Kôrei (2000) (TV)

Director:

Kiyoshi Kurosawa

Writers:

Mark McShane (novel)
Tetsuya Onishi (teleplay) ...

Release Date:

12 May 2001 (Japan)

Genre:

Drama | Horror | Thriller

Plot:

A psychic housewife and her husband become burdened with a kidnapped girl who escaped her assailant...

Plot Keywords:

Haunt | Ghost | Police | Psychic | Doppelganger

Awards:

2 wins

Cast

Kôji Yakusho	...	Sato
Jun Fubuki	...	Junko Sato
Tsuyoshi Kusanagi	...	Hayasaka
Hikari Ishida	...	Junko's customer
Kitarô	...	Detective
Ittoku Kishibe	...	College professor
Ren Ôsugi	...	Restaurant customer
Shô Aikawa	...	Shinto priest
Daikei Shimizu	...	Tazaki, sound engineer
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Hajime Inoue
Shiuri Isobe
Michisuke Kashiwaya
Masahiro Toda
Megumi Wakabayashi
Ryûji Yamamoto

Also Known As:

Seance (International: English title)
Seance (Ko-Rei) (Canada: English title)

Runtime:

118 min | Switzerland:95 min | Argentina:98 min (Buenos Aires Festival Internacional de Cine Independiente)

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby SR

Certification:

France:U | Argentina:13 | Singapore:PG

Company:

Kansai Telecasting Corporation

Movie Connections:

Version of Seance on a Wet Afternoon (1964)

Left Elbow Index

I am a great fan of Kurosawa's movies, yet I find this film a weak shadow of his usual work. I think this comes in large measure from his own statement that this film is a combination of a horror movie combined with a crime movie and the original 1960s story. It seems just too convoluted to succeed. On top of that, he claims that there were numerous rewritings of the 1960s story to fit it into the real world, whatever that means. The Left Elbow Index considers seven elements in film--acting, production sets, dialogue, plot, film continuity, character development, and artistry--on a scale from 10 for very good to 5 for average and to 1 for it needs some help. The acting, production sets, and dialogue are all rated average. The acting seems stilted and seems better timed to fit a soap. The production sets appear to be little more than what one sees in one's daily environs. And the dialogue seems to fit modern life, no great philosophies and no great blunders. The plot is rated weak since it appears difficult to sort out important elements of plot from trivial events in the film. The elements of plot and the emotional level of the film seem not to fit together well, even the suspense scenes appear hollow. The film continuity appears upset by the episodic TV nature of the juxtaposition of scenes, which seems to present too much clutter. I wonder why film makers tend towards putting characters in autos and driving them in and out of scenes, like Roy Rogers cowboy movies. We know how Roy got to and from where ever he was going, must he always be seen jumping on and off Trigger? There seems little character development to speak of, probably because the characters do not appear to be in a suspense, a horror story, or the real world. The artistry is rated as average, keeping in mind that average for Kurosawa is excellent for others. The close-ups are good and there are some interesting camera angles. The Left Elbow Index average is 3.3, down to 3.0 for a film that reminds me of college sophomores trying to make a Halloween film. The film is worth seeing, as any of Kurosawa's work is, but don't expect the master at his best.