About the Producer / Director
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A TAKASHI MIIKE FILM IN COMPETITION 7.30pm, Tuesday 4th September, Sala Perla (daily press) Press Screenings: 10.30pm, Tuesday 4th September, Palalido (press, industry, professional) Press Conference: 12.00pm, Wednesday 5th September, Palazzo del Casino – 3rd floor Official Screening: Midnight, Wednesday 5th September, Sala Grande (All Accreditations) INTERNATIONAL PRESS ITALIAN PRESS DDA Public Relations Marzia Milanesi Comunicazione per il Cinema Hotel Excelsior #114 Tel : +39 041 526 6147 / 6141 Marzia Milanesi +39 348 3144360 Jill Jones [email protected] +39 335 6817909 [email protected] Jenny Bertetto +39 349 1999743 Anna Bohlin [email protected] +39 335 6755227 [email protected] INTERNATIONAL SALES Melody Monfreda Celluloid Dreams +39 335 672 3245 2 rue Turgot, Paris 75009 [email protected] T: 01 49 70 03 70 F: 01 49 70 03 71 [email protected] www.celluloid-dreams.com Photos can be downloaded from www.image.net Genre: Action / Western Running Time: 121 minutes Completed: August 2007 Production Partners: Sedic International; Geneon Entertainment; Sony Pictures Entertainment (Japan); Dentsu; TV Asahi; Shogakukan; A Team; Nagoya Broadcasting Network; Tokyu Recreation. Writers: Takashi Miike and Masaru Nakamura Director: Takashi Miike su·ki·ya·ki [soo-kee-yah-kee] n. A popular Japanese dish made with beef and usually containing soy sauce, bean curd, and greens, cooked in a single pot at the table. Simple ingredients cooked together without added broths to create a unique essence that is truly Japanese. Paying homage to the spaghetti western, or “macaroni western” as they are known in Japan, world renowned filmmaker Takashi Miike (Audition) has invented a uniquely stylish Japanese action western which he has named the "Sukiyaki Western." Set during the Genpei clan wars of the 12th century, and shot entirely in the English language, Sukiyaki Western Django, brings together a talented crew including several previous Miike collaborators, such as award-winning Director of Photography, Toyomichi Kurita (Robert Altman’s Cookie’s Fortune), in addition to an all-star cast including Hideaki Ito (the Umizaru films), Koichi Sato (Crest of Betrayal), Yusuke Iseya (Casshern), Masanobu Ando (Battle Royale), Takaaki Ishibashi (Major League films),Yoshino Kimura (The Samurai I Loved ), Teruyuki Kagawa (Devil’s On The Door Step), and Kaori Momoi (Memoirs Of A Geisha), with a special cameo appearance from filmmaker Quentin Tarantino. What emerges from the sukiyaki pot, in which all of these ingredients simmer together, is Miike’s magnificent view of the world. CAST Gunman: Hideaki Ito Kiyomori: Koichi Sato Yoshitsune: Yusuke Iseya Yoichi: Masanobu Ando Benkei: Takaaki Ishibashi Shizuka: Yoshino Kimura The Sheriff: Teruyuki Kagawa Shigemori: Masato Sakai Akira: Shun Oguri Piringo: Quentin Tarantino Ruriko: Kaori Momoi CREW Director: Takashi Miike Screenplay: Masaru Nakamura & Takashi Miike Executive Producers: Toshiaki Nakazawa, Nobuyuki Tohya Co-Executive Producer: Dick N. Sano Producers: Hirotsugu Yoshida, Toshinori Yamaguchi Cinematographer: Toyomichi Kurita Music: Koji Endo Production Designer: Takashi Sasaki Lighting: Hideyuki Suzuki Sound: Jun Nakamura Editor: Taiji Shimamura Set Decorators: Takahisa Taguchi Costume Designer: Michiko Kitamura Sound Effects: Kenji Shibazaki First Assistant Director: Masato Tanno Production Manager: Hajime Tsubouchi Dialect Coach: Nadia Venesse Casting Director: Toshiie Tomida CGI Producer: Misako Saka “The sound of the Gion Shoja temple bells, echoes the impermanence of all things.” “The color of the Sala flowers reveals the truth that to flourish is to fall.” The proud do not endure, they are like a dream on a spring night. The mighty fall at last, to be no more than dust before the wind. SHORT SYNOPSIS Several hundred years after the infamous Battle of Dannoura (1185) in a remote Japanese mountain village, tension runs high as the white clad gang of the Genji (Minamoto clan), led by Yoshitsune, and the red clad gang of the Heike (Taira clan), led by Kiyomori, brutally confront each other over rumors of hidden gold. When a nameless drifter, burdened with a dark past but possessed of remarkable gun skills, arrives in the village, both the Genji and the Heike speculate as to which side he will join. Power struggles, betrayal, lust and love interweave, drenching the earth with blood, as the historic Taira-Minamoto War resumes in the “macaroni western” wilderness. LONG SYNOPSIS The sound of a temple bell rings through the wilderness lit by the setting sun. A bandit leader’s gun is pointed at the forehead of Piringo, a stranger wearing a poncho. Quicker than lightning, Piringo shoots down the surrounding bandits. On the ground beside him is a simmering sukiyaki pot. Several hundred years