Tribute to Yasuzô Masumura 2023 / Kyojin to gangu / Japan 1958
Copious corporate satires were released in the 1950s, but there was nothing like Giants and Toys, Masumura’s frantic, delirious and brilliantly acerbic tale of three caramel candy companies fighting for Japan’s hearts and pockets. Partially inspired by Elia Kazan’s A Face in the Crowd and set against the space race, Giants and Toys is both a product of its era and a timeless allegory of consumerist and celebrity cultures, the toxic dominance of America, and the moral price paid for modernity. Shot on garish Agfacolor film stock and intonated in a rapid-fire dialogue, Giants and Toys is a feverish sugar rush of a film: an onslaught of image and sound that feels eerily relevant in an age of social media influencers and spiritual vacuums.
Joseph Fahim
96 min / Color, DCP
Director Yasuzô Masumura
/ Screenplay Yoshio Shirasaka podle předlohy / based on the novel by Ken Kaiko
/ Dir. of Photography Hiroshi Murai
/ Music Tetsuo Tsukahara
/ Editor Tatsuji Nakasizu
/ Art Director Tomoo Shimogawara
/ Producer Hidemasa Nagata
/ Production DAIEI studio, Kadokawa Corporation
/ Cast Hiroshi Kawaguchi, Hitomi Nozoe, Hideo Takamatsu
/ Sales Kadokawa Corporation
Kadokawa Corporation
2-13-12 Fujimi, Chiyoda-ku, 102-8552, Tokyo
Japan
Phone: +81 807 233 6972
E-mail: [email protected]
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