Issue:
. . . at 6:30 pm on Thursday, Aug. 7 for director Sion Sono’s gonzo new film Tokyo Tribe, followed by a Q&A with Sono (his debut appearance at FCCJ) and his three young stars Ryohei Suzuki, Young Dais and Nana Seino. An adaptation of the mega-bestselling manga series “Tokyo Tribe2” by Santa Inoue, the film opens five years after the Shibuya riots. Tokyo is divided into territories run by 23 tribes — the Shibuya Saru, Shinjuku Hands, Kabukicho GiraGira Girls, Bukuro Wu-Ronz, Nerimuthafuckaz — each with their own colorful approach to fashion and the new lingua franca: rap. When the Wu-Ronz leader (Suzuki) attempts to whack a rival, all hell breaks loose . . . and it’s the ass-end of hell, as one octogenarian DJ puts it. With nods to West Side Story and A Clockwork Orange, Sono goes deliciously overboard with his visual and aural assault. But there’s a message in there somewhere! (Japan, 2014; 116 minutes; in Japanese with Oscar- worthy English subtitles)
— Karen Severns
