YAKUZA APOCALYPSE: Premiere Video Interview with Midnight