A feverish collision of avant-garde aesthetics and grindhouse shocks (not to mention a ... more
direct influence on Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange), Funeral Parade of Roses takes us on an electrifying journey into the nether-regions of the late-'60s Tokyo...
Cross-dressing club-kid Eddie (played by real-life transvestiteentertainer extraordinaire ... more
Peter) vies with a rival drag-queen(Osamu Ogasawara) for the favours of drug-dealing cabaret-managerGonda (Yoshio Tsuchiya). Passions escalate and blood begins to flow- before all tensions are released in a jolting climax (thatprefigures by nearly thirty years Tsai Ming-liang's similarlyscandalous The River). With its mixture of purely narrative sequences and documentaryfootage, Funeral Parade Of Roses comes to us from a moment whencinema set itself to test, and even eradicate, the boundariesbetween fiction and reality, desire and experience. Consequentlythe film shares a kinship with such other 1969 works as MasahiroShinoda's Double Suicide and Ingmar Bergman's A Passion. YetMatsumoto achieves a zig-zag modulation between pathos and hilaritythat makes his picture utterly unique: a filmic howl in the face ofsocial, moral, and artistic convention. A feverish collision of avant-garde aesthetics and grind-houseshocks (not to mention a direct influence on Stanley Kubrick's AClockwork Orange), Funeral Parade Of Roses takes us on anelectrifying journey into the nether-regions of the late '60s Tokyounderworld. In Toshio Matsumoto's controversial debut feature,seemingly nothing is taboo: neither the incorporation of visualflourishes straight from the worlds of contemporary graphic-design,painting, comic-books, and animation; nor the unflinching depictionof nudity, sex, drug-use, and public-toilets. But of all the"transgressions" here on display, perhaps one in particular standsout the most: the film's groundbreaking and unapologetic portrayalof Japanese gay subculture. Special Features: New transfer from the director's personal print Audio commentary from director Toshio Matsumoto Interview with director Toshio Matsumoto Booklet featuring a new essay by musician Jim O'Rourke
Production Year: 2004 - Drama - Director: Nick Cassavetes - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over, 12 years and over - Starring: Rachel McAdams, Ryan Gosling, Gena Rowlands
Production Year: 1995 - Drama - Director: Ang Lee - Original Language: English - Classification: Universal - Starring: Emma Thompson, Alan Rickman, Kate Winslet, Hugh Grant, Greg Wise, Hugh Laurie, Robert Hardy
Advantages: Funny, black humour Disadvantages: Didn't get it the first time
Daniel is devastated when his father dies, but his stiff upper lip prevails and he arranges the funeral, carefully planning everything. Unfortunately, the funeral home doesn't take as much care, because when the coffin is delivered, the body inside is not the right one...After this fiasco, everything else goes wrong too. Daniel's successful author brother, Robert, turns up, claiming that he has no money and cannot afford to pay for his half of the funeral. Their cousin, Martha, turns up with an unintentionally drugged-up boyfriend Simon and her hapless brother, Troy. Friend Howard comes with miserable Uncle Albert and lecherous Justin in tow. And then there is the mysterious height-challenged Peter who has a secret that Daniel doesn't like. Will the funeral turn into a free for all? Or will Daniel somehow manage to pull it off?
As ...
Director: Frank Oz
Writer: Dean Craig
Genre: Comedy - Drama
Country: USA/Germany/UK/Netherlands
Certification: 15+
Language: English
Released: 25th February, 2008 (DVD)
MAIN CAST:
Matthew Macfadyen (Daniel)
Keeley Hawes (Jane)
Andy Nyman (Howard)
Ewen Bremner (Justin)
Daisy Donovan (Martha)
Alan Tudyk (Simon Smith)
Jane Asher (Sandra)
Kris Marshall (Troy)
Rupert Graves (Robert)
Peter Egan (Victor)
Peter Dinklage (Peter)
Daniel, who has spent his life living with his parents, and whose wife is desperate to leave his family home, has one more task to complete before he and his wife can move out and begin their new life together - he needs to bury his father.
After having made arrangements for the funeral and brought the family together, Daniel's painstakingly meticulous plans quickly go awry when ...
Advantages: Very watchable, interesting storyline, quite scary in parts Disadvantages: Rather dated, a little stilted acting here & there
portraying a story on celluloid) didn't the people at the ending work out what was going on, and act accordingly?
Audrey Rose can be bought on DVD from many different websites. The cheapest I've seen it is on play.com for £3.99, and the most expensive I've so far seen is from Asda, at £12.79.
If you like a film that's a little disturbing and a little creepy - that's not quite in the horror film genre - more of a psychological thriller - and a very thought-provoking movie about the concept of reincarnation, this could be something you'd enjoy, so long as you can make allowances for datedness. I'd say it's worth it, even if only to see how Anthony Hopkins looked 32 years ago! I suppose at the end of the day, it's an "is she or isn't she" situation - is Ivy Templeton truly Elliot Hoover's dead daughter reincarnated? Or is Elliot Hoover ...
CelticSoulSister 06.12.2009
· Read full review
Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Audrey Rose (DVD)
![Funeral Parade of Roses (bara no Soretsu) - Masters of Cinema series [DVD] [1969]](http://picnica.ciao.com/uk/78373416.jpg)
