After the Wave: Sex, Violence, and Comedy in the Films of Takashi Miike

The aims of this paper are to come to an understanding of the distinctive aspects in the films of Takashi Miike and to explore the continuities and discontinuities between the filmmakers of Japan's cinematic generations. Miike's films revolve around the use of social marginals, sex and violence, having some elements in common with the films of Shohei Imamura and Nagisa Oshima, representative directors in the Japanese New Wave of the 1960s. This article first examines how an emphasis on popular criticism over elitist criticism in Miike's cinema offers an example of going beyond conventional anti-establishment cinema. The next section discusses how Miike's emphasis on artificiality over primitivism challenges the failings of his New Wave predecessors. In the concluding section, I argue that an emphasis on comic presentation over realistic documentation in Miike's films contributes to the unique appeal of his work.