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Horror movie fans might not be aware of this disturbing Japanese thriller from Takashi Miike, one of Japan’s most prolific directors known for his explicit and taboo representations of violence and s*x. These themes are very common in his works, and 1999’s Audition is no exception.

As one of the industry’s leading creatives in the horror genre, Guillermo del Toro loves exploring various movies from different parts of the world. In fact, he’s a huge fan of Audition as he once posted about it on his social media page.

Guillermo del Toro fanboys over Japanese horror movie Audition

Takashi Miike’s Audition is a movie that is hard to un-see once you’ve seen it. Based on Ryu Murakami’s 1997 novel of the same title, this horror thriller received positive reviews from Western film critics. It is considered both feminist and misogynistic, especially with Asami Yamazaki’s storyline.

If you’re keen to experience a thought-provoking film featuring an unorthodox audition and profound commentary on gender roles and relationship dynamics, we’ve got a picture that might very well scratch that decidedly specific itch. But wait, there’s more! Celebrated director Guillermo del Toro is a fan of the film of which we speak and has even said as much on social media.

With that in mind, you can see all the particulars via the tweet below.

Film: Audition by Takashi Miike. Gorehounds will only get 2 or 3 moments of cringing violence but there's tension throughout.

— Guillermo del Toro (@RealGDT) June 3, 2016

While del Toro is absolutely right that Audition only features gore in brief spurts, that is more than made up for thanks to the undeniably visceral nature of said gore and the almost unbearable baseline of tension prevalent throughout.

Despite Audition’s status as a stone-cold classic, it...

Japanese horror, often referred to as J-horror, has captivated and terrified audiences worldwide with its distinct approach to the genre. Unlike its Western counterparts, which frequently rely on overt violence and jump scares, J-horror typically excels in creating a pervasive atmosphere of dread, tapping into deep-seated psychological fears, and exploring the unsettling realm of the supernatural. This unique sensibility has earned Japanese horror films global recognition and significant influence, particularly during the late 20th and early 21st centuries. This article aims to delve into the pantheon of Japanese horror cinema, identifying the most consistently acclaimed films, examining their key features and cultural significance, and exploring their enduring legacy on the international stage.

Defining the Apex of Fear: Identifying the Top Japanese Horror Films

Determining the definitive “best” Japanese horror movies of all time is a subjective endeavor, yet a consensus emerges when examining numerous reputable sources, including film review websites,...

It's February! The month of cold weather, the Super Bowl, and of course, Valentine's Day! Yes, Valentine's Day, the most ridiculous of holidays, one that seemingly only exists to sell overpriced heart-shaped boxes of disappointing chocolates. If the onset of Valentine's Day has you in a romantic mood but you're still craving the blood and guts of the horror genre, you're in luck! This month's horror streaming column is devoted to romance-tinged horror flicks you can watch with your significant other, or all by your lonesome.

Read more: These Are The 35 Most Disturbing Movies Of The Century So Far

Audition

Streaming on Shudder, The Criterion Channel, Tubi, Kanopy.

It's probably fair to say that "Audition" is the film that really introduced filmmaker Takashi Miike to a wider Western audience. In this nasty piece of work, a middle-aged man named Shigeharu Aoyama (Ryo Ishibashi) who lost his wife seven years ago teams up with his friend,...

Ryū Murakami’s cult 1990s Japanese horror thriller novel Audition is heading to the screen once again, courtesy of Speak No Evil writer Christian Tafdrup.

It is not hyperbole to say that Takeshi Miike’s Audition is easily one of the most memorable horror films of the 1990s. Miike is well known for his ultraviolent films, including Ichi The Killer and Imprint – the latter being an episode of the Masters Of Horror series deemed so gratuitously violent it was banned from broadcast, eventually surfacing on DVD. By contrast, Audition is a masterclass in restraint, the tension building to unbearable levels before its horrifying finale.

Based on the 1997 novel by Ryū Murakami and released on 1999, the plot follows Shigeharu Aoyama, played by Ryo Ishibashi, a lonely middle-aged widower who hatches a scheme to find a girlfriend by holding fake film auditions. Here he meets Asami, played by Eihi Shiina, a sweet,...

If you have seen the 1999 Japanese horror film Audition, you know it's a movie that means business. It's a bit of a slow burn, but once it gets going and heads towards its gruesome climax, you can't help but have to pick your mouth up from off the floor. It's one of those films that shouldn't be touched again because it's perfect as is but, this is Hollywood. Any film is in play for a new take, and it looks like it's Audition's turn to get the remake treatment.

Per Deadline, a new take on Takashi Miike's Audition is in the works, with a deal near to being closed for Focus Features, Hyde Park Entertainment, and Mario Kassar Productions to produce the film. What's promising here is that Christian Tafdrup, who directed the original Danish version of Speak No Evil, is co-writing the project with his brother Mads Tafdrup.

