Haze (2005)

A man wakes up to find himself locked in a cramped concrete maze of corridors, in which he can barely move. He doesn't remember why he is there or how he got there. He has a terrible stomach injury and is slowly bleeding to death.

Director:

Shin'ya Tsukamoto

Writer:

Shin'ya Tsukamoto

Stars:

Shin'ya Tsukamoto, Takahiro Murase, Takahiro Kandaka

1 nomination.

Cast

Cast overview:
Shin'ya Tsukamoto
Takahiro Murase
Takahiro Kandaka
Masato Tsujioka
Mao Saito	...	(as Mao Saitô)
Kaori Fujii

Storyline

A man wakes up to find himself locked in a very tiny, cramped concrete corridor, in which he can barely move. He doesn't remember why he is there or how he got there. He has a terrible stomach injury and is slowly bleeding to death. He begins to edge his way along the narrow maze-like corridors, only to see other people undergoing their own horrible tests though holes in the walls. Unable to find a way out, he finally gives up on the struggle and gives in. Barely clinging to his sanity he creeps forward with the last ounces of his strength and meets a woman in a place full of floating corpses. The man and the woman both try to recall where they came from, but their memories are so uncertain that they are not even sure they want to return. The man insists on giving up but the woman maintains that it was not her fault and refuses to give up. Reluctantly he agrees to help her, as she attempts to swim past the corpses. Neither of them can imagine the incredible end to the journey.

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Plot Keywords:

written and directed by cast member | japanese shocker | surrealism | survival | maze | 

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Taglines:

You will experience the palpable feeling of terror and all encompassing sense of claustrophobia as you watch this intense exercise in basic fear and dread...

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Genres:

Horror | Mystery

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Certificate:

Not Rated

Details

Official Sites:

Official site [Japan]

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Release Date:

1 October 2005 (USA)

Also Known As:

Haze - Il Muro

Company Credits

Technical Specs

Runtime:

49 min 24 min 49 min

Sound Mix:

Stereo

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.78 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

In his interview at Locarno Festival, the director said he found the initial idea watching Charles Bronson's claustrophobic tunnel scene in The Great Escape.

User Reviews

Disturbing ambiguous nightmare, or maybe not...

Coming close to completing my collection of all the Shinya Tsukamoto movies, and this one is pretty hard to explain. A man wakes up in somekind of a concrete space, hardly able to move, and notices he has an injury which is bleeding. It's very dark, and you only see his face for quite a while and hear him think to himself about what is going on. He begins to crawl through tunnels, or maybe a maze, and comes across a woman also trapped and bleeding. Different visions occurs, like a force knocking on a huge door which he can't seem to reach, and multilated bodies floating on the surface of a source of water in this space. They begin a conversation about life, dreams, death, and what is happening to each other, and how to escape. He wonders if the world is at war and they are prisoners, or some pervert has locked them away for whatever reason, or is it really a very nasty nightmare or are they in hell. That's pretty much what is going on, at least for what you can see, because the movie is pretty dark until the last 10 minutes or so. Although the movie is only around 49 minutes long, that is plenty long enough for this type of ambiguous narrative. Being a huge fan of Tsukamoto, this movie to me is like a terrible nightmare, and that may be what it is, you have to judge that because the movie doesn't help you along much at all. But what there is that is so Tsukamoto, is the superior use of music and sound effects, along with some disturbing visuals. Interesting movie to say the least, and a must-have of course for Tsukamoto fans.