Just Visiting This Planet

The dark sensibilities and cultural resonances of Butoh, the radical Japanese dance movement, are explored in this multilayered work. Profoundly rooted in both traditional and contemporary Japanese culture, Butoh arose in a spirit of revolt in the early 1960s. Characterized by frank sexuality and bodily distortions, Butoh transforms tr...

Runtime

55m

Cast

Tatsumi Hijikata, Kazuo Ohno

After escaping from an insane asylum, a medical student assumes the identity of a mysterious dead man, who appears to be his doppelganger, and gets lured to a sinister island ruled by a mad scientist and his malformed men.

Runtime

1h 39m

Director

Teruo Ishii

Cast

Teruo Yoshida, Yukie Kagawa, Teruko Yumi

A selection of seemingly unconnected scenes featuring Nick Cave, Blixa Bargeld, Nina Hagen and Lene Lovich. Losely based on Voltaire's satire "Candide".

Runtime

1h 33m

Director

Peter Sempel

Cast

Blixa Bargeld, Campino, Nick Cave

Ankoku Butoh is a style of avant-garde dance that established itself in the counter culture experimental arts scene of post WWII Japan. The dance form is thought to have been founded by Tatsumi Hijikata, who both created and performed in butoh pieces from the late 1950’s - through the early 1970’s. In butoh, the style of movement is ex...

Runtime

1h 11m

Director

Misao Arai

Cast

Tatsumi Hijikata

In the UK suburbs, an underground tournament is set to challenge twelve fighters from different backgrounds to compete for the price of £500,000. They have been handpicked for a no-holds barred competition that will push each fighter to their limit. Each fighter has their own reason for competing, and each will give everything they've ...

Runtime

1h 35m

Director

Chee Keong Cheung

Cast

Mark Strange, Nathan Lewis, Joey Ansah

Leung is the bodyguard of a Chinese Triad boss, Wong, to whom his loyalty is unrivaled. Living in Hong Kong, Wong requests that his bodyguard travel to the UK to protect a young British woman, whose true identity is known only by Wong himself. Even Wong's son, Yuen, is kept in the dark, which leads to a betrayal that threatens to destr...

Runtime

1h 35m

Director

Chee Keong Cheung

Cast

Vincent Sze Cho-Lam, Richard Ng Yiu-Hon, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa