Sunday, July 30

The Pillow Book Review


The 1996 film by Peter Greenway is an utter masterpiece and not for mainstream audiences but if you understand Asian cultures, fetishes and love Ewan McGregor, this is a must get. Vivian Wu (The Joyluck Club) plays Nagiko, a girl infatuated with calligraphy since her father was a writer and wrote her name on her face every birthday. She has a big fetish by having it written on her body and then later writing on men. She eventually meets Jerome (Ewan, in the middle of the movie) an Englishman who is the lover of the publisher who blackmailed her father years ago. So she wants to be published and she also wants revenge on he publisher. The movie is exteremly sexy and dark and funny. The movie mixes English, Chinese and Japanese. Nagiko is Japanese and most of the movie is set in Japan if you were wondering. Most comical, the subtitle translations in English are inaccurate on purpose due to 'babel,' Greenway's whimsy. Now if you can't wrap your head around Nagiko writting books on twelve different naked men (spoiler inviso-text: and her lover being turned into a book), then this movie isn't for you.

DVD: A Movie: A