng chē zhàn de jù huì
2019
1970
Ore ni sawaru to abunaize
1966
野獣の青春 / Yajû no seishun
1963
Golden Marie
1952
非常線の女
1933
1968
ドーベルマン刑事 / Doberuman deka
1977
探偵事務所23 くたばれ悪党ども / Kutabare akutô-domo - Tantei jimusho 23
1963
Minagoroshi no kenjû
1967
2008
アウトレイジ / Way of the Yakuza
2010
江湖儿女
2018
Milano Rovente
1973
2016