FILM REVIEW: BIG MAN JAPAN

Eye is going to get you. A scene from Big Man Japan.

Beware! This stink monster is coming to a theater near you!

By Don Simpson

Like a folding umbrella or dehydrated seaweed, Big-Sato (Hitoshi Matsumoto) gets big when necessary; which, in Big-Sato’s case, is when big bad monsters (such as The Strangling Monster, The Evil Stare Monster and the Stink Monster) invade Japan. He is always on call; he can never relax, always waiting for the next monster attack. When he gets a call to “bake,” he hops on his moped (or train – depending on the distance) and heads over to the nearest power station to power up. When small, he is a longhaired good for nothing slacker; when big, he resembles Don King in purple briefs.

Big-Sato is the sixth generation of Big Man Japans. Previous generations were well compensated, celebrated and had servants; but work for Big-Sato has slowed down and the glamour, compensation and servants of his ancestors have gone away (his compensation includes a small government salary and advertising revenue from sponsors whose logos are affixed to his body like a human NASCAR).

It would be an understatement to say that Big-Sato is underappreciated; he is downright despised by the people of Japan. He is separated from his wife – she did not want their daughter (whom Big-Sato occasionally meets at the Big Boy restaurant) to follow in her daddy’s footsteps. Big-Sato’s grandfather (the fourth) has dementia and lives in a nursing home, but he occasionally electrocutes himself in order to grow large and terrorize Japan – but every family has its problems.

Written and directed by and starring Japanese comedian Hitoshi Matsumoto, Big Man Japan is a painfully dry and deadpan mockumentary revealing the humble reality of an unreal superhero. Matsumoto playfully pokes fun at the giant superheroes of Japan’s cinematic past (such as Godzilla), as Big Man Japan showcases just how tedious movies about giant superheroes can be.