The Crazy Family (Sogo Ishii, 1984)

Sunday 03.06.18 | 19.30 | 1hr 46m

Having just relocated to a comfortable new home in suburbia, the Kobayashi family – Katsuhiko, his wife, Saeko, and their two children, Masaki and Erika – appear to be the picture of middle-class success. But the family’s comfortable bourgeois veneer begins disintegrating when grandfather Yasukuni and white ants infest their home, eating away at the woodwork. As the Kobayashis’ house begins to crumble, so does the sanity of its inhabitants. Katsuhiko takes it upon himself to keep them from the asylum…at any cost.

Sogo Ishii’s provocative, oddball satire hasn’t screened in the UK for 30 years. Now known as Gakuryū Ishii, the avant garde filmmaker spearheaded the Japanese New Wave with his early punk features Panic In High School (1978), Crazy Thunder Road (1980) and Burst City (1982). With his latest, Punk Samurai Slash Down, due this year, it’s the perfect time to discover his weirdest.

Trasho Biblio’s Tommy McCormick will introduce the screening with a special message from director Sogo Ishii.

Thanks to WField Inc