Six-String Samurai... what can I say? There are certain moments in life
when you know, right then, that you were meant to be in a place at a time
with certain people to experience that which lies before you. I was meant to see
Six-String Samurai at its last showing at SXSW this past March.
My dealings with this film began a few months before Sundance and Slamdance last
January. On my Ain't It Cool News Web site I had previously run an ejaculatory review
of a flick called Six-String Samurai. It could have been a plant, but no mere
suit could write such a spasm, it came from someone pure who doesn't see a darker
pay slave in a mirror, it came from a geek, a film geek to be specific.
I went to Sundance and was swamped by media. I would do my updates from the Media
Center via my laptop; it was the first time I went abroad to file reports. I felt
like Edward R. Murrow in blitzkrieg London impacted by V2 rockets carrying spools
of unseen film. I typed faster, each keystroke a breath of air.
This geek comes to my shoulder and hands me the first flier for Six-String
Samurai. He tells me, "Harr, haar, Harrrrieeeeeeee, yuh yuh half ta seeeee
it!!!" There was that fevered look of Peter Lorre insanity in his eyes, "Riiick,
yuuuuu half tuu hiiiiiide meeee!!!"
I looked at the flyer, it looked like a bad movie, a pale two-bit piece
of crap ripoff of El Mariachi and Road Warrior. Another geek, I assumed,
campaigned me for about five minutes to see the film. It turns out it was Lance Mungia,
the director.
Months flip by to SXSW, and I miss the first two screenings. Japanese Television
is trapping me in my house, trying to get me to miss the third and final showing
of the festival. I fight them off, they tail me and my father across town and follow
me into the theatre. All my friends are in attendance, the first time ever, it was
as if an unseen force gathered us there. As the film began, Japanese Television continues
filming me, I flip them off, shooing them away. They leave.
I haven't been the same since, neither have my friends. We were let in on a beautiful
secret, a glorious revelation, a moment of profound discovery. We saw Six-String
Samurai: the pure definitionof the strength and power of an unbridled independent
film. Not great cinema, but a film that reaches into your adrenal gland, toys with
your pleasure centers, and forces drool out of your mouth. The film is pure joy on
celluloid.
Then there became this mission for me, I had to alert the world to its presence,
its coolness. I put up reviews by all my friends and myself. Each one a giant headline
trumpeting its arrival. For a generation raised on George Miller, Sam Raimi, John
Carpenter, John Woo, and Robert Rodriguez, this was pure candy -- the type you don't
know when you've had enough and you get sick. A glorious sickness that compels you
to spread your ailment, to run down the street babbling like Peter Lorre with wild-eyed
movement. The first geek was right ... look at me ... I'm reduced to ejaculatory
reflex action by this film. What a joy!