re:mote voices

Title:Princess Raccoon [Operetta Tanuki Goten]
Cast: Ziyi Zhang, Jô Odagiri, Hiroko Yakushimaru, Mikijiro Hira, Taro Yamamoto, Hibari Misora
Director: Seijun Suzuki

Lord Azuchi Momoyama is the fairest of them all, his advisor and their scrying pool tells him so. But he is a bad man, treats people as furniture, and will lash out at all who stand in his way. So when the pool suddenly suggests that Amechiyo, Azuchi's son, will become the fairest of them all, something must be done. The prince is abducted by a ninja, and taken to the mysterious mountain, where all who climb it become lost forever.

However things do not go to plan. The mountain is home of the Tanuki, raccoon spirits. At the foot of the mountain, the ninja is attacked by a local farmer, who has mistaken him for a Tanuki and intends to make Tanuki soup. This leaves Amechiyo at the foot of the mountain, in Tanuki territory, and when he awakes from his drugged sleep he encounters a beautiful young woman. It quickly becomes clear that she is in fact a princess, and the banished prince falls in love. But she isn't human, and man and Tanuki should never fall for each other. However it is the time of the 13th moon, and anything can happen.

Princess Raccoon is a musical, a comedy, a rock opera, a bemusing anomaly. Zhang Ziyi (Crouching Tiger, House of Flying Daggers, Hero), plays the part of the Tanuki Princess, the only Chinese performer in a Japanese film. Though that is explained, since she is a princess from another land, and through magic the Japanese prince can understand what she says. For the most part the film is performed in front of sets as though it were on stage, though at times there are out door scenes with live action. Musically we veer from traditional Japanese operetta to psychedelic seventies rock opera. There is even a computer animated character, the princesses side kick, a mischievous bat/raccoon/ball thing?

Princess Raccoon is by turns striking and bemusing, and on the whole is completely baffling, leaving the viewer quite uncertain as to what to make of it at all!