have passed since the infamous Battle of Dannoura (1185.) Dust and tumbleweed roll across the desolate plains of Nebada. A gunman (Hideaki Ito) rides towards the village, now almost a ghost town, on a black horse. The first settlers of the village of Yuta were the “Heike Ochiudo,” the Heike warriors who were defeated in the battle against the Genjis. About six months prior, the word spread that somewhere in the Yuta gold was buried. As gold rush fever swept over the region, the Heike Ochiudo descended on the village. When the Heike gang, clad in red, first arrived, the villagers welcomed them as fellow descendants of the Taira clan, hoping that they would restore peace in the village. The villagers were wrong. The red gang led by Kiyomori Taira (Koichi Sato) bribed the sheriff (Teruyuki Kagawa), and drove all the outsiders from the village, extorting the locals and violating the graves of their Heike ancestors. When the village mayor (Renji Ishibashi) protested their brutal rampage, he was tied to a horse and dragged to his death, his body hung in the village street as a warning to others. The anarchy of the Heike gang quickly came to an end when the Genji gang, dressed in white, arrived in their ox-drawn carriages. Upon arrival, Benkei (Takaaki Ishibashi) used his rifle blast a hole in Munemori Taira’s (Yoji Tanaka)’s stomach through which Yoichi (Masanobu Ando) skillfully shot an arrow from his bowgun to take down another Heike gang member. Sitting in his coach, the cool-headed leader of the Genji gang, Yoshitsune Minamoto (Yusuke Iseya) surveyed all. As the battle between the red and white gangs escalated, the villagers continued to flee the town by night. In the midst of such anarchy and bloodshed, a lone gunman drifted into the village. On seeing the stranger, Yoichi from the Genji gang shoots at him with his bowgun but the stranger reacts quickly by shooting the flying bow down in midair. With such incredible combat skills, it was clear that whoever succeeded in winning over the lone gunman to their side would ultimately win the battle. The lone gunman heads for shelter at a general store managed by a wise woman, Ruriko (Kaori Momoi). Ruriko lives with her mute grandson Heihachi (Ruka Uchida). Each day, with an ocarina dangling from his neck, Heihachi waters a rose tree with flower petals that are red on one side and white on the other. He points at the rose and moves his lips as if trying to say something. Heihachi lost his voice when his father Akira (Shun Oguri) was brutally killed before his very eyes. His father Akira, the son of Ruriko, had returned to the village with a wife, Shizuka (Yoshino Kimura). Shizuka was born into a Genji family but with the joining of the two families, Akira pronounced: “The days of Heike or Genji are over.” Akira and Shizuka planted the new species of rose, with red and white on each side of the petal, after their son Heihachi was born. In spite of their wishes, the war between the red and white gangs did not end. When the red gang leader, Kiyomori, first arrived in the village, Akira confronted him by telling him to: “Get out! There is no treasure buried here!” and as a result was shot dead by Kiyomori in front of his wife Shizuka and son. In order to protect her son and avenge her husband, Shizuka decided to live in the white saloon where the Genjis are quartered. Dancing to the music played by travelers from the South, she becomes the lover of their leader, Yoshitsune, but watching Shizuka with lustful eyes is Yoichi. When the lone gunman appears at the white saloon and asks, “How much is that woman?” Yoichi, enraged, lashes out at the gunman, but to his surprise, his leader Yoshitsune intervenes saying, “Give it up, Yoichi. The strong and the brave gets the woman.” To the stranger he states: “Gunman, you are only the second person that I felt was truly worthy of killing.” “Who was the first?” the gunman responds. “The Bloody Benten. I first heard the legend about her when I was a child” explains Yoshitsune. Shizuka and the gunman spend the night together. When Shizuka says: “Kill Kiyomori for me,” the gunman confesses in sympathy: “I was about the same age as your son when my parents were killed.” Meanwhile, unknown to Yoshitsune, Yoichi, consumed with jealousy, plans to take down the gunman and orders Benkei to procure a Gatlin shotgun. When the red leader, Kiyomori, hears of this plan, he goes after them with his cavalry in the hope of stealing the guns. Benkei and his men go full speed ahead in search of the guns when Heike’s cavalry attacks. All hell breaks loose in an explosive battle of guns and dynamite. News of the battles reaches Yoshitsune and he confronts the gunman who is still in saloon in a showdown. The gunman, making a narrow escape, jumps on his black horse, firing two guns at the same time and one of the bullets hit Yoichi.