House (Hausu) Directed by: Nobuhiko Obayashi Written by: Chiho Katsura Starring: Kimiko Ikegami, Miki Jinbo, Kumiko Oba, Ai Matsubara Just in time for Halloween, the Criterion Collection has released director Nobuhiko Obayashi's creepy, cartoony and absurdly hilarious feature film debut House (Hausu) on DVD and Blu Ray. The film is a smorgasbord of in-camera tricks and techniques that celebrate all of the best elements of genre filmmaking while creating a completely unusual and unique cinematic experience. The synopsis on the back of the House blu ray couldn't be more appropriate, describing the film as Scooby Doo through the lens of Mario Bava. It's certainly a colourful experience that probably owes some of its imagery and effects to Italian genre films. To put it into a modern perspective, the film's aesthetics could be described as a Michel Gondry take on J-Horror. Oddly enough, Hausu was apparently Japan's direct response to...
- 10/29/2010
- by Jay C.
- FilmJunk
Janus Films' aggressive booking and marketing of Nobuhiko Obayashi's psychedelic art-horror film House (Hausu) has quickly turned a heavily-bootlegged Japanese obscurity into a North American pop culture phenomenon. So much has been written about House in recent years that one might get the impression that there is not much to say. To the contrary, The Criterion Collection's new Blu-Ray shows there is much left to be said about House.
Nobuhiko Obayashi was itching to use his skills as a television commercial director -- he did those Charles Bronson Mandom commercials floating around the Internet -- to make a feature film. He asked his 11 year old daughter Chigumi to come up with some ideas. She came up with some wild concepts that only a little kid could dream up, including: an evil cat, a house that eats people, a finger-chopping piano, murderous futons, a bleeding clock and all other sorts of mayhem.
Nobuhiko Obayashi was itching to use his skills as a television commercial director -- he did those Charles Bronson Mandom commercials floating around the Internet -- to make a feature film. He asked his 11 year old daughter Chigumi to come up with some ideas. She came up with some wild concepts that only a little kid could dream up, including: an evil cat, a house that eats people, a finger-chopping piano, murderous futons, a bleeding clock and all other sorts of mayhem.
- 10/26/2010
- Screen Anarchy
It feels like we've been waiting forever for Criterion to tell us when they're going to release Nobuhiko Obayashi's insane masterpiece House (or Hausu), and it looks like it'll be arriving just in time for Halloween on DVD and Blu-Ray! Look at this list of special features: * New, restored high-definition digital transfer (with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition) * Constructing a House, a new video piece featuring interviews with director Nobuhiko Obayashi, story scenarist and daughter of the director Chigumi Obayashi, and screenwriter Chiho Katsura * Emotion, a 1966 experimental film by Obayashi * New video appreciation by director Ti West (House of the Devil) * Theatrical trailer * New and improved English subtitle translation * Plus: An essay by Chuck Stephens...
- 7/16/2010
- 24framespersecond.net
Here we are again: another mid-month Criterion Collection new release announcement, with some incredible titles to talk about. Many of today’s announced titles have been teased at in one way or another, over the past few months.
First up we are finally going to see Akira Kurosawa’s masterpiece, Criterion Collection #2, Seven Samurai finally making its high definition debut in the states. This release was something that Criterion mentioned back in December, as the Ak 100: 25 Films of Akira Kurosawa was released, and the Yojimbo / Sanjuro films were about to be announced on Blu-ray. In the post, Jonathan Turell mentioned that they wanted to have Seven Samurai ready on Blu-ray for Kurosawa’s birth month as well, but that it wouldn’t be ready until later in the year. The Seven Samurai Blu-ray was also teased at earlier this year when Amazon suddenly added a pre-order page for it,...
First up we are finally going to see Akira Kurosawa’s masterpiece, Criterion Collection #2, Seven Samurai finally making its high definition debut in the states. This release was something that Criterion mentioned back in December, as the Ak 100: 25 Films of Akira Kurosawa was released, and the Yojimbo / Sanjuro films were about to be announced on Blu-ray. In the post, Jonathan Turell mentioned that they wanted to have Seven Samurai ready on Blu-ray for Kurosawa’s birth month as well, but that it wouldn’t be ready until later in the year. The Seven Samurai Blu-ray was also teased at earlier this year when Amazon suddenly added a pre-order page for it,...
- 7/15/2010
- by Ryan Gallagher
- CriterionCast
Today, Criterion released this strange image from their twitter feed. This image, from what I gather, is from the much rumored Criterion release of Nobuhiko Obayashi’s 1977 horror film, Hausu.
Does this image put this rumor to rest? Well let’s examine the evidence. Last October, Janus teased a Hausu release via their twitter feed. Janus later released a press release of acquiring the rights to the Japanese horror film, also announcing a restoration and a theatrical run in January. A few days later, Criterion started selling a bright orange t-shirts with a strange cat on it and the poster version of this shirt. For many months afterwards, there was no rumblings from Criterion about a possible release until today.
How to describe Nobuhiko Obayahshi’s 1977 movie House? As a psychedelic ghost tale? A stream-of-consciousness bedtime story? An episode of Scooby Doo as directed by Dario Argento? Any of the...
Does this image put this rumor to rest? Well let’s examine the evidence. Last October, Janus teased a Hausu release via their twitter feed. Janus later released a press release of acquiring the rights to the Japanese horror film, also announcing a restoration and a theatrical run in January. A few days later, Criterion started selling a bright orange t-shirts with a strange cat on it and the poster version of this shirt. For many months afterwards, there was no rumblings from Criterion about a possible release until today.
How to describe Nobuhiko Obayahshi’s 1977 movie House? As a psychedelic ghost tale? A stream-of-consciousness bedtime story? An episode of Scooby Doo as directed by Dario Argento? Any of the...
- 4/6/2010
- by Rudie Obias
- CriterionCast
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