Okay, first things first: watch this crazy goddamn trailer…
…I don’t really know what to add to that.
The trailer is for The Symbol, from director (and one half of Japan’s biggest comedy duo) Hitoshi Matusmoto. You may recognize Matsumoto’s name, since his first film Big Man Japan is seeing release around the country* as I type/you read.
Little is known about The Symbol, other than it being about a man trapped in a big white… something. Jason Chen of Screen International states “the film itself features dialogue in Japanese, Spanish, English and Russian as well as some foreign location work.” Digging around a little bit, I came across a few stills at Wildgrounds.com, including this…
…which only serves to further confuse. In their coverage, Twitchfilm alludes to disappointment from the producers when The Symbol wasn’t accepted into Cannes. The festival typically has no problem accepting bizarre or fucked-up films, so I wonder if this one crosses the line from extremely weird to completely stupid. For some inexplicable reason, I usually enjoy stories that involve people trapped in a single room**, so I would like for this to turn out well. The Symbol premieres in Japan on September 12th, hopefully an American release of some sort following later.
If you care to navigate the all-Japanese official site, have at it. I would also suggest taking a look at the distribution company’s page for English speakers for a good time.
*I plan on catching it in Atlanta when The Plaza picks it up on June 26th
** Or cube… Cubes work too.