Right now there is a massive anticipation for a movie amongst the cool kids in Japan. Every where you go in the hip, youth driven area of Shibuya, you'll see posters and billboards heralding the imminent arrival on August 23 of the film version of one of the hottest mangas (Japanese comic book) ever -
Detroit Metal City. Heck, there are even caffeine addicts in Starbucks dressed up like the manga's protagonist, Johannes Klauser II.
(Photo courtesy of director Ron Mann from his recent trip to Japan) So what the hell is
DMC?
DMC began as a manga series by Kiminori Wakasugi in the popular magazine Young Animal. It told the tale of timid country boy Soichi Negishi, who leads a double life as the lead singer of the notorious death metal band, Detroit Metal City, Johannes Klauser II.
The comedy results from either Negish's constant need to balance his two identities, or his innate politeness overwhelming his common sense and forcing himself to don the Krauser guise and behave in ridiculous shock metal ways.
For instance, the picture above comes from a story where Negishi anonymously gets into a flame war on a
DMC fan forum, leading the fans to think a big
DMC event is going to happen at Tokyo Tower. Not wanting the fans to be disappointed and riot, he goes along to try and calm them down, but ends up ?raping? the Tokyo Tower instead to his fans rapturous delight. And here are some other pages from the manga to give you a sense of the twisted laffs from these metal maniacs.
When the first collected works of the comic were published, they sold out right away and those unable to get their hands on them where called "Detroit Metal Refugees"! And where there is great success, usually a film adaptation is right around the corner.
There has been a little internet buzz in non-Japanese blog circles about the film adaptation, but mainly due to the attention that the films' "special guest star" has gotten ? Gene Simmons. Yes, that
Gene Simmons. The dude with the tongue from KISS. And, of course, the author of
"Ladies of the Night: A Historical and Personal Perspective on the Oldest Profession in the World."He plays Jack IL Death, the reigning king of black metal that challenges Klauser II to a guitar showdown. And among female J-film fans, hearts are a flutter with the casting of teen idol Ken'ichi Matsuyama as Klauser II. Matsuyama really rose to fame with his portrayal of L in the film series based on
Death Notethe massively popular manga as well as the recent spin off film,
L: Change the World (directed by Hideo Nakata of
Ringu fame).
We've been lucky to snag the International Premiere (that's fancy festival lingo for the first screening of a film outside of its country of origin, which is next to the coveted "World Premiere" tag, that we have for
Deadgirl and
Sexykiller) of
Detroit Metal City, following the August 23nd release in Japan.
Time to see what all the fuss is about! It's only in Japanese, but here is the official website and check out the trailer for
DMC!
(Note that the only YouTube trailers are in Japanese, but you'll get the jokes. Hopefully we will have a subtitled trailer up soon)
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