A new take on the cult horror classic “Audition,” one of the more influential modern horror films in the torture-porn genre, is coming to the screen.

Focus Features is nearing a deal to produce a feature adaptation of “Audition” based on the 1997 horror-thriller novel by Ryū Murakami, which was originally brought to the screen by Japanese master Takashi Miike in 1999 starring Ryo Ishibashi and Eihi Shiina.

Focus will produce the project alongside Ashok Amritraj’s Hyde Park Entertainment and Mario Kassar Productions, who have tapped Christian Tafdrup to write and direct the film. Tafdrup is the Danish director behind the original “Speak No Evil,” which was last year adapted into English by Blumhouse and Universal. Tafdrup is co-writing the script with his brother Mads Tafdrup.

“Audition” starts as a domestic drama of a widower who is holding mock auditions in order to find a new wife, only to discover that...

Danish filmmaker Christian Tafdrup brought the incredibly bleak film Gæsterne, a.k.a. Speak No Evil (read our review Here) into the world back in 2022 – and when the American remake was released last year, Tafdrup let it be known that he wasn’t impressed by the new take on his story, because it didn’t leave viewers traumatized like the original film did. Now, Deadline has revealed that Tafdrup is on board to direct a remake of director Takashi Miike’s dark and twisted 1999 Japanese film Audition… and we can probably rest assured that he’s not going to take it easy on viewers with his take on the material.

Based on a 1997 horror thriller novel by Ryū Murakami, Miike’s Audition was scripted by Daisuke Tengan and has the following synopsis: Widower Aoyama decides to start dating again. Aided by a film-producer friend, Aoyama uses auditions for a fake...

A true horror classic, Takashi Miike’s Audition is impossible to scrub from your brain even 26 years after its original release, and a fresh take on the tale is now in the works.

Deadline reports today that Focus Features, Hyde Park Entertainment and Mario Kassar Productions are “nearing a deal” to produce a new adaptation of Ryū Murakami’s 1997 novel Audition, which served as the basis for Takashi Miike’s movie back in 1999.

Christian Tafdrup, who directed the original Danish version of Speak No Evil that was remade by Blumhouse last year, is co-writing the new Audition with brother Mads Tafdrup.

Executive Producers include Cineverse’s Chris McGurk and Yolanda Macias.

Ryo Ishibashi and Eihi Shiina starred in Takashi Miike’s Audition. In the Japanese horror film, “A widower takes an offer to screen girls at a special audition, arranged for him by a friend to find him a new wife.

Horror films have existed since the dawn of the medium. Shortly after the invention of film, French director George Mellies created Le Manoir du Diable (The Haunted Castle), likely the world’s first horror flick. Though silent, The Haunted Casztle included comparably quaint scares of the 1890s. Since then, the genre has evolved considerably, and a movie won’t get many screams from a man in a bedsheet anymore. It needs something more, something substantial and shocking. By the dawn of the new millennia, one certainly couldn’t produce something akin to Mellies’ The Haunted Castle and expect a terrified audience. Moreover, these films faced a veritable haul of predecessors. By this point, filmmakers had thoroughly terrified audiences with all the traditional scares. Ghosts, ghouls, and demons were no longer novel concepts.

This was the conundrum facing Takashi Miike, and he answered with a film as controversial as it was groundbreaking.

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If you are a horror fan then there is a big chance that you might have heard about the horror streaming service Shudder, and if you have its subscription you might be wondering what’s in store for you in October 2024. Don’t worry there is a host of new and old horror movies coming to the service in the upcoming month and we have listed the 13 best movies coming to Shudder in October 2024.

Hush (October 1)

Hush is a slasher horror thriller film directed by Mike Flanagan who also co-wrote the film with Kate Siegel. The 2016 film follows the story of a dead writer living in a remote house in the woods but when a masked killer appears in the window she must fight for her survival. Hush stars Kate Siegel in the lead role with John Gallagher Jr.,...

Regardless of their artistic merit, it’s understandable that it can sometimes be difficult for mainstream cinephiles to connect with movies about twisted bodies and grisly mutations. Obviously, this doesn’t mean that these films are any less deserving of praise – it’s just that not every critic has a strong stomach. That’s why it’s so satisfying to see a production like Coralie Fargeat’s satirical body horror flick The Substance get the recognition it deserves in spite of its disturbing mean streak.

And in honor of this Demi Moore / Margaret Qualley experiment wowing highbrow audiences worldwide, we’ve decided to come up with a list recommending six other arthouse body horror flicks for your viewing pleasure! After all, there’s no reason that fine cinema should be devoid of blood and malformed guts.

For the purposes of this list, we’ll be defining “arthouse” as any film...

“Words create lies. Pain can be trusted.”

