旅途中的日子

改編自柘植義春的漫畫《海邊的抒景》《混沌洞的笨先生》，講述郁郁不得志的李編劇因緣際會來到一個大雪紛飛的深山中，誤打誤撞進入了一家破舊的旅館。屋頂幾乎被積雪壓塌，旅館的老板笨造看起來毫無干勁，旅館里沒有暖氣，飯菜也馬馬虎虎，連床鋪都得自己鋪。然而，笨造似乎藏著什么秘密。某天晚上，笨造帶著李踏入了夜晚雪原……

老兄救命

失蹤兒童錄像帶

　　敬太（杉田雷麟 飾）的弟弟日向很久之前，在山中失蹤。敬太一直還在尋找弟弟。一天，他突然收到母親寄來的一盤舊錄像帶，里面是弟弟失蹤瞬間的錄像。　　敬太擅長通靈的室友（平井亞門 飾）從錄像帶中感受到了不祥的氣氛，并勸敬太不要過多地介入其中。 隨后，他倆與一直報道此事的記者 美琴（森田想 飾）共同前往了弟弟失蹤的那座山。

等待方舟

　　Set in an underground dungeon inhabited by bundled, ragged human beings, after the nuclear holocaust. The story follows the wanderings of a hero through the situations of survival. People wait for the Ark to arrive and rescue them while their habitat falls apart.　　Delving deep into the dusty and long abandonded vaults of b-cinema in search of lost gems always leaves me with a bittersweet taste. On one hand the discovery of unexpected gems where no one would think them possible is a rewarding experience. On the other hand though it makes one wonder how many of these remarkable low-budget oddities, personal love affairs of directors never quite famous and now all but forgotten, have almost forever slipped from memory?　　n any case what we have here is a little post-apocalyptic gem from Poland that is really better than it has any right to. The dystopian near future of O-BI, O-BA finds a group of survivors of the nuclear war that ravaged the Earth inhabiting an underworld concrete bunker and biding their time as they wait for the mysterious Ark, an air ship of some kind that will come and save them. The Ark proves to be an elaborate hoax, carefully designed to give hope to the malnourished and desperate denizens of the bunker, while in the meantime the dome that separates their miserable existence from the nuclear winter outside is slowly caving in.　　What first striked me about the movie is the design of the bunker and the depiction of the survivors. The survivors are gaunt, filthy and terrible-looking penitents, dressed in rags and aimlessly wandering the neon-lit halls of the bunker like automatons. The bunker is a rundown, seedy place, with bright neon lights peering from all sides like the eyes of malignant beasts.　　On one hand it is a slightly 80's depiction of the dystopian future but the movie never stoops down to MAD MAX cheese. Instead it combines biting political satire with the bleak outlook of a world with no future, black comedy with barbs on apathy, religion and power. The survivors, for example, are fed some kind of flour dropping from a tube that hovers in the air - later on we discover the food supervisor uses books and the Bible itself as filler for this meagre meal. There are many such short symbolic touches, perhaps not life-changing or faith-restoring, yet playful, clever and inspired.　　One thing is for sure; O-BI, O-BA is not your run-of-the-mill sci-fi schlock. It overcomes its modest budget with creativity and has genuine artistic aspirations both from a writing and directing perspective. My opinion is that it should have been filmed in black and white instead of colour though. The director uses atmospheric light and shadow to great effect and it would have registered even better in stark black and white. The blue-green neon on the other hand outstays its welcome after a while. Just a minor gripe in an otherwise solid b-movie with its heart set in all the right places.　　Imagine a less bleak THE ROAD (Cormac McCarthy) being injected with the satire and humour of DR.STRANGELOVE and you're getting there. See it if you can find it.