Sion Sono is following what is now a well-traveled career path for Japanese directors: First the indie debut that plays the international festival circuit ("Bicycle Sighs" in 1990), then the cult sensation taken up by the fan boys ("Suicide Club" in 2002), and finally the horror pic that hopefully makes your fortune: "Exte."
But for Sono, as the release dates for the above films indicate, the journey upward has hardly been quick or smooth. Born in 1961, he is no wunderkind, negotiating his first Hollywood remake deal while the ink on his film-school diploma is still wet.
Instead, he is still struggling to get his films properly made and shown. "Hazard," his Candide-in-New-York drama, sat in a can for nearly four years before its release late in 2006. "Kikyu Club, Sonogo (Balloon Club, Aftewards)," his bitter-sweet drama about former members of a college balloon club saying goodbye to their youth, played at a late show at one Tokyo theater, ending on Feb. 2. It's a sensitively directed, if occasionally stagy film, with a stand-out turn by Hiromi Nagasaku as the frustrated lover of the self-absorbed club founder -- but Sono's large cast contains not one real star.