Few things in this world are more frightening than dating. In addition to the fear of getting stood up or rejected, women have the added bonus of worrying that the person they’ve matched with might turn out to be a serial killer. It’s just smart to text your location and the photo of your blind date to a friend while asking for advice on which earrings best complement your impossibly sexy First Date Dress. Women talk about our hopes for a romantic adventure in the same breadth that we relay justifiable fears that we might end the evening as a collection of dismembered body parts in a trash bag at the bottom of a ravine.

Shigeharu Aoyama (Ryo Ishibashi) learns about this terrifying dichotomy the hard way in Takashi Miike’s insightful masterpiece Audition. Tired of the single life but terrified of women,...

“Audition” is quite a historic production (at least for its cult following), since it was the film that established Takashi Miike as a prominent member of the horror category and Eihi Shiina as a “priestess” of the grotesque.

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Based on the homonymous novel by Ryu Murakami, who actually wrote it as a reaction to a failed love affair, “Audition” tells the story of Shigeharu Aoyama, a middle aged entrepreneur who has recently lost his wife and has been living a disinterested life ever since. His 17-year-old son, Shigehiko, who worries about the turn his father's life seem to have taken, prompts him to meet new women. Yoshikawa, a friend of Shigeharu and a film producer, proposes that he take part in a sham in order to meet women, an idea he agrees to. According to the plan, actresses would...

Warning: This article contains mentions of extreme violence.

Some horror movies often go unnoticed by mainstream audiences despite their excellence in the genre. Films like "The Platform" and "Audition" offer social commentaries and push the boundaries of taste with their brutality. "Terrifier" has gained a cult following for its controversial and visually stunning portrayal of a sadistic killer.

Several stalwart cult horror movies are often forgotten even by long-time fans of the genre. Cult horror movies can vary greatly from obscure art films to radical spatter B-movies. Whereas some horror films are treated as blockbusters, others are regularly overlooked by audiences, even though some of those are among the best horror movies ever made.

Cult horror movies typically gain an ardent following, perhaps more so than movies outside the genre. In fact, many horror B-movies become beloved classics within the genre. Despite this, some of the best movies of the...

by Eleo Billet

Released last year as a world premiere at Fantaspoa film festival, Yoshihiro Nishimura's new work stars transgender actress Anna Nagasaki in a picture that is, as usual, wild, bloody, and fun. However, the limits of the director's creations are becoming more and more apparent since, despite its pleasant sides, the movie feels very recycled.

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As with all of Yoshihiro Nishimura's films, it is hard to accurately describe the unfolding story. Sometimes the characters' names are not given, incongruous events occur apace, and the moral, if there is one, is blurred. But we will give it a try. The storyline centers on a Chinese yakuza organization, discriminated against by the Japanese, which has just lost its leader and several of its members. Cornered, the survivors are aided by a young pink-haired woman who comes out of nowhere and fights with vigor.

Takashi Miike's 1999 Japanese horror film "Audition" recently earned the title of the scariest foreign horror movie of all time. The film tells the story of a faux audition held to find a new bride for a widower, and stars Eihi Shiina as the mysterious potential wife. Speaking with Asian Movie Pulse (Amp), Shiina credits "Audition" as "an extremely" important role for me." Indeed it was — prior to, Shiina's sole film credit was Isao Yukisada's 1998 drama "Open House," but the role of the psychotic Asami earned her international recognition. Amp reveals that the former Benetton model's road to "Audition" was similar to Asami's, sans the torture. What she thought was a simple meeting and deep conversation turned out to be a tryout for the lead role, much to her surprise. She tells Amp:

"I heard that Miike wanted to see me, so I thought to myself that I want to meet him.

Dates can go very wrong in horror movies. Carrie White's prom date with Tommy Ross goes up in flames before the last dance, in both Stephen King's novel "Carrie" and Brian De Palma's film adaptation. In Sean Byrne's Aussie horror movie "The Loved Ones," poor Brett doesn't even make it to his school dance after rejecting Lola, who hosts a macabre dance of her own. All grotesqueries of romantic relationships find screen time in the genre.

So when Takashi Miike signed on to adapt Ryū Murakami's 1997 novel "Audition," he picked up on its themes of voyeurism, sexism, and exploitation in the entertainment industry -- its leading man Shigeharu Aoyama (Ryo Ishibashi) holds a shady "audition" for his next wife, launching the story's events into motion -- but left its nastiest moments for the finale, long after audience is embedded into the mysterious allure of Aoyama's chosen bride,...

“I can’t put my finger on it but there’s something wrong with her.”

When writer Tony Rayns met Japanese director for one of the first times in the 1990s, he spoke to him about his incredible output per year, which sometimes ranged somewhere between six to seven movies. According to Miike, the answer was obvious for he liked to keep himself busy with his films through the year. Additionally, rejecting a producer’s proposal, especially for an interesting idea, was something Miike could (and probably still can) not do, and in the end the people involved would find the right time and right place in his busy schedule to work everything out.

