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<font size="4"><br>Kikujiro</font>
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<br>movie review by David Ng</font>
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<p><font size="6" color="#FF0000"><b>T</b></font>he curmudgeon-orphan bonding genre gets another reworking in <i>Kikujiro</i>, a new film by celebrated Japanese writer-director-editor Takeshi Kitano (<i>Hana-Bi</i>, <i>Sonatine</i>). His maverick style is on display once again, but this time in service of a formula story about a 9-year old school boy who decides to find his mother with the help of a reluctant neighbor. Director Kitano makes a heroic effort to avoid the movie’s unavoidable clichés; his storytelling veers deliberately from farce to melodrama. But in permitting himself so much freedom, he inadvertently jerks his audience around, disorienting them with his mish-mash style.
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