You could try and explain the plot to Katsuhito Ishii, Hajime Ishimine and Shunichiro Miki’s “Funky Forest: The First Contact”, but it’d take three hours and ten minutes. An ensemble piece, this is a channel-hopping switch between different characters and their bizarre lives. It’s all madness, but all humour, to leave your eyes bulging in surprise, but mouth smiling with joy.
Among some lesser featured characters, we have the ‘Unpopular with Women Brothers’ made-up of ‘Guitar Brother’ Masaru (Tadanobu Asano), Shoichi (Susumu Terajima) and their younger Caucasian brother Masao (Andrew Alfieri); Notchi (Erika Saimon) and her former English teacher Takefumi (Ryo Kase); the ‘Babbling Hot Spring Vixens’, a group of young female professionals; and a school where everybody gets in on the act.
Characters overlap and the cast take on a number of roles in differing scenarios, but all share this crazy world where understanding what is happening is irrelevant. A universal theme is that of men trying to meet women, with the organising of a singles picnic bringing with it a collection of the male characters sat together in a field.
At two-and-a-half hours long, this is a lengthy experiment in humour of various forms and characters, and so a criticism is to say that there are a couple of moments of overindulgence. Takefumi’s extended dream sequence resulting in a lengthy dance routine on a beach could have been shortened, as could the break into animation with a ‘dog-directed’ sequence.
But, as this is framed in chapters, as if switching between TV channels late at night, with intermissions thrown in for good measure, this is a film that doesn’t necessarily need to be watched in one sitting. It’s easy to digest – if a lot of it is undigestible – and the comedy is a very Japanese brand of strange, making you intrigued as to where it is going to go next.
Coming at a similar time to Ishii’s “The Taste of Tea”, much of the cast, including Hideaki Anno, Maya Banno and Takahiro Sato, have been drafted in and they throw themselves into the comedy with glee. Terajima is perhaps the star, acting much of it with an uncharacteristic smile on his face when confronting a classroom of noisy school ‘children’. Asano, always good for a comic turn, also delivers, as does Kase in yet another obscure role.
This has all been made with a smile on the faces of all involved. It is far from great filmmaking, and certainly far from serious, but everyone has taken it with the right attitude. If you go into this with that attitude also, you will be rewarded with an extended period of laughs. If not, this will simply be an obscure mess featuring some freakish creatures.
Indeed, some of the more unusual features may leave you questioning a more sinister subtext. But it’s best not to think too much about this. Let it flow and let the laughs come out. You just might need a Snickers to get through it.
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