Slighcarp and Grimshaw

Dear Dad,

In the midst of the chaos that has been the past couple weeks of my life, Jeff and I took a few hours out of our limited entertainment schedule to watch “Princess Raccoon.” If we hadn’t already decided that we were going to watch it in two shifts (because I fall asleep after one hour of anything) I’m not sure we would have made it through that movie at all.

I will not argue that “Princess Raccoon” is a visually striking film. I love this strange set piece with Princess Raccoon and Prince Amechiyo on a swirling river in a canoe. But just before this wide shot, Princess Raccoon was doing this fake-steering thing with her paddle and looking menacingly at Prince Amechiyo in a way I simply could not get behind. Even if it were an actual stage-play I would have had a hard time suspending my disbelief.

This was my favorite scene: the Virgen Hag raps about Azuchi Momoyama, Prince Amechiyo’s evil and outstandingly arrogant father (his closest analogue in western culture is clearly Snow White’s stepmother). I remain uncertain whether “Virgen” is a typo or an honorific I do not understand, because I saw “virgin” spelled correctly at least once in the subtitles. Also, there is clearly some link between black magic and Christianity based on how the Virgen Hag calls on Mary while she defends Momoyama by attacking people–or raccoons, it’s hard to tell the difference–with the evil silly string that comes from her fingertips. Regardless, this was the one musical number (of many) that I did not fast forward through a bit of.

Yes, we did a lot of fast-forwarding. The movie brought me to mind of my comments on seeing Ricki Martin live: too many slow, boring songs. I enjoyed the Japanese rap, Japanese prog, Japanese ska, etc. But the Japanese ballads, ballads, ballads were boring.

Also hard for me as a westerner watching this film, what is up with the raccoon mythology? During the curtain call, every character that was a raccoon put a raccoon mask to his or her fact to illustrate that s/he was in fact a raccoon. And, yes, curtain call. This movie had a curtain call. Huh?

Next time you recommend a movie, I am going to make you defend it with much more than a “I really want to know what you think.” Or else I shall ask you to watch “Beer Bad,” my personal favorite of the stupid “Buffy” episodes, over and over until you get the genius of a cave slayer and evil beer.

love always,
Sarah