“Audition” is screening at Udine Far East Film Festival

Interestingly, the year this encounter took place marks a significant milestone in Miike’s career. The Rotterdam Film Festival not only showed three of his movies – “Audition...

One Shot is a series that seeks to find an essence of cinema history in one single image of a movie.It’s one of those scenes whose pronouns get italics; that scene, the one at the end of Takashi Miike’s Audition in which the vengeful Asami (Eihi Shiina), wooed by Aoyama (Ryo Ishibashi) after an ersatz audition, pierces her lover’s skin with needles and slices off his left foot. She describes what she is about to do to him in calm, sweet tones (“This is a very painful spot”), and her coos are warnings to us too; this is what I’m about to do, are you going to watch? At the climax of the unflinching scene, Asami winds a wire saw around his ankle then swipes happily until, with a flourish, it’s off. For a moment, the camera shifts, and we are outside looking in...

Eihi Shiina is a Japanese fashion model and actress from Fukuoka, Japan. She got her first big break in 1995, working for Benetton, after which she represented Japan at the global Elite Model Look ’95. More magazine work followed.

Shiina made her film debut in 1998 with “Open House”. She also published a book of photographs and poems, entitled “No Filter, Only Eyes”, that same year. She is recognized internationally for her role as Asami Yamazaki in Takashi Miike’s “Audition”, and as the vengeful police officer Ruka in Yoshihiro Nishimura’s “Tokyo Gore Police”. Apart from her many collaborations with Yoshihiro Nishimura, she has also acted in Shinji Aoyama’s “Eureka” and Takeshi Kitano’s “Outrage”.

You can follow her on Facebook and Instagram

We speak with her about taking a break from the industry, her collaborations with Takashi Miike, Yoshihiro Nishimura, Takeshi Kitano and Shinji Aoyama, being a model and an actor,...

“I can’t put my finger on it but there’s something wrong with her.”

When writer Tony Rayns met Japanese director for one of the first times in the 1990s, he spoke to him about his incredible output per year, which sometimes ranged somewhere between six to seven movies. According to Miike, the answer was obvious for he liked to keep himself busy with his films through the year. Additionally, rejecting a producer’s proposal, especially for an interesting idea, was something Miike could (and probably still can) not do, and in the end the people involved would find the right time and right place in his busy schedule to work everything out.

“Audition” is streaming on Mubi

Interestingly, the year this encounter took place marks a significant milestone in Miike’s career. The Rotterdam Film Festival not only showed three of his movies – “Audition”, “Dead or Alive” and...

“Helldriver” is another preposterous splatter film by the master of the genre, Yoshihiro Nishimura, this time engaging on zombies.

The “story” unfolds as follows: Taku and his sister Rikka are a couple of roaming sadistic murderers who eventually decide to kill her abandoned husband. During the act, his daughter Kika arrives and attacks the couple. Subsequently, a meteorite falls on Rikka, releasing a toxic gas that transforms every resident of northern Japan into a zombie, and her into their queen. Some years later, the country is split in half by a wall that separates the healthy population of the south part from the zombies in the north. The government hires Kika, who is now a skilled zombie killer, to lead a team of outlaws to the north, to kill the zombie queen.

Not to forget, the only way for someone to kill a zombie is to cut...

Audition

Blu ray

Arrow Video

1999 / 1:85:1 / 115 Min. / Street Date – February 12, 2019

Starring Ryo Ishibashi, Eihi Shiina

Cinematography by Hideo Yamamoto

Directed by Takashi Miike

It could be described as lyrically sadistic but de Sade himself might flinch at Audition – like its fragile leading lady, Takashi Miike’s film treads ever so softly before lowering the boom on its stupefied audience.

Ryo Ishibashi plays Shigeharu Aoyama, a middle-aged widower tired of sleeping in a single bed but ill-equipped for the dating game. Like the desperate anti-heroes of so many noirs, Aoyama makes just one mistake but it’s a doozy – he stages a sham audition as his personal matchmaking service. Into that not-so-tender trap steps Asami, a supernaturally shy ballerina with secrets all her own.

Miike spins their gauzy-lensed courtship with kid gloves and compassion and by the time the happy couple set sail for a seaside rendezvous we’re aching...

Love is certainly in the air this week, especially with our horror and sci-fi home releases, as we have plenty of tainted love on tap for those of you who tend to enjoy the darker side of romance. Scream Factory is ready to put you in the mood with both the Collector’s Edition of Valentine and their Poison Ivy box set, and Arrow Video has assembled an impressive Special Edition of Audition that fans are definitely going to want to pick up on Tuesday.

For those of you looking for some less romantically-inclined entertainment, Popcorn is getting the SteelBook treatment, and you can take a ride aboard the Horror Express as well. Other notable releases for February 12th include Possum, Killer Campout, Doom Room, Haunted Hospital: Heilstätten, Purgatory Road, and Nightflyers: Season One.

