Discotek excels on two Sogo Ishii DVDs: BURST CITY and ELECTRIC DRAGON 80,000 VOLTS

Sogo Ishii, with his mad mix of Godard sensibilities with the cyberpunk energy, has remained criminally ignored on R1 DVDs. So far, only his samurai epic Gojoe got a proper release... until now. Thanks to Discotek Media, now we can enjoy two of his best works.

Burst City (1982) was Ishii's first film with a budget, and it’s a bizarre amalgam of genres – part Mad Max, part Quadrophenia-like musical. In fact, many of the actors are actual members of real punk bands.

Electric Dragon 80,000 Volts (2001) is a recent effort. The plot, if there is one, revolves around the rivalry of two electrically attuned men, Thunderbolt Buddha (Masatoshi Nagase) and Dragon Eye Morrison (Tadanobu Asano). Electric Dragon is largely a free-form and an incredibly visually innovative film, truly like nothing you’ve ever seen before.

Discotek has created the definitive package for this film, packing the disc with extras and including a complete soundtrack CD performed by Asano himself (the distributor says that they were sadly unable to acquire the rights to the Burst City soundtrack).