Funky Forest/Warped Forest — Funky Forest/Warped Forest(Blu Ray)

Here’s a double-headed shot of cinematic oddness from Japan. Funky Forest: The First Contact is from 2005, and is a two-and-a-half-hour journey into surreal skits & interactions. And The Wrapped Forest is from 2011, runs at a shorter one hour twenty minutes- with a slight bit more coherency, though there is still a truckload of wackness and bizarre-ness. Here from the folks at Third Widow Films, is a double disc Blu-Ray release of the films- featuring directories commentaries and other extras.

Funky Forest: The First Contact( aka Naisu no mori: The First Contact) was made in 2005. It was jointly directed by Niigata-born Katsuhito Ishii, Osaka-born Hajime Ishimine, and Tokyo-born Shunichirô Miki. Ishii has nine feature-length credits to his name- these go from action-comedy Shark Skin Man and Peach Hip Girl (1998), surreal family fantasy Cha no aji ( 2004), and college student-focused musical comedy Sorasoi (2008).  Ishimine has three feature lengths to his name- going from aspiring DJ trying to find love comedy Frog River (2002), and Custom Made 10.30 (2005) which is seemingly a mix of comedy, drama, and music. Lastly, Miki has three feature-length credits- taking in the film to hand, Sorasoi (2008) with Ishii, and Funky Forest sequel The Warped Forest (2011)

Funky Forest: The First Contact clocks in at two and half hours- it's basically a selection of surreal skits and interactions, which at sometimes connected-sometimes not. The film is split in two with a bizarre three-minute interlude at around the hour mark. The first half sees a selection of characters- we have a bickering stand-up duo dressed in white and oversized tuxedos. There’s Guitar Brothers- a long-haired and bearded man- who plays guitar and chats with his two brothers, a portly Caucasian, and the older stringy tall brother.  There’s a selection of female shop workers on a spar break,  and an on-off boyfriend/ girlfriend- he’s an English teacher and part-time DJ, and she is his student. Over the first half we get the telling of surreal stories, night-time beach dance sessions, odd drama interactions, and some form of grey ‘n’ blue other reality- with spaceships, and battling school children in.

The second half gets even more bizarre, and often light ‘n’ wacky body horror bound. Character-wise we open with a teen schoolgirl meeting a strange yellow fur-suited man with a tail- he wants her to pull his long tail, this she does and another guy appears with a TV-like box… which exposes a fleshy orifice. There are lots of visits to a classroom full of students- for awkward and surreal presentations, including some of the students playing odd flesh-made instruments. There’s a really high and super bizarre sequence- where a school sports trainer and a female student play a racket-based series of games with a fifty-five-year-old man, who has long milking nipples, and blood-sucking creatures in his trouser (see what I mean, damn, damn odd). More from Guitar brother and his brothers, oh and a group of pre-teens plug into the forest to play it.

The first half is more dialogue based, and at times the surreal stories do become a little tiring- but there is a weird pull to the whole thing, which keeps you hanging in there. The second, around an hour and a half is more rewarding- and it really does hit some totally bizarre highs. On the whole Funky Forest: The First Contact is truly an odd and quirky trip of a film, which you really have to turn off your logic and sense to, and let yourself drift along..and for the most part, it remains a compelling and truly wacky ride.
 On the extras side of this disc we have a commentary track from the three directors. A making of(68.56), Cut scenes(21.31), Katsuichi’s Dance Secret Treasure (7.17), Transfer Student is Here(5.01)

 

The Warped Forest is from 2011, and presents similar wacky surreal-ness to Funky Forest: The First Contact- but in a (slightly) more coherent and formal connected manner. It was directed by just one of the directors of the first film Shunichirô Miki, who co-wrote the film with Yuuka Oosumi.

The film runs at a shorter one hour and twenty minutes- and I’d say it’s certainly a little more approachable than the first film too. Things open up in monochrome with three men in their hotel discussing whether they should go in the communal baths or not. One of the numbers, a university lecturer side steps the debate to talk about how three of his students disappeared while dancing to reappear in a forest. All of a sudden, the men’s door opens, with the panicked manager and his assistant rushers in to inform them that the men have been missing for the last few days, with police and search brought out. As the film progresses the sketch-like/ episodic feel of the first films continues- but as already mentioned it feels a little more coherent, with storylines/ characters sometimes linking.  I won’t detail all the storylines here, as I think quantifying the whole thing would rather spoil the mad flow of the whole thing. Along the way in the film's strange world people keep money in their tummy buttons, there are pear-like fruits with suckable nipples on and female-like orifices, and we have some giant people who try to live along with the rest of the normal-sized folk. A few moments of truly stand-out oddness here come in the form of a lemon-like creature that’s birthed from a yellow fur hat, and a large naying white beast that pulls on human nipples.  There is most certainly a sexual undertone to much of the film’s weirdness, but equally, there is a mellow and magical vibe too.  All in all, The Warped Forest is a suitable and worthy follow-up to the first film, and I do hope down the line there will be another film to appear.
On this disc we have the following extras- directors' commentary, making of (11.56), directors' interview (23.18), Wonderful Dwellers of Funky Forest(22.38), storyboards & illustrations gallery.

 

If you’re into high-end Japanese visual oddness- which amuses, puzzles, and at points leaves one's jaw agape. Then this double disc is most certainly going to be something you need to pick up. To buy direct head here to the good folks at Third Window Films.