The high-definition segments that open and close Stephen Kijak's rockumentary We Are X are the most stunning concert visuals I have ever seen, onscreen or in person.
As ferociously hard-rock music blares, a camera that has to be on an Olympic-sized track slides back and forth and side to side to capture the band members' unsynchronized gyrations, a laserium-like light spectacle with explosions and flames punctuated by loud thuds from the bass drum. It's as if a KISS show had a baby with From Dusk Till Dawn's Titty Twister bar.
These scenes bookend meaty—and, often, heart-wrenching—archival, interview and rehearsal footage that drives home Kijak's thesis that X Japan is more than a human karaoke machine aping western music, that this truly unique band deserves a spot on any serious list of great bands that just fucking rock.
This is presented mostly through the words, images and tortured life of drummer/pianist/composer/producer Yoshiki, who blows through so many different looks over the years that David Bowie would be inclined to say, “Dude, enough.”
Beyond fashion, Yoshiki is a musical prodigy who, like many gifted artists, has created masterpieces from personal tragedy and physical pain. Classically trained as a child, he can now, at 50, put tears in your eyes with sweet ballads, sways to your hips with instrumental wizardry and walls to your balls with speed metal driven by his powerful drumming.
Before we go any further, I must confess to not having seen or heard much X Japan before watching the film, and I knew nothing of Yoshiki's backstory. Had that been different, I likely would not be so cynical about the shots of him wrestling with debilitating pain as every show winds down. We Are X would have you believe Yoshiki may, at best, be crippled or, at worst, die should he keep pushing himself as he does.
Whatever works; X Japan has sold more than 30 million singles and albums combined, and while they are—wait for it—big in Japan, they actually have fans all over the world and count among their admirers everyone from Sir George Martin to the Japanese emperor, from Gene Simmons to Stan Lee (who made Yoshiki a comic-book hero).
Kijak's résumé includes the highly praised documentaries Jaco, about bass player Jaco Pastorius, and Stones In Exile, about the making of a seminal album by the world's greatest band. We Are X has his cameras checking in and out of the buildup to a Madison Square Garden concert two Octobers ago as a “present day” device to move his story along. Hail the conquering rock gods and all that, but I'm not convinced this was as effective, as most of those scenes are listless.
But that actual concert footage? Wow! Worth the price of admission.
We Are X was directed by Stephen Kijak; and stars Yoshiki, Toshi, Pata, Heath and Sugizo. Screening at Regency South Coast Village, Santa Ana, and Art Theatre, Long Beach (and perhaps beyond).
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Idealistic politician Franco Mujica (Unax Ugalde), who stumbles into Mexico's presidency, finds his first year in office marred by scandal, corruption and his own ineptitude in Manual de principiantes para ser presidente (A Beginner's Guide to the Presidency).
Writer/director Salim Nayar (Tu te lo pierdes, Causas naturales) begins with an effective screwball-comedy tone that, had it been maintained, could have had his movie regarded as a Mexican Veep or In the Loop. Of course, those two projects owe their success to Armando Iannucci.
In less skilled hands, Manual de principiantes para ser presidente suffers from too many competing characters and plot threads that choke the film before its predictable conclusion. I'm not even thinking here of the women—Mujica's wife (Alejandra Ambrosi), daughter (Arantza Ruiz) and fixer (Amaia Salamanca)—who get El Presidente back on the right path. All three actresses shine.
Making light out of a corrupt, intractable and heartbreaking political system is hard. With a lead such as Ugalde, who is more Justin Trudeau than Donald Trump, Nayar, as with so many screenwriters before him, ditches the funny because he's got something to say, maaaan.
Unfortunately, what he has to say has been said before—and much more effectively.
We Are X was directed by Stephen Kijak; and stars Yoshiki, Toshi, Pata, Heath and Sugizo. Screening at Regency South Coast Village, Santa Ana, and Art Theatre, Long Beach (and perhaps beyond).
Manual de principiantes para ser presidente (A Beginner's Guide to the Presidency) was written and directed by Salim Nayar; and stars Unax Ugalde, Alejandra Ambrosi, Amaia Salamanca and Alec Von Bargen. Opens Friday at AMC Orange at the Outlets, Edwards Irvine Spectrum, Edwards Long Beach Stadium and Regal Cinemas Garden Grove.
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.