Funky Forest: The First Contact

Three loser brothers (including a caucasian kid, who doesn’t appear to really know Japanese), are struggling to be popular. But luckily they get a chance to have a co-ed picnic with some pretty young ladies! And that’s all the plot you’ll need, or indeed get! Much like flipping through Japanese TV channels, this audience favourite (LIFF 2006), ranges from slapstick comedy and weird-sci-fi animation, to Cronenberg-esque squirty alien creatures and a delightful dance-battle dream sequence. It’s a brilliantly outrageous collection of 21 deeply surreal episodes that’ll melt logic, and likely minds.

‘Funky Forest plays like a sort of supremely bizarre sketch comedy, the strangest variety show you are ever likely to come across… As the film moves forward the different characters begin to intersect, their stories to overlap, until by the end all of these wildly different elements are seen as a unified community. If there’s an overarching point to the film this is likely where it lies: these characters are all people who believe themselves to be disconnected and alone but this is because they focus only on themselves, they lack the perspective to see just how connected they really are. As many have already pointed out Funky Forest is a film best experienced as a group. It is more a communal experience than a solitary one. This is also part of the point. Wonder is better shared together than alone.’

From a review by Todd Brown in Screen Anarchy.