Funky Forest: The First Contact...with the utterly bizarre.

Hello All,
I've seen the strangest thing. A film that made no sense and complete sense at the exact same time. One of the funniest, most outright strange films I've seen in recent memory. The film is called Funky Forest: The First Contact. Watch the original Japanese trailer here, the eerily vague English trailer here, and my favorite excerpt from the film here.

A "still" from "Funky Forest"

Funky Forest: The First Contact is a film composed of many different short vignettes that follow a group of multiple established characters. None of these characters interact outside their own short vignettes (with the exception of one so called "singles picnic") and each vignette is an entirely self contained story...of sorts.  There is no real story involved in any bit of Funky Forest and anything resembling a narrative structure is minimal and basic, but this does not hurt Funky Forest in any way, in fact, the inclusion of a set narrative structure would destroy what the film is entirely. Funky Forest needs no story to achieve its goals, because it utilizes motif instead; throughout the film vignettes are repeated and the only way we, as an audience, are to understand what is going on is to recognize that these situations are repeating and getting more ridiculous. For example, the film opens with two men dressed in white on and entirely white stage, they trade banter like some Japanese Moon version of Abbot & Costello for a short period, they start to move and act more emotionally until, mid-sentence, the screen cuts to black. Then it cuts back in, they are still fighting, then back to black. Then back in. This repeats for a bit before a new skit is introduced, and throughout the film these two gentlemen are continuously shown randomly throughout the film. for the rest of the film scenes cut to black and back into an entirely different sketch at random; there is no telling when a skit will end and a new on will begin, it just happens whenever which gives the film an unseen type of disarming, confusing, random and unhinged humor.

Intent- The lead director of Funky Forest, Katsuhito Ishii, is a fairly prolific director and writer who has established through his other film that he is a competent auteur. He knows what he's doing behind the camera. Nothing in Funky Forest is there accidentally and it is by no means a piece that was created for the sole purpose of being weird; there is some clear artistic intent, but I cannot begin to interpret what it is. Perhaps many of the underlying themes are lost in the American-Japanese culture divide. The creators of this film have proven through multiple past films that they can create a well put together film, so clearly Funky Forest must be a conscious departure from this style into something completely original.

Oddness- Funky Forest is undeniably strange; there are humanoid tentacle monsters, a hidden alien subplot, unwarranted random dance scenes, a deranged version of Abbot & Costello, and some pretty disgusting sex imagery throughout. The entire film is almost indescribable as it follows almost no plot other than following characters in this strange universe. If you want a mind numbingly bizarre film, you will find it in Funky Forest.

Findability- Funky Forest is available for a completely free full viewing on YouTube along with multiple download sources, and clips/images hidden in forums throughout the internet. Funky Forest is very easy to get your hands on online; the real challenge comes in finding an audience that actually wants to view a film like this.

Satisfaction- Funky Forest gives its audience a new film viewing experience as they sit and stare at the TV understanding almost none of what is going but laughing to tears anyway; there is no room left within the insanity to do anything else but giggle at how confused you are. If you want to watch an odd movie that breaks conceptual boundaries in seconds, repeatedly, then Funky Forest will give you exactly what you want in ways you never thought you wanted.

I highly recommend it. Highly.

Thanks for reading,
Alex