FILM

Singapore 2011 96 mins Subtitles Dir: Eric Khoo Starring (voices): Tetsuya Bessho, Motoko Gollent, Yoshihiro Tatsumi, Mike Wiluan

A Singaporean animated adaptation of a Japanese manga artist's autobiography is unlikely to have much appeal beyond the fanboy constituency. Mercifully, Eric Khoo's film intersperses Yoshihiro Tatsumi's story with five of his dark and perverse yarns in the 'gekiga' style that he pioneered way back in 1957. Be warned that these are no kiddie comics; indeed, it emerges that one of the battles fought by Tatsumi was for recognition of their adult nature so as to avoid censorship by those who wanted to protect children.

Director Eric Khoo uses contrasting styles to present the material. The autobiographical vignettes are in full colour while all but one of the stories are monochrome, aping the Tatsumi's own panel drawings. We don't actually learn a great deal about him, beyond his worship of mentor Osamu Tezuka (creator of Astro Boy, apparently), difficult early home life in the aftermath of WWII, and later struggles for recognition. But the stories are striking, in a twisted, bleak and frequently mean-spirited way. The opener, aptly titled 'Hell', tells of a photographer who makes his name with a snap of two shadows burned onto a wall in Hiroshima. But his interpretation of this touching tableau proves to be wide of the mark. A lonely worker's pet ape meets a sticky end in 'Beloved Monkey'; pornographic toilet wall graffiti comes to life in 'Occupied'; and in 'Just a Man', a sour old geezer on the verge of retirement sets out to have an affair so he can bear to spend the rest of his life with his 'bitch' of a wife and grasping daughter. Yup: murder, mutilation, incest, misogyny, sexual dysfunction, and, er, monkey misfortune - all human (and simian) misery is here! (Robin Askew)

Website www.facebook.com/tatsumi.film

Opens: January 13

Copyright Robin Askew 2012