Audition: Special Edition

One of the most shocking J-horror films ever made, Audition exploded onto the...

Takashi Miike’s Audition will be available on Blu-ray From Arrow Video February 12th

One of the most shocking J-horror films ever made, Audition exploded onto the festival circuit at the turn of the century to a chorus of awards and praise. The film would catapult Miike to the international scene and pave the way for such other genre delights as Ichii the Killer and The Happiness of the Katakuris.

Recent widower Shigeharu Aoyama is advised by his son to find a new wife, so he seeks the advice of a colleague having been out of the dating scene for many years. They take advantage of their position in a film company by staging an audition to find the perfect woman. Interviewing a series of women, Shigeharu becomes enchanted by Asami, a quiet, 24-year-old woman, who is immediately responsive to his charms. But soon things take a very dark and...

Have you ever seen a movie so bad, that as you were watching it, you paid less attention to what was going on and more to the fact that you’re still allowing your brain to process it? Have you ever seen a movie so bad that the longer you watch it, the more horrified and worried you become at the sheer size of the balls on the director and screenwriter? Like if they would go that far then what would they do next? I’m prepared to admit that in my exhaustive search to give you my opinions on some of the best Asian cinema out there…I have often come across the worst.

Now I too have seen the dark side. And its kung-fu is strong. One in particular that I just have to get off my chest is Tokyo Gore Police. I think a moment of horrified silence would be appropriate here.

Director Yoshihiro Nishimura (Tokyo Gore Police) has worked in horror as a make-up effects technician and director for several years, now. His latest production is titled Kodoku: Meatball Machine. Set for a 2017 release in Japan, the film's first trailer is almost nothing but bloodshed. Litres of blood are used as strange monsters battle each others. Bullets fire from breasts and chainsaws eviscerate the slow. While there is no North American release date scheduled, fans of horror can take a look at Japan's take on horror, here. Kodoku: Meatball Machine is a sequel. It follows the 2005 film, Meatball Machine. Both films deal with Necroborgs. Created by alien parasites, they turn their host in a murderous man-machine. Eihi Shiina (Audition), Takumi Saitô (13 Assassins), Ami Tomit (Tag) and Maki Mizui star in this latest film. More details, including a trailer, are available below, for this shocking title. Release Date: 2017 (Theatrical, Japan). Director: Yoshihiro.

Ever watch a black and white movie and feel like you can see the color? Even though there’s no spectrum, there are so many tones in between the absence and consumption of color. The Eyes of My Mother does this so well because it feels very natural. The cinematography by Zach Kuperstein is simply stunning, and it’s the first thing I think anyone would tell you about the movie. Nicolas Pesce decided to shoot his debut in this format for what I saw as reflecting the cold tone of the story. So very cold. Make no mistake, this movie is bleak. Be ready.

Mother has had her daughter Francisca be comfortable with death from a young age. One day, a stranger strikes up a conversation with young Francisca on their farm, and his intentions aren’t good. Once grown, Francisca has to deal with the loss of both parents,...

Mo Brothers' MacabreSTORY65%ACTION65%ACTING65%VISUALS67%POSITIVESPure ExploitationShareefa Daanish's performance as DaraNEGATIVESAddressed only to fans of the genre2016-08-1266%Overall ScoreReader Rating: (0 Votes)0%

Based on the short film Dara, Mo Brother’s (actual names Kimo Stamboel and Timo Tjahjanto) debut feature is a genuine slasher film, so filled with gore and violence that became the first Indonesian film to be banned in Malaysia.

A group of people consisting of Adje and Astrid, a married couple expecting a baby, Alam, Eko, Jimmy, and Adje’s sister are heading to the airport in Jakarta. While on the road, they come across a very beautiful woman named Maya, who has been robbed and asks them to take her home. Eko is smitten with her and he persuades the others to comply. Eventually, they reach her house in the middle of nowhere, and she invites them in, to be properly thanked by her mother.

Stars: Ryo Ishibashi, Eihi Shiina, Tetsu Sawaki, Jun Kunimura, Renji Ishibashi, Miyuki Matsuda, Toshie Negishi, Ren Ôsugi, Shigeru Saiki, Ken Mitsuishi, Yuriko Hiro’oka | Written by Daisuke Tengan | Directed by Takashi Miike

Takashi Miike’s Audition will always be a special movie to me, because it sparked off my obsession with Takashi Miike. It also put me off the meal I was eating when I first watched it, so it impressed me too. The fact that Arrow Video have given it a special edition should be enough to make it a must buy, but do they do the film justice with their release?

Audition (Ôdishon) is the story of Shigeharu Aoyama (Ryo Ishibashi) a widower who “auditions” prospective women to date under the rues of a film role. When Asami Yamazaki (Eihi Shiina) is interviewed she catches his eye, and he takes her on a first date. Little does he...

