Interesting, overlooked, and significant obituaries from around the world, as they happen, emphasizing the positive achievements of those who have died. Member, Society of Professional Obituary Writers.
Wednesday, February 22, 2017
Seijun Suzuki
Iconoclastic film director -- via the Guardian. AKA Seitaro Suzuki. One of several overlooked Japanese genre directors of the 1960s and '70s, Suzuki is be,st known for his yakuza (gangster) films such as Branded to Kill, Fighting Elegy, Youth of the Beast, Tokyo Drifter, and 50 others. He marked his films with drop-dead poker-faced coolness, gritty and nasty, sporting ragged and unconventional cinematography, a black outlook on life, and increasingly surreal scenarios. Branded actually got him blacklisted as a director for a decade. In time, critical attention from American independents such as Jarmusch and Tarentino and Asian filmmakers such as Kitano, Kar-wai, Kiyoshi Kurosawa, and Miike restored his reputation. Later, his Taisho trilogy won him new acclaim. Did extensive acting later in his career as well.
