The Comic Side of Nakadai

This past Tuesday and Wednesday, [Film Forum] showed off the comedic side of actor Tatsuya Nakadai with [Age of Assassins](http://www.filmforum.org/films/nakadai.html#age), Kihachi Okamoto's zany spy satire and [I Am a Cat](http://www.filmforum.org/films/nakadai.html#cat), Kon Ichikawa's dry comedy of manners. Both are fairly obscure and have remained out-of-print for far too long. Hopefully the Criterion Collection will take a break from Ozu and release DVDs of both titles as they sorely need repeat viewings. Age of Assassins is a schizophrenic predecessor to Yves Robert's [The Tall Blond Man with One Black Shoe](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0068655/), a Blake Edwards-type satire where a bumbling loser reluctantly transforms into a debonair spy. Nakadai plays Kenji, a geeky professor of criminology with a terrible case of Athlete's foot and an unparalleled affection for his dead mother. After the homicidal Population Control Council wantonly decides to eliminate him, Kenji becomes determined to fight back with the help of a reporter (Reiko Dan) and a car enthusiast (Hideo Sunazuka) whom he catches trying to steal his pathetic little jalopy.

Like Seijun Suzuki's [Branded to Kill], Age of Assassins is a stylish and bizarre narrative whatsit whose bracing humor stems from its apparent boredom with spy formula clichés. Okamoto and fellow screenwriter Ei Ogawa and Tadashi Yamazaki's script is an unsettlingly surreal experiment in pastiche that abruptly changes directions on a whim. From killer hypnotists to an explosive encounter at a military base, there's no doubt that the story is made up along the way, like a frenzied improvised dance that transitions from waltz to conga to Charleston.

Likewise, the characters' motives are a nonsensical stew of paranoia and circular logic. Mizorogi (Eisei Amammoto), the head of the Population Control Council, is the warden of a bizarre asylum where he trains madmen to kill. The asylum sets the stage for the film's awesomely strange final Spanish duel, where Mizorogi and Kenji tie their wrists together and go at each other with daggers. According to Mizorogi, "It's fashionable now."

Insanity does not just run through Age of Assassins, it gallops. That giddy energy serves as a perfect counterpoint to I Am a Cat, a languid meditation on the necessity of contemplation and idle chatter. Nakadai plays Kushami, a mustachioed teacher and stand-in for acclaimed novelist and poet [Natsume S_seki]. Kushami's intellectual daydreaming finds its anthropomorphic counterpart in a grey cat that he takes in. Their laziness and inflexibility make them fast friends and perfect foils for one another.

Kushami however could not be any more different than Kenji. While Kushami is, obviously far more subdued than Kenji--Kushami shuffles along with a modest jaunt while Kenji leaps, crouches and then sprints from place to place-, his introverted egoism is of a completely different species than Kenji's paranoid delusions of grandeur. Though he fiercely clings to them, Kushami knows that his musings on poetry and marriage are just another way to pass the time and certainly aren't going to attract the attention of hired killers or global conspiracies anytime soon.

Nevertheless, the warmth in Kushami's struggle to justify his unruly behavior makes I Am a Cat the more sustainable of the two films. He's far more sympathetic than any slapstick killer. As easy as it is to choose the tragicomic over the madcap, I Am a Cat is simply more consistent and thoughtful. Age of Assassins however is by far the more rewatchable of the two.