There are some films that once seen are never forgotten. Audition is one of these films. Having first seen Takashi Miike’s arguably most famous and notorious movie some fifteen years ago, the memory of how it quite simply stunned me back then has never quite faded, and so returning to it for the first time in a decade and a half it was a pleasant surprise to discover that not only has Audition lost none of its power to shock and horrify in the intervening years, but that it’s actually a much deeper, entertaining and, yes, funnier film that I’d remembered.

For those unfamiliar with the film it works best going into it knowing as little as possible, but the basic plot revolves around widower Shigharu Aoyama (Ryo Ishibashi) being persuaded by his son Shigehiko (Tetsu Sawaki) that seven years of being alone is long enough and...

Guy Maddin with Kim Morgan in photo booth in Yves Montmayeur's The 1000 Eyes Of Dr Maddin

The director of Michael H - Profession: Director, the documentary about Michael Haneke which features Jean-Louis Trintignant, Susanne Lothar, Josef Bierbichler, Béatrice Dalle, Juliette Binoche, Emmanuelle Riva and Isabelle Huppert, is off to Beijing, Taipei and Tokyo. Yves Montmayeur has his sights on Shu Qi (Hou Hsiao-hsien's The Assassin), Michelle Yeoh and Cheng Pei-Pei (Ang Lee's Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon), Zhao Wei (Ma Jingle and Dong Wei's Mulan: Rise Of A Warrior) and Eihi Shiina (Audition, Tokyo Gore Police) for his "new documentary film on 'Amazons in the Asian Pop Culture'! Or how Asian warrior women are dealing with martial arts and feminism."

The 1000 Eyes Of Dr Maddin director Yves Montmayeur Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

His latest film, The 1000 Eyes Of Dr Maddin, which stars Isabella Rossellini, Udo Kier, Kenneth Anger, John Waters,...

The jump scare is a uniquely horror movie convention. Where some movies use it as an excuse to play peekaboo and assault you with noise, others use it as a way to shatter your complacency as a viewer. It’s the purest form of scare: something bursts out of a dark corner, a loud noise cuts the tension, or a jolt to the plot comes on so unexpected, you don’t know what hit you. It may just be a momentary fright, but a good horror movie will put you on edge and keep you there.

****

Alien (1979)- No blood, no Dallas

Horror purists are of the mind that jumps are cheap, and, for the most part, they are. Yet, in those nerve-wracking scenes, when a director knows exactly what they are doing, it’s riveting. I’ve always prided myself on not being one of those people who gets jumpy during a horror movie,...

Here we are at what is a surprisingly modern list. At the beginning of this, I didn’t expect to see so much cultural impact coming from films so recently made, but that’s the way it goes. The films that define the horror genre aren’t necessarily the scariest or the most expensive or even the best. The films that define the genre point to a movement – movies that changed the game and influenced all the films after it. Movies that transcend the horror genre. Movies that broke the mold and changed the way horror can be created.

10. El laberinto del fauno (2006)

English Language Title: Pan’s Labyrinth

Directed by: Gullermo del Toro

It’s more a dark fantasy film than a horror film, but it would be tough to make a list of 50 of those. Plus, it has enough graphic, nightmarish images to push it over the threshold.

Norman England started his career in the show business as a guitar and keyboard player for the New York based band Proper iD. In 1993 he moved permanently to Japan, where he began working as a journalist. In 1998 he spent a week on the set of George A. Romero’s TV commercial for the video game Resident Evil 2 and in 1999 became the Japan correspondent for Fangoria, a U.S magazine dedicated to horror, splatter and exploitation movies. As a journalist he has worked for a variety of magazines such as Hobby Japan, Japanzine, Flix, Japanese Giants, theJapanese Times, Eiga Hiho, e.t.c.

Since 1999, he has visited over 35 film sets in Japan, including The Grudge, Gamera 3 and the entire Godzilla Millennium series, with an extended stay for Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah, where he visited the set almost continuously from April to October of 2000.

With Asami and Rina Takeuchi

He has...

For nearly two decades, Tokyo Gore Police helmer Yoshihiro Nishimura has been on the foreground of Japanese extreme cinema, both as a director and as a special makeup artist, gaining notoriety for his often hallucinatory FX work seen in such fest faves as Meatball Machine and Sion Sono’s Suicide Club. The Ninja War of Torakage marks a new path for Nishimura, as he blends the popular Japanese ninja genre with his crazy, visually driven style of filmmaking. The movie stars Takashi Miike regular Takumi Saitoh (13 Assassins, Ace Attorney) as the lead, with cult-actress Eihi Shiina (The Audition, Tokyo Gore Police) as Torakage’s evil master. Watch the trailer below.

The Ninja War of Torakage – Trailer [Vo] by Filmosphere

The post Watch the high-octane, mind-blowing trailer for ‘The Ninja War of Torakage’ appeared first on Sound On Sight.

