Orient Kyuuko Satsujin Jiken (2015)

Agatha Christie's 1934 novel, Murder on the Orient Express, gets its first Japanese adaptation even though certain details are ill-fittingly transposed and dramatic tone is chucked out the window. The special works best closely following the lead of its 1974 cinematic version but the extended back story, which spans an extra two and a half hours of screentime, is arguably superfluous and does nothing to correct the unintentional injection of humor to an otherwise dark and grisly scenario. Fans of the mystery novel might rejoice at this latest incarnation but the innate weakness of the original story remains intact, along with the show's flippant treatment of its resolution. It's certainly an unusual pick for a two-part television special but its star-studded cast is certain to attract interest, given that the project marks Fuji TV's 55th year of broadcast television.  

In this version, legendary protagonist Hercule Poirot is reimagined as Suguro Takeru (Nomura Mansai)--- a tall, lean and fussy private detective, sporting an upward-turning moustache, eager to get back to Tokyo from Shimonoseki Station after assisting local authorities. Through the help of ministry official, Baku (Takahashi Katsumi), he is able to secure a sleeping berth on a luxury line initially thought to be fully-booked. The famous detective's passage aboard the first class carriage is not without incident, as his sleep is interrupted because of the constant movement of people in the carriage. 

The next day, businessman Todo Osamu (Sato Koichi) is found dead, murdered in an adjacent compartment. Along with Baku and a surgeon (Sasano Takashi) who's willing to lend his medical expertise, Suguro sets out to find the perpetrator whom he believes is still on board the train. He begins his investigation by interrogating all 13 passengers who occupy different stations in life, seemingly unrelated to each other. By piecing together clues found inside the victim's compartment and assessing the demeanor of each suspect, the great detective is able to relate the present case to a tragic incident concerning a prominent family, which in turn leads him to uncover a conspiracy to commit murder in the first degree. 

The story is constructed in such a way as to showcase Suguro's powers of observation even though the same suffers from an inherent weakness in the text by reason of the number of coincidences drawn and the far-fetched leaps in deductive reasoning. Thematically, it serves to demonstrate how individuals can be considered equally guilty of committing a heinous act to dispense their own brand of justice. There's an underlying debate in it---a moral question of whether there are indeed instances when it is acceptable to take the law into one's hands and render judgment against one who has escaped prosecution. 

The special goes through the motions of establishing the narrative of telling a tragic tale, condoning a form of summary execution but it lacks the weight accorded to the ethical dilemma of the scenario presented such as can be seen from the 2010 version starring David Suchet.  The adaptation fumbles by failing to explore the moral scruples that accompany the decision of killing a man in cold blood. Very little is said about the rule of law, divine punishment and perdition, making the revelation of the actual killing such a gruesome sight. It unintentionally makes light of the situation by imbuing characters with a nervous energy, reiterating resolve with gruff indignation, sometimes odiously treating the whole murder scheme like a game or enterprise. 

Writer Mitani Koki tries to remedy the dispassionate and limited portrayal of such a diverse group of characters by allotting the second half of this 2-part special as a means to tell the story from the perspective of the perpetrators. An extended back story is provided perhaps to justify the use and lengthen the exposure of its impressive cast but there's very little value-added to the show's 5-hour long runtime.

For those not in the know, Murder on the Orient Express is a grim and inopportune tale of revenge, originally set overseas, in Eastern Europe. Transplanting this famous mystery to Japanese soil robbed it of the exotic locale and the cultural/ethnic diversity that would have placed religious and socio-political beliefs as compelling factors that contribute to the outcome of the story. Meanwhile, viewer empathy for the array of characters is restricted given the large cast and the cluster of story lines in need of dispatch. Nomura Mansai's performance borders on parody while of the lot, veteran actresses Kusabue Mitsuko and Fuji Sumiko inevitably steal the show as the rest of its stars fade into the background. 

RATING: 
STELLAR CAST IN CLASSIC MYSTERY STORY
ILL-FITTING DETAILS IN THE ADAPTATION 
UNNECESSARY BACK STORY
LENGTHY

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Read My Lips : 駄目!

