Audience Member
A few interesting shots aside, it's a chore to sit through, a random mess with a fuck-ton of grating jumpcuts and no cohesion. It alternates between making no sense and beating you over the head with simplistic ideas and the most blatant exposition ever. Filming a photo of the characters and narrating who's who? The protagonist literally running away from his house and shouting his family issues at the top of his lungs? Oh look, an American flag and a Coca Cola bottle, imperialism's bad, mm'kay?
Rated 0.5/5 Stars •
Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars
02/11/23
Full Review
Alvise F
Terayama's metacinema is an avant-garde manifesto disguised as a circus theater.
It is an eccentric social critique of modern Japan, deprived of soul and morally decadent, enslaved by capitalism and subjugated by the blind obsession with America.
The search for subjectivity in a society tending to the oppressive homologation culminates in some symbolic acts of anarchic awareness: young people tear off their uniforms and make love on the railways in a sexual liberation impulse; they burst into the streets; they burn the American flag.
Peace is not ephemeral as Peace cigarette smoke; freedom cannot be dictated by the illusory promises of the so-called "economic miracle"; self-consciousness is only achievable by throwing away the absurd constraints of the hypocritical and materialistic Japanese society.
The nameless protagonist opens a Pandora's box: the mother is a shoplifter, the father a pervert, the sister mentally unstable; the real face of post-war Japan is not the respectable mask it awkwardly tries to put on (showed to the world during the ‘64 Olympic Games), but a corrupt and degenerate one.
Recurring themes in the provocative artistic production of the Art Theater Guild (ATG), the independent film production company active in Japan between the 1960s and 1980s that promoted mostly New Wave films and "cinéma d'auteur".
Terayama's stylistic approach is experimental and extravagant. The unconventional narrative structure is, perhaps, too often disordered, but creates an inspired pastiche with influences from Russian literature, Noh theater and prog rock music.
Inter-cut by surreal monochromatic scenarios, the nihilist rebellious act of the youthful disillusionment is a socialist song with psychedelic tones.
"Throw Away Your Books, Rally in the Streets" is a hymn to freedom of expression, an accomplished self-liberation coming-of-age, the last desperate scream against the inevitable Japanese conformity.
"The city is an open book. Write on its infinite margins!"
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
05/22/22
Full Review
Audience Member
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Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
02/10/23
Full Review
Audience Member
You could easily dismiss "Throw Away Your Books" at first sight, as nothing more than a product of 60s counter culture. The thing is, the movie resonates still to this day, and many things easily apply to any culture, not just modern Japan. Sexual relations, friendship, family, everything is either a joke, a charade or just never a honest thing. It's a honest reflexion on the frustrations of not only young people, but people from any age group. Even when the movie starts going heavily into "performance" mode it doesn't sabotage the entire thing.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
02/08/23
Full Review
Audience Member
I really hesitate to jump to any conclusions when it comes to cemented greatness, especially because I have only just seen this film for the first time. But let me say that Shuji Terayama is one of my favorite filmmakers. This is the best film I have seen by him, and quite possibly one of the best films I have ever seen period.
This is a work of extreme power and beauty. Its themes of disillusionment, coming of age, anarchy and the failure of dreams are so universal and powerful, that despite the specificity of the Japanese New Wave and late 1960's counter culture that influenced them, the work still resonates with a intensity and intelligence only shared by the greatest of films (Malick's "The Tree of Life", Bergman's "Persona", and Jodorowsky's "The Holy Mountain" come to mind, among others.) It is one of those works of art that seems to understand the human condition, what it means to exist and the entire scope of this existence. I am so profoundly moved by this work and by Teryama in general, and cannot wait to re-examine this film.
Genius near unparalleled.
Rated 5/5 Stars •
Rated 5 out of 5 stars
02/08/23
Full Review
Audience Member
Novelistic story of a young man on a soccer team who has a dysfunctional family, intercut with a liberal amount of vignettes that vary in content, length and quality; "Throw Away Your Books, Rally in the Streets" defies description as it boldly breaks the laws of cinema. Experimentation is conducted, the wilder the better. Green-tinted flashbacks, purple fantasies, musical interludes, subliminal editing, daring sequences with the actors acting strangely in public (a la "Borat"), wanton disregard for three-act structure or basic necessities like the Fourth Wall. With its Dostoevskian number of characters obsessed with the state of Japan circa 1971, and the overall varying successes of its myriad cinematic experiments, "TAYB, RitS" might be a trying viewing experience for those not in the right state of mind for it.
Overall, its a bumpy and kind of overlong ride, but well worth it for the cumulative effect. While the concluding speech (with the tableau of assembled film crew) goes on for an Onanistic length, the film finally ends with what are without a doubt the greatest ending credits ever.
Very much interested to check out more of Shuji Terayama's work, but it seems to be hard to come across in the States.
Rated 4.5/5 Stars •
Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars
02/16/23
Full Review
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