With Halloween fast approaching, EW is picking the five best films in a variety of different horror movie categories. Each day, we’ll post our top picks from one specific group—say, vampire movies or slasher flicks—and give you the chance to vote on which is your favorite. On Oct. 31, EW will reveal your top choices. Today, we’re ready to talk about those movies that hit a little too close to home. All horror movies prey on the psychological premise that there's beastliness roiling within everyone. But let's get real: You don't see news reports about werewolves, vampires,...

** Spoilers ahead **

I am not a horror film fan. I appreciate the genre but considering that my over-amped imagination will turn a sight of a little girl with long hair in ghostly white attire into a full epileptic seizure within me, I try to stay as far away from scary films as much as possible. But trying to be a well-verse film critic requires me to explore uncharted territories especially that of the horror realm and thoroughly challenge my threshold. Granted I haven’t seen films like the Japanese Ringu, A Serbian Film, It or even Cannibal Holocaust, but I know scary when I see it. Ahem, The Chainsaw Massacre and The Orphanage. But I can confidently say that these five films that I am about to list is still a terrifying film experience for the majority of viewers and one that cornered me to confront my fear resulting in...

Here we are at what is a surprisingly modern list. At the beginning of this, I didn’t expect to see so much cultural impact coming from films so recently made, but that’s the way it goes. The films that define the horror genre aren’t necessarily the scariest or the most expensive or even the best. The films that define the genre point to a movement – movies that changed the game and influenced all the films after it. Movies that transcend the horror genre. Movies that broke the mold and changed the way horror can be created.

10. El laberinto del fauno (2006)

English Language Title: Pan’s Labyrinth

Directed by: Gullermo del Toro

It’s more a dark fantasy film than a horror film, but it would be tough to make a list of 50 of those. Plus, it has enough graphic, nightmarish images to push it over the threshold.

Japanese horror Audition will receive an English-language remake.

Mario Kassar, who previously executive produced Terminator and Basic Instinct, is involved in the American project based on the 1999 film, reports Deadline.

Based on Ryu Murakami's novel of the same name, Audition follows a widower named Shigeharu Aoyama who puts out a fake casting call for a new wife.

Shigeharu is enchanted by one of the auditioning girls, who isn't what she appears to be.

The remake will be directed by Australian director Richard Gray, who previously worked on Mine Games, and is said to follow the novel but will take place in an American setting.

The original Audition, which starred Ryo Ishibashi and Eihi Shiina and was directed by Takashi Miike, is considered a cult classic.

Watch a trailer for the Japanese version of Audition below:...

Mario Kassar, who has served as a producer on blockbusters such as First Blood, Terminator 2: Judgment Day and Basic Instinct, is mounting a remake of Takashi Miike's cult classic Audition.

The original film, which was adapted from Ry&#251 Murakami's 1997 novel, centered on a lonely widower (Ryo Ishibashi) who puts out a fake casting call to help find a new girlfriend. When he finds the one girl he likes, Asami Yamasaki (Eihi Shiina), his quest to find the new love of his life turns into a nightmare beyond comprehension.

The story is said to be quite similar to the original book and movie, only with an American setting. The plot centers on a widowed man named Sam Davis, who is convinced by his filmmaker friend to hold a casting call for a fake movie. The girl he falls for is a ballerina named Evie Lawrence.

Richard Gray is directing from his own adapted screenplay,...

Odd List Ryan Lambie Simon Brew 21 Nov 2013 - 05:51

The underappreciated films of 1999 are the focus in our last list of 90s overlooked greats...

The year 1999 was a significant year for film in many ways. Apart from being the year that George Lucas began his Star Wars prequels with The Phantom Menace, it also saw the release of The Blair Witch Project, a horror film which became one of the first to use the internet as a marketing tool, resulting in a massive hit. The Matrix ushered in a new age of special effects filmmaking, arguably paving the way for the superhero blockbusters crowding into multiplexes today.

Mainly, though, 1999 was simply a brilliant year for film. Justly lauded movies like Fight Club, The Green Mile and Eyes Wide Shut aside, there were a huge number of films that didn't get the critical or financial success they deserved - so many,...

It’s that wonderful, frightful, cool and creepy time of year again, when everything including the leaves on the trees are dying and our taste buds are craving sugary sweets and pies made from the guts of our jack-o-lanterns. It’s October, which means Halloween is nearly upon us! Get you costumes completed, your home haunts constructed and your candy collected for trick’r treaters, because you have to make time to watch some of the scariest movies this time of year.

In an effort to assist you in your cinematic scare-fest, we’ve come up with a list of the scariest movies to watch on Halloween… with one caveat. We have excluded virtually all “slasher” flicks. Why? Well, let’s just say we all know them, we all love them on some level, but really… don’t we all want something more in our scary movies? In honor of...

