Legend of the Black Scorpion, Zebraman, & Nightmare Detective

Nightmare Detective just reminded me of better films about people going into other people's dreams to solve crimes. Wait... honestly, there aren't any good live-action films about that (Paprika is the only one of which I can think). This doesn't break that trend. It should be an acceptable film, but it was filmed far too darkly and it just gets utterly ridiculous well before the end.

Zebraman is a goofy Miike film, ostensibly about a father who is obsessed with an old TV show, and he starts dressing up as the main character and save the world. And it's a family film. So the wife having an affair, the daughter having lots of sex, the son gets bullied at the school where he substitute teaches. Of course. It's utterly ridiculous that it's somehow viewed as a family film, but then again, most of the rest of the world isn't as prudish as we are.

Legend of the Black Scorpion is an adaptation of Hamlet. And pretty much all I could think was that it was pretty, but as an adaptation, it's a boring mess. Overlong and nowhere near as good as most adaptations (of either Hamlet, or from other East Asian Shakespeare adaptations, like Throne of Blood and Ran). Not all that much to say. Reviews were positive, from what I remember, but I need to stop just watching anything with Zhang Ziyi in it.