I thought he was just some random guy put in there for artistic reasons but at the end of the film the aristocats acknowledge his presence and commands Izo to punish them all.
So if he played a part in the story what was his function?
I think hes basically just supposed to be izo's destiny or maybe fate for a better word. I wish I knew what the guy was singing about, the subtitles dont give it justice. I did take notice that there were a lot of references to world war two during the guitarist scenes. Maybe IZO was destined to live that horror of war over and over again.
...DESTINY of SUCK...
This is of course a Takashi Miike film though too. So the guitarist could be in there for just F'd up reasons.
My thought was that the guitarist represented Izo's subconscious
shareagreed.
share[deleted]
an idea is that he is the devil..and the dude with the snake is god
share[deleted]
That was Buck Dharma, he travelled through the nexus of the crisis and the origin of storms. It's Miike, it makes as much sense as anything else.
shareMiike Is a pretty whimsical writer/director, chances are he threw in the Guitar guy for ur own interpretation, who really knows what Miike is thinking...
shareI personally loved the movie, wished some of the dialogue had been translated for English better though...
Btw jamesjones nice astronomy quote in that, great tune.
I must agree with theroyalscam1. And Mr Kazuki Tomokawa is one of japans most beloved folk singer. He is what Johnny Cash is for America and Totta Näslund is for Sweden. really like Kazuki Tomokawa and his raspy anger voice.
I hope that someday they will make a soundtrack cd from this movie.
But for you who can not wait for that, I can recommend Kazuki Tomokawa cd "Golden Best" that you can buy on amazon.com
ore maybe the "International Sad Hits, Vol. 1: Altaic Language Group" who is a cd of sadsongs sang over the world in its native language. but only one song on that cd is of Mr Kazuki Tomokawa.
//Yoshi
actually, there are 4 songs on that "International sad hits" by Mr. Tomokawa. also 4 by Kan Mikami by the way.
the song in "Izo" is "Pisutoru" ("Pistol"). it can be found on his album "Itsuka, tooku o miteita" and on the live in Osaka Banana Hall CD, as well as on his DVD.
I just watched the movie. what an awful thing that just keeps dragging on. but the Tomokawa songs were great of course. here they are:
- "Kenshin no ichigeki"
- "Tougen"
- "Me o muite tabeteiru anata"
- "Déraciné"
- "Ayakashi no tsuki"
- "Mata kon haru"
- "Wake no wakaran kimochi"
- "Pistol"
except for the first one, all of these are on the album "Itsuka, tooku o miteita". the first one is on the album of the same name. enjoy!
I thought the opposite, that Izo represented a piece of the guitarist's subconscious. The other pieces would be a multitude of characters that interact with Izo, such as the God-like snake man, and the woman who tells him that she is a pieve of Izo. It would be interesting and fresh to have a film about a man's personified subconscious, rather than the man himself. In Miike style, telling what is real and what is in the mind is as tricky as ever.
shareDon´t look for meanings in Miike´s work. Just relax and enjoy the trip.
shareI wish the guitarist had been killed first.
shareI saw the guitarist as being the creator of the 'grudge' that evolved into the demon through it's blind hatred and unwillingness to accept the pain. The guitarist had a very sad and emotional story to tell through his song about losing his daughter, and it appeared (to me) that he was blaming 'higher powers' for it.
What sealed the deal for me was: ***SPOILER***
When he was sitting on the table and said "punish them" as if participating in the fury of his revenge against these authoritative figures.
the guitarist name's is Kazuki Tomokawa, a good friend of Miike-sensei.
Miike cast him to play as some sort of a minstrel, to kinda guide the audience about the story, kinda like Robin Hood animated movie, with the rooster singing as a minstrel at the same time telling a story..
Exactly right! I watched it with some excellent fan subs and every song is a narrative.
shareTo me, the guitarist represented Izo's emotional side. Izo couldn't seem to express how he truly felt by himself, and the guitarist was the part of his soul that played out his feelings into his songs, sort of like he was playing a soundtrack to Izo's life. (Or afterlife, whatever.) Then again, there weren't any subtitles for his songs, unfortunately, so I don't even know what the hell he's singing about, so I can only go by what I saw.
At first, I thought the guitarist was really annoying, but as I watched the movie, I began to feel that the kind of music he was playing actually fit this movie pretty well. Obviously, the screams, and gags, and wheezes, and chokes, and everything else he was doing was supposed to represent pain and suffering, as if the songs were being sung by someone who he himself was dying, and pain and suffering is what this movie's mostly about, so I think it goes with the movie.
I used to be Vasnan_ja_Viren.