Ever since I moved to the U.S, I noticed that it’s always a hassle to let American see the foreign films with captions on. There are lots of film critics that will see less than 10 foreign films in a year except very dedicated ones.
So when Parasite won the Academy Award for Best Film in 2020, directed by an internationally acclaimed filmmaker Bong Joon-ho, it was certainly more acceptable to watch the films with captions and increased viewership of foreign films and TV series with Covid time.
Now, in an exclusive interview with Collider, film director Chad Stahelski (John Wick: Chapter 4) is echoing with those movements, he said he would make his upcoming live action film, “Ghost of Tsushima” movie adaptation entirely in Japanese.
Asked why he wants to do the film, he says: “Honestly, it’s probably the same things that would scare the s— out of most people. It’s a fantasy period piece. It’s done with reverence to Akira Kurosawa, who’s probably in the top five biggest influences of my life as far as film goes. It’s a chance to push technology and people in a story that’s timeless. It’s your typical mythological story of good versus evil, finding a man, watching him change the world or the world changes him. It’s all the Joseph Campbell stuff that you’d love in a story. You put that in with, obviously, so I’m told I have a bit of a Samurai fetish, which is probably true from Manga and anime and stuff.
So, I think if we did this right, it would be visually stunning. It’s character driven. It’s got an opportunity for great action, great looks. And honestly, we’d try to do it, all in character. Meaning, [that] it’s a Japanese thing about the Mongols invading Tsushima island. A complete Japanese cast, in Japanese. Sony is so on board with backing us on that.
I’ve been going to Japan since I was 16. I have a love of the country, love of the people, love of the language. To try to direct not only in my language, but someone else’s and culturally shift my mindset to bring it apart in a cool way that still entices a Western audience.”
The video game became one of the most acclaimed and fastest-selling titles of the PlayStation with over nine million copies sold in under two years. Set on Tsushima Island off the Japanese coast in the 13th century, the story begins as the fearsome Mongol Empire invades the island, wreaking havoc.
As one of the last surviving samurai, Jin Sakai rises from the ashes to fight back. He goes on to say thanks to Netflix and success stories like “Parasite” and “Squid Game,” western audiences are getting more and more used to reading subtitles.