Neighbour No. 13 (2005)

Wonderful character development!

Truly Dreadful Film

Sadly Over-hyped

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Jûzô Murasaki is a boy miscast in his classroom, being frequently abused, tortured, beaten and humiliated by the bully Tôru Akai and his gang of juvenile punks. After years of repression, rejection and fear without facing Akai, he develops a psychopathic dual personality with a violent alter-ego. While living in the apartment 13 of a tenement building, he becomes unable to control his violent dark personality, who plots an evil revenge against his upper floor neighbor Akai and his family.I am a great fan of Asian movies and I found "Rinjin 13-gô" a hidden gem, developing a dark, gruesome and surrealistic psychological thriller of repressed hatred and revenge combined with horror. The screenplay follows the usual patterns of Asian horror movies, with a plot point in the very end, and the viewer must use his or her brain to understand the whole plot. I believe this is the greatest quality of screenplay writers and directors of this genre in Asia. I note that people accustomed to watch blockbusters and American movies only seem to have difficulties to properly understand the intelligent Asian screenplays. In this film, all the adult situations only have happened in the mind of the young Jûzô Murasaki, and when he faces the bully Tôru Akai, he resolves all his inner problems and the time-line will never happen the way it is disclosed in the film. Therefore, the screenplay is absolutely original and I do not recall seeing any similar story. In addition, the movie is stylishly shot, with unusual angle of camera and a nice cinematography. The actors and actress have great performances and there is a cult cameo appearance of the director Takashi Miike in homage to the promising Yasuo Inoue. My advice to the movie lovers is to keep his name in the pocket, since his debut could not be better. My vote is eight.Title (Brazil): "Ódio" ("Hate")

First-time director Yasuo Inoue tells the story of a troubled young psychopath named Juzo Murasaki,who was tormented through school by group of his classmates,led by Toru Akai.This leads to the young boy to create a split personality,where his other half is on the psychotic side and apparently only comes out when he feels bullied or angry."The Neighbor No.Thirteen" is slow and deliberate horror film laced with heavy psychological tones.It's obviously influenced by "All Night Long" series and Takashi Miike's works.The film offers a few moments of brutal and highly disturbing violence,so fans of Japanese transgressive cinema should be pleased.The finale is quite disappointing,though.My rating:9 out of 10.

This movie is a pretty harsh look at how bullying and loneliness can affect someone's life. It's one of the best horror/revenge flicks I've ever seen.What we have here is a story about a young boy who is abused by his fellow classmates. Due to this abuse he has grown up with a split personality. Which is his bad, vengeful, stronger side. The movie is basically about him coping with the emergence of his Mr. Hyde.The movie plays incredibly well. Some may have issues with the long scenes, but for me the movie was shot incredibly well. It's this type of movie that makes me roll my eyes at these WB flicks or even TV shows. The cinematography, direction and music was nothing less than awesome. Whenever they show his alter side, it was nothing but pure badass, creepy goosebumps. There really is not much to complain about. It would have been nice to maybe get to know the characters a little more. Maybe to understand why Juzo went so kaka cuckoo. The other slight complaint is the ending. It's a tad confusing, but either way you think how it ended...it works.This was a damn treat. A serious revenge/horror/thriller flick that delivers on pretty much all cylinders. I think I might start wearing my down vest again.

I have just watched the film, and there is not much I can say without spoiling some of it for you. Let's just say that is a revenge film, and like many Japanese films of its type, insanity plays a part. The film starts when a young man, Juzo, gets a job at a construction company. We learn that Juzo spent much of his school years hiding from bullies (and from the introduction, also being tortured in some VERY shocking ways). The cruel attacks by his supervisor at the site begin to affect Juzo, bringing more and more of his school memories to the surface, and the desire for REVENGE.*The Neighbour Number 13 (Rinjin jusan go)* That's all I can say really, as I don't want to spoil or diffuse this film. I am pretty sure if you do a search you will find a couple of reviews on the boards, from the cinema release, but beware of spoilers: the story is everything in this film, there are few twists and turns, and some sections will leave you stumped.I liked this film: it is very stylishly shot, and the use of colour is fantastic in some scenes. I have never read the original comic that this film is based on, but I can only assume that the film's many lapses into the surreal are faithful to the source: there is even an animated section of the film, and identifying the reality in this film is not always an easy thing to do.There are some very still sequences that reminded me of Kitano's films (Hanabi or Brother in particular), and some of the more insane scenes are definitely like adding a pinch of Miike to the mix. While there is a fair bit of violence in the film, most of it occures offscreen, though the fate of one character is shown particularly graphically.One aspect of the film that I am sure is from the source material, as it seems to be a very manga thing to do, is the depiction of some of the more grosser things in life, ie: bodily excretions, both liquid and solid are shown in this film, when I am sure few Hollywood films would not. It's nothing too graphic, but it was enough to make me squeal "Ewww gross!" like little girl. tongue.gif So in the end, I quite enjoyed this film. It is stylish, tense and atmospheric. This director's style, reminds me in some ways of Kitano's older work, in that I felt sometimes that was just following the characters around. Some scenes are just not trimmed down to keep the action flowing, and I like that. Like I said, there are some quiet moments, but they are often filmed in a kind of detached manner, and filled with tension, possibly reminiscent of Kiyoshi Kurosawa.The Neighbour Number 13 is a film that would be best watched with friends, and discussed over SEVERAL pints of beer - or at least Cokes and Gummi bears tongue.gif While it isn't amazing, it is very interesting and looks fantastic. If you have bought all of your essentials and you are looking for a sidedish, I can fully recommend this film.