My God, My God, Why Hast Thou Forsaken Me? (2005) User Reviews

Depending on your "musical" tastes, Brilliant or Awful

[ChungMo · 8/10 · 23 August 2006]

Little prepares the average US film watcher for this one. Is it Japanese over the top violence? No. Is it Japanese S & M sex perversions? No. Is it just general Japanese cultural stuff that doesn't translate well? Not really. What is it?

The only thing I knew about the film was that it was about two musicians making found object music after some major crisis in the near future. What sort of music? I knew what a lot of found object music sounds like but the two musicians featured here were totally unknown to me. The first real clue was a prominently displayed "Borbetomagus" sticker. If you don't know who that is, look them up, "art noise" is a generous description. The musicians (and some will question that) are given large amounts of time where they perform their noise generation (including guitars and synthesizers). I have an appreciation for this type of sound experimenting and was involved with the US art noise scene in it's infancy in the late 1970's and early 80's. Unfortunately the performances in the film are dull except for the final extended solo which is excellent. To have such a well made film revolving around this type of sound would be unheard of in the US.

The plot is simply that the only people infected with the "Lemming Syndrome" who survive have attended concerts by the two musicians. A wealthy man tries to convince the musicians to cure his suicidal daughter. That's about it.

Slowly paced but extremely beautiful. A wonderful music track when the noise is not happening. Subdued but good performances from everyone. A couple of scenes were baffling to me and I don't understand the Biblical reference or why the music group is named "Stepin Fetchit".

This review is a recommendation and a warning.

Brilliant.

[lilyphilia-1 · 8/10 · 18 August 2006]

"My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?"-- these were the last words of Jesus on the cross, and is the translation of the title of this film.

Minimal dialogue, beautiful sounds, desolate scenery-- With all of those aspects, I found 'Eli, Eli, Lema Sabachthani' to be a beautiful film. The story in itself is something unique and untouched before-- an illness that drives people to suicide, the only cure being sound... Acting by Asano Tadanobu only makes the film more stunning-- he plays his usual disconnected and silent character, but it was very effective in this film, maybe more so than in his other works.

Combining the crazy guitar of 'ELECTRIC DRAGON 8000V' with the subtle beauty of 'Last Life in the Universe', I found 'Eli, Eli, Lema Sabachthani' to be a very interesting, enjoyable film of beauty and disconnect.

I can see where some people would not like this film-- the plot isn't very clear at times, and minutes and minutes pass by with almost no words spoken at all. A melancholic feeling is carried on throughout the entire movie-- with the slow, sorrowful piano often playing in the background, I might even call 'Eli Eli' a bit depressing. But if you're interested in artistic films that take you on a journey, then I think you should see 'Eli, Eli, Lema Sabachthani?'.

I doubt that this movie will ever be for sale on DVD in Europe or North America... But if you speak Japanese, definitely buy the DVD from a seller in Japan.

Flawed but fascinating

[carl-205 · 7/10 · 2 August 2005]

Sitting at a café after seeing this film, I overheard the conversation of some hip thirty- somethings who had apparently been to the same session: "… figured it would be a typical Japanese film with long superfluous shots of someone smoking a cigarette and all that …". I can't say that I've ever seen a Japanese movie with such a scene but there is certainly a pervasive sense of Zen in a great deal of Japanese high-culture—"high" to distinguish it from the distinctly un-Zen Anglophile pop-culture. Whether it's shakuhachi music, Akira Kurosawa or Noh theatre, silence and ostensibly unimportant details are given as much credence and gravitas as the explosions and plate-smashing we take for real drama. There is a very persuasive argument to be made for such expansion of time because it is in these gaps of technical information that the audience's imagination is engaged and given the space to roam—and few things are more vital if the art is to be successful. So, what about Eli Eli Lema Sabachthani? Let's set the scene first. The year is 2015 and Lemming Syndrome is gripping the world. The Syndrome's symptom is suicidal tendencies. The film spends blissfully little time on the sci-fi technicalities of such an illness. What it does spend a lot of time on is music. You see, it seems that two post-punk-experimental musos from the band Stepin Fetchit, may be able to cure people using their ardently noisy music. If you like the idea of constructing a musical instrument out of recycled piping, an umbrella and the motor of a portable fan, then you're going to like this film no matter what. Indeed, the film refuses to run a completely predictable episodic course and, even at the moments of greatest tension, we could well be taken to some distant crag of Japanese coastline in order to record the sound of something obscure. The musicians and their art are lovingly portrayed—the film might well be seen as a paean to the concerted artist. The original music, the grand scale of the cinematography and the touching simplicity of the characters are the film's greatest strengths. Nevertheless, the film fails to fully capitalise on its originality of vision. There are hints of cuteness and confusion that take away from the emotional impact of the story and from the intellectual scope of the content (in a world where suicide is an illness, how can you discern a 'real' suicide?). Still, whether you're a music-geek or a Japan-freak the film deserves to be seen.

Not Shinji Aoyama at his best - still worth a look

[tnwestlake · 7/10 · 24 January 2007]

I happen to think Shinji Aoyama is one of the best film makers working today. I was virtually dragged to see Eureka by my boyfriend who knew nothing about the film, but loved the idea that it was 4 hours long and Japanese: I found myself totally entranced by one of the most absorbing, intensely human films I've ever seen. A couple of years later I ran into Desert Moon and was again bowled over (it took me a moment to realise it was the same director).

As you can imagine I had (very) high expectations of this movie: the bible's most devastating phrase for a title and mass suicide the theme (and believe me, Shinji Aoyama is a master at drawing immense hope out of the deepest despair)... and, well, it wasn't that great. It's still a good film - beautiful to look at, interesting themes intelligently developed, plenty of room given for good acting, and some very lovely music, but it just lacked the depth I was expecting. At some points it even started to resemble a music video...

Maybe I'm being harder on this film than it deserves - it's still more worthwhile than a lot of the films I've seen over the past year - but Shinji Aoyama is capable of genius and simply doesn't deliver it here...

Brilliant

[polysicsarebest · 10/10 · 13 January 2009]

Thought it was beautiful and absolutely amazing from beginning to end. With rare dialog (but what's there is hilarious), the main focus is the beautiful cinematography, the sparse and understated performances of everyone, and the NOISE!!! Yes, the noise aspect of the film is what really got me interested in it, but the film as a whole is definitely some kind of minor masterpiece apart from that.

All the beach shots... the shots of the characters walking around making noises.... shots of people sitting, wordless.... shots of people watching the rain. A very slow, VERY minimal art film. I was just in love.

An extremely interesting, unique, moving film... but only about 1 out of every billion people will enjoy it.

Zero-Zero-Zero

[Ishkandar_B · 1/10 · 5 June 2006]

I consider myself a cinephil; not a cinema freak but at least a person who does not sleep when watching movies other than Hollywood bang-gang-do-sex things; I am outrageous (!!!) not with the director (every one has the right of his "artistic" opinion, provided that there are fellows eager to waste their time and money) but with the sado-masochists programming this film for the 5th Cluj-Napoca TIFF. The most unfairly 107 minutes spent in my life… Zero-Zero-Zero…

P.S. I am rating with one but if the webmaster decide to make the mistake to watch this movie the voting will include the zero value too in the future layouts