Review of World Premier of “Ghostroads” – A Japanese Rock and Roll Ghost Story – The Vue Cinema – Raindance Film Festival 2017
We all – or most of us – love Rock and Roll Bands – let’s face it….so this variation on a theme is funny, quirky, slightly ridiculous and will raise a smile or two for the majority of its viewers. With a script dreamt up by Mike Rogers, and co-directed and produced by him and Ken Nishikawa, we see Tony of “The Screamin’ Telstars” with his struggling retro rock band meet up with a ghost who seems to have the answers to his dreams – through Tony buying a second hand amp of all things! Darrell Harris plays Peanut Butter – the ghost who is given sfx and seems to shimmer in a silver grey haze as he emerges from the amp every time Mr Pan – Tony switches it on.
With a truly mesmerisingly beautiful Japanese girl after him, (she needs more work) and working on the advice of the ghost, Tony’s life with and without the band unfolds in a dreamy sequence which though filmed on a low budget, does keep the audience hanging in there. In addition we are looking at a struggling band, and musician, not a highly successful one, so this adds a bit of homely gravitas to the frustrations of the minstrels.
The script was described thus – “it is a roadmap but on the way you can drive off and use the creative process”. The soundtrack is imaginative and haunting, and the smoke coming out of the amplifier – key prop in the story – with a mind of its own – and all the other trappings with the ghost sequence and “poor” haunted Tony’s life journey , together with lots and lots of lean, quaffed, fashionably dressed Japanese rock guys – all contribute to something a bit different on a somewhat familiar story.
I think the posters should give more information on whether the band is an actual or fictitious one. Look out for it and see what you think when you watch it yourself.
Penny Nair Price.