Hazard (2005)

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Year: 2005

Director: Sion Sono

Writer: Sion Sono, Kazuyoshi Kumakiri (contributing writer)

imdb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0798722/

Genre: Action/Drama

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Shin is a Japanese university student living a boring and meaningless life. One day, he spots a book titled Dangerous Ways to Walk the World, in which he finds a page written about hazards in New-York. Eager to get out, he jets off to New-York to find this inspiration. He quickly does find out the hazards of the city when he is mugged and left with no money or clothes. By chance, he meets Lee and Takeda, two Japanese-American punks who take him in. With Lee and Takeda, Shin’s days in New-York are now full of excitement and danger. When they need a ride, they threaten people and take their cars. When they are hungry, they rob the deli for food. But their trouble-seeking ways eventually gets them chased by the police...

What I took from Sion Sono's film was a tightrope walk. The characters themselves were constantly swaying back and forth between poignancy and absurdity, the events and feel of the film itself moving from reality to fantasy, and even myself at times feeling anywhere from sympathetic to annoyed. As viewers, we all seem to attempt virtually the entire film to find a balance between what is and should be real, and what should be taken as fun and fantasy.

This film takes a foreign stereotype of what New York city (and possibly more of America) is, and runs with it. To the frustrated youth in "sleepy but restless" Japan, a land more defined by conformity and set rules and tradition, the view of America still as the Wild West could seem appealing. The characters are portrayed almost as children playing in a harsh adult playground, and doing so quite well.

Shin (played in a very nice role by Jô Odagiri) is living his ordinary college life in Japan, but desires danger as a change of pace. He wants to challenge himself and sees himself, maybe even the whole of Japan, as cowardly. He feels constantly grounded, and we learn through narration that his dreams of runways show his desire to take off, fly away, be free.

And he does just that. Literally screaming and dashing away from it all, Shin awakens in a gritty, dirty, pre-Giuliani New York City. Having read about the hazards in this foreign land, Shin wants to find just that... Hazard. We're never told exactly what Hazard is besides the idea of a dangerous place where rules do not apply and all can be free.

There is an awkward scene in a cab where Shin is insisting the driver take him to Hazard as the child narrator explains that still no one knows where exactly Shin intended to go. While this fits into the story, I suppose, I do find it hard to believe that someone educated and with the means to travel internationally would be so ignorant as to ask to go to Hazard like this once arriving. Maybe I just need to look at this metaphorically? His conveniently finding Hazard t-shirts for sale in Times Square was a little silly as well.

After meeting his soon-to-be partners in crime, the abrasive "half" Lee (Jai West), and the emotionally childish Takeda (Motoki Fukami), the story picks up. Shin has been overwhelmed up to this point, and looks constantly confused and nervous as he slowly fits his way into Lee and Takeda's energetic and manic lifestyles, the two selling drug-laced ice cream and rob stores at will to maintain their way of life.

My favorite scene of the film has Lee teaching Shin to speak English by reading Walt Whitman. As we see Shin slowly reading and gaining confidence while Lee simultaneously teaches him about the sorrows of the world, we start to see the human sides of Lee and even Takeda. Up to this point we are just shown their lives and actions as being without consequence. Lee symbolically holds the Empire State building in his fingertips as if it is his to destroy if he so chooses. But we also pan out and see that these world-conquerers are sitting on a big pile of garbage. Their place to go and be safe and overlook their playground is just trash. Shin walks the tightrope I mentioned earlier across this mound of trash as he is transforming into the free "American" youth.

Unfortunately for me, the film does not hold on to this reality/fantasy balancing act so well. The second half instead has our characters slipping farther into their world of violence and irresponsibility. Realism is abandoned at times, culminating in a story reminiscent of Taxi Driver, just not as adept. And after the film finishes, I am not exactly sure the characters nor the viewers have learned anything worthwhile.

Sono's view of America here as a glamorized, crime-filled West feels more from a 70s Scorsese film than it does reality. For something filmed near-documentary style with a grainy, hand-held camera, are we to assume he wants his viewers to believe this is the reality of life in New York? For example, there is an overtly-racist, crooked white cop/detective named Mike that is an unfortunate stereotype of Americans here. He is over the top and pretty grating. Does Sono want his audience to believe this is the way cops are in America, or should I just chalk it up to movie-world and move on?

That said, the film was well done and thought-provoking. I really enjoyed the soundtrack - it made it feel like an Asian film despite being largely set in New York - and despite getting a touch motion sick from the hand-cam (I'm such a sensitive boy), I thought the style of filming was emersive and kept me closer to the characters despite their defying reality.

It was just philosophically that I differed with the film, that it felt confused on whether or not it wanted to realistically portray or to glamorize the violent lifestyle, which kept it from being great. It's a fine line to tread I think, and I'm not sure Sono balances it out.

Hazard is definitely an interesting watch, and worth your time. See if you had the same feeling about it than I did... or tell me if I'm just overanalyzing a youthful Japanese fantasy of a free life away from the conformity of home.