Bunraku

There's been some talk of Bunraku and what it would contain with a whole list of styles to be incorporated into it that just didn't sound right at all, everything from puppets to papier-mâché, and I've just kept wondering what it would end up looking like after all the talk.

Well wonder no more for the Guy Moshe written and directed film starring Josh Hartnett, Demi Moore, Woody Harrelson, Ron Perlman, Kevin McKidd and Gackt, finally has a trailer.

It looks a lot less than the previous rumours have said, in that there's not all the styles and bizarre story telling effects that were talked about when the project first made its appearance, but there are a couple of cool and rather different stylistic choices to be seen. Yes, there may be a Sin City (Filmstalker review) feeling to it, but is that a bad thing? I think that comes from the fact that it feels a little like a film noir, has the characters introducing themselves and the style is different to most films.

Question is though, how is Bunraku going to turn out? While Sin City worked a sequel has been hard to come by and films that have followed such as The Spirit have been pretty downright awful.

The cast is really good though, and the director is responsible for Holly (Filmstalker review), a superb film that looked at the sex trade in Cambodia and beyond and was part of the worldwide K-11 project to raise awareness of child trafficking and the sex trade in general.

Here's a blurb for Bunraku from a previous story:

A mysterious drifter (Josh Hartnett) and an ardent young Japanese warrior Yoshi (Gackt) both arrive in a town that is terrorized by outrageous and virulent criminals. Each is obsessed with his separate mission, and guided by the wisdom of The Bartender (Woody Harrelson) at the Horseless Horseman Saloon, the two eventually join forces to bring down the corrupt and contemptuous reign of Nicola (Ron Perlman), the awesomely evil "woodcutter" and his lady Alexandra (Demi Moore), a femme fatale with a secret past.

This classic tale is re-vitalized and re-imagined in an entirely fresh visual context, set in a unique world that mixes skewed reality with shadow-play fantasy, a place where even the landscape can betray you. Heroes triumph here only because the force of their will transforms and transcends both space and time.

The world of Bunraku is past and present, fantasy and reality, Samurai and Western all combined. Like Sin City and 300, it gives classic conflict a whole new graphically supercharged dynamic. Resonating through a wide range of cultures and showcasing a mind-blowing array of martial arts disciplines, Bunraku is a fresh arena for breath-taking fight action.