It's no secret that I'm a Ninomiya Kazunari fan. I may be perceived as someone who has an Anti-JE stance in terms of general entertainment, but I have loads of goodwill towards this kid. Way before I discovered him to be an unabashed idol---who liked to cop a feel at band members and whose sarcastic remarks [screamed Napoleon complex at the get-go] and laidback attitude could potentially polarize viewers---he already won me over with his hilarious portrayal of a virgin boy in Stand Up and his outstanding work in the film Ao no Hono-o. There's no easy way to say this, but this kid had me fooled. He might look like a hunched gerbil with black gums and an abnormally scrawny torso but I love watching him all the same. He's the exception.

Now before anyone starts to think that I've gone fangirl loco* over this boy, let me get straight to the subject of this post. To make a long story short---I loved the Neener and therefore, I was doomed... doomed to suffer through 2 hours, 10 minutes and 49 seconds (give or take) of the English dubbed version of GANTZ because I was stoked to see it and had nothing else to do, and of course, having the emotional quotient of a toddler, I dove in without fully taking into account the fact that I would be listening in to nerve-grating audio and horrible dialogue. O, woe is me! To have seen what I have seen and have heard incongruous dubbing!

To sub or to dub?

I know it's an age-old dilemma that film buffs and anime lovers alike have debated upon  for years without reaching a satisfying conclusion. Whether the intention is to appeal to a wider audience or to meet the demands of purists and netizens, there are admittedly pros and cons to each side, which is why film production outfits are forced to make a judgment call. Proponents of both schools have come up with reasonable arguments for utilizing either method, but at the end of the day, when all is said and done, film distributors would always render a decision based on profit; taking a huge gamble by giving the viewers the option to either put up with it or skip it. And while it all boils down to personal preferences and the relative exposure  of each individual to foreign films and different cultures, I'm of the opinion that since subtitling and dubbing exist for the purpose of translating materials for an audience that doesn't speak the original language, it should follow that both be as accurate or in keeping with the film's context as possible. Furthermore, it should be unobtrusive to the viewing experience as a whole, or at the very least not be so off-putting as to draw attention away from the film.

Coming into GANTZ, I was already at a bit of a disadvantage. Having read parts of the manga, I already had a preconceived notion of how the story should play out; having watched a number of Asian dramas, I was already used to reading subs and therefore preferred the original version over the "localized" release this time around. But if there's such a thing as bad and  good subtitles, then surely there's also such a thing as good and bad dubbing. Just as subtitles are expected to be clear and concise, the quality of dubbing should also be held at a certain standard. The problem with this version of GANTZ is that the dubbing didn't seem to complement the movie at all, the voices didn't match the characters and most of the lines were delivered either in a stilted manner or a cloyingly cartoonish tone. There's an obvious rift between what you hear and what you see onscreen, it's a dissociation that lasts from start to finish, giving you a feeling that things weren't conveyed properly because the voice actors were less than convincing. It may all sound trivial, given that it's a sci-fi adventure movie, but the English audio certainly worked towards diminishing the fantastical elements of the story, making dialogue-laden scenes free of  action sequences a total buzz kill. Plus, anyone who's seen Ninomiya Kazunari before would no doubt lament missing out on his vocal inflection---there's a world of snark, angst, conceit and self-consciousness in Kurono Kei's character that simply didn't come across in this big screen adaptation. Another issue I had was how the dialogue sounded unnaturally choppy, the sentence construction was awkward at best, particularly during Kanata Hongo's brief, crazy-eyed monologue.

Some may argue that part of the reason why GANTZ turned out to be an utter disappointment was because the script for the film didn't even come close to replicating the graphic violence, wicked humor and plain awesomeness of its source material---to which I say, this argument is not without merit (but I'll save that for another post once the second installment comes out).  Point is, the English dubbed version of this movie pushed it from generic, mindless entertainment to a catastrophically BAD big budget movie, given that it already failed to establish a working story with characters whom you would care about and want to survive should aliens infest the planet. It's a bit too early to say this, but this duology might eventually come down as a prime example of what not to do when making a live-action version of a popular manga series. Still, for those who might want to see this film, take my advice and wait for the official release, don't settle for the English-dubbed version because, trust me, it's absolutely cringe-worthy. 

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* loca -- What can I say? I suck at foreign languages. 
Featured movie stills care of nurikocam - http://twitpic.com/21o828
Suggested Reading - To Sub or to Dub: The Challenge of "Translating" Films for Foreign Audiences

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