ALEX FARBA

2023 Golden Apricot Film Festival  in Yerevan runs July 9 – 16, 2023

By Alex Deleon  for Filmfestivals.com

Takeshi Kirano at the height of "beatness" in "Violent Cop", 1989

Takeshi Kitano (北野 武, Kitano Takeshi, born January 18, 1947), better known as Beat Takeshi (ビートたけし, Bīto Takeshi) in Japan, is a Japanese comedian, actor, and filmmaker. 

The nickname "beat" which he adopted as a Manzai crosstalk TV comedian in 1973 was clearly a reference to the American rebellious "Beat Generation" of the fifties led by the likes of Ginsberg and Kerouac.

In his debut film  as a director, Violent Cop (その男、凶暴につき, Sono Otoko Kyōbō Ni Tsuki, =. 'Warning: This Man is Wild') in which he played an extreme version of a Dirty Harry like violent cop in 1989, was the beginning of a very successful if controversial directorial career, with  international recognition and prizes at Cannes and Venice.   His trademark as a director and star of his own films has always been in-your face violence coupled with sly black humor.

While he is known primarily as an outrageous comedian and TV host in his native Japan, he is better known abroad for his work as a serious filmmaker and actor in a series of his own  extra violent cop and gangster pictures.

The festival will feature a public talk with Kitano, and his latest film “Kubi” will be screened.  "Kubi"  is yet another departure for Takeshi, an historical drama harking back to the age of Nobunaga, the famous  Medieval Japanese  warlord who unified Japan in the 1560s.  In this one Kittano settles for a more or less secondary role while going back to a more traditional style of directing.

Together with another guest of honor, British producer Jeremy Thomas, he will present Nagisa Oshima’s film “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence” which stars David Bowie and Kitano in a notable supporting role, which was his big screen debut in 1983.

With a most unusual nasty  gangster personality Kitano has attracted a huge cult following in Japan and elsewhere. Definitely the most offbeat of a currently active Japanese film directors, it can be seen as something of a coup that the Golden Apricot festival has been able to lure him to Yerevan this year.

The weatherbeaten face of Takeshi "Beat" Kitano, shows  hard mileage at age 76.

Poster for "Kubi" , Director Kitano Takeshi's  newest opus, 2023.