The Attraction Was No Mystery

The Scene: Tuesday’s American premiere of the Japanese film “The Mystery of Rampo” at the Directors Guild. That the erotic fantasy/mystery was last year’s highest grossing live-action film in Japan (where movie tickets cost $22) gave the opening added zing.

The Buzz: To many American viewers, the film was beautiful, but inscrutable. To one guest, it was “like Sherlock Holmes meets Barton Fink.” To another: “David Lynch meets Luis Bunuel on acid.”

Who Was There: The film’s director/producer, Kazuyoshi Okuyama, star Michiko Hada, plus 550 guests including Robert De Niro, Andy Garcia, Jeff Goldblum, Jon Lovitz, Brad Krevoy, David Colden, Joan Chen, Robert Wise, Gloria Reuben, Meyer Gottlieb, Samuel Goldwyn Jr. and Japanese Consul General Seiichiro Noboru.

Subtext: The premiere marks a major move by Shochiku Co. Ltd., Japan’s second-largest film producer, to enter the U.S. market. The company also has co-production deals with the Samuel Goldwyn Company and De Niro’s film company, Tribeca. As one guest put it succinctly, “These guys are trying to get into Hollywood when the other Japanese are trying to get out.”

The Evening’s Most Applicable Japanese Phrase: Gomasuri . It translates literally as “grinding sesame seeds.” Colloquially, it means to “kiss-up to” or “polish apples” for someone important. So much grinding was going on, it sounded like thunder.

Why the Film Wasn’t Released By Disney: The production notes describe one character as “a noble marquis who in private is a perverse transvestite with narcissistic and sadistic tendencies. He also suffers from a mother complex and possesses a voracious appetite for strange sexual behavior.” And that barely does him justice.

Money Matters: Tickets were $50 and $100. More than $80,000 was raised for victims of the Kobe earthquake.

Chow: It was all donated. From Matsuhisa came sushi and from Chinois on Main came desserts. Having all the Matsuhisa sushi you could eat for the price of a $50 ticket made the evening a bargain.

Quoted: “I enjoyed the movie,” said De Niro. “What I liked is that it was a movie that was well-intentioned and seemed to come from a good place. It wasn’t a movie that was done just for the money.”