This post will be retroactively published on October 30, 2013. We apologize about the delay but we know you will enjoy the list the same. Thanks for your patience.

With the remake of Carrie being released in a few days, we celebrate this month’s The Thirteen column with our top 13 female villains and anti-heroes! I have culled the staff together and picked the best of all the names given. Caution: There may be spoilers.

Angel Blake from the film ‘The Blood on Satan’s Claw‘ Played by Linda Hayden

I first saw 1971’s “The Blood on Satan’s Claw” a couple of years ago, as an assignment for a long-running podcast that had a knack for uncovering cinematic, oddball gems. I remember saying that Satan’s Claw is like watching a 90+ minute car crash; impossible to look away from. But let’s get to what makes Angel Blake a great villain.

Villains have always been and will always be some of the most fascinating and memorable characters in the world of genre film. Here we will take a look at the greatest villains of cinema from the 1990’s.

The criteria for this article is the same as in my previous articles Cinema’s Greatest Villains: The 1970’s and Cinema’s Greatest Villains: The 1980’s: the villains must be from live-action films-no animated features-and must pose some type of direct of indirect lethal threat. The villains can either be individuals or small groups that act as one unit.

The villains must be human or human in appearance. Also, individuals that are the central protagonists/antiheroes of their respective films were excluded.

Brad Dourif as The Gemini Killer in The Exorcist III (William Peter Blatty, 1990): Veteran actor Dourif is intense and unforgettable as an executed murderer inhabiting someone else’s body in...

Regardless of the abundance of male directors in horror, this genre pretty much belongs to the fairer sex. Think about it – how many time have we watched a film where the majority of men are drooling, sex obsessed morons who spend the best part of the story inebriated or getting violently disposed of by a maniac who often bears the Y chromosome? Whoever said women in horror were just limited to suffering and killing the big bad beastie at the end of yet another formulaic teenie kill flick, are clearly not looking hard enough but that said, the best of the female villains often miss out of the kudos they rightly deserve. This is our brief run-down of just a small gathering some of the greats . (Warning: Spoilers!)

Margaret White (Piper Laurie)

Film: Carrie

“They're all gonna laugh at you!”

Poor Carrie White never stood a chance. Knocking door to...

Directed by Takashi Miike, based on the novel by Ryu Murakami

Starring: Ryo Ishibashi, Eihi Shiina, Tetsu Sawaki, Jun Kunimura, Renji Ishibashi, Miyuki Matsuda

Runtime: 115mins

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Summary:

This is a masterful thriller, horror, and romance story all in one. Solitary widower Aoyama (Ryo Ishibashi) gets talked into finding a date by his son (Tetsu Sawaki). He is uncertain about seeing women, and expresses his worries to his friend, a film maker (Jun Kunimura), who suggests an Audition. The women who attend have no idea they are really being auditioned for a date. To his surprise, Aoyama does like one of the women who comes to the audition, and he asks her out. Her name is Asami (Eihi Shiina), and she is both charming and unsettling. As the film progresses we learn about her dark past, and Aoyama finds himself sucked into her strange world. The tension builds...

David Bond and Manda Manuel, producers of the upcoming The Profane Exhibit, have some new info to share on the anthology film. The word we’ve received is that shooting of Yoshihiro Nishimura's segment is complete!

Nishimura has a great track record with films like Helldriver and Tokyo Gore Police, and the fact that he's reunited with Eihi Shiina (Audition, Helldriver, Tokyo Gore Police) for "Jigoku No Chorishi" ("The Hell Chef") makes this one segment of The Profane Exhibit we'll definitely be looking forward to.

About "Jigoku No Chorishi" ("The Hell Chef")

Serial killing and cannibalism meet gourmet cooking in Yoshihiro Nishimura's "Jigoku No Chorishi" ("The Chef of Hell"/"The Hell Chef"), a fetishistic tale of murder, suicide and madness set in contemporary Tokyo. Iconic actress Eihi Shiina stars as a mysterious, parasol-carrying woman who encounters a school uniform-wearing, wrist-cutter girl on the street, only to watch her...

Japanese cult director Yoshihiro Nishimura has just completed shooting his segment of international horror anthology project The Profane Exhibit and he has enlisted a familiar face to help him do so. Nishimura's Tokyo Gore Police star Eihi Shiina - best known for her lead role in Takashi Miike's Audition - once again takes the lead for the director in The Hell-Chef.Serial killing and cannibalism meet gourmet cooking in Yoshihiro Nishimura's Jigoku No Chorishi (The Chef of Hell / The Hell-Chef), a fetishistic tale of murder, suicide and madness set in contemporary Tokyo. Iconic actress Eihi Shiina (Audition, Tokyo Gore Police, Helldriver) stars as a mysterious, parasol-carrying woman who encounters a school uniform-wearing, wrist-cutter girl on the street, only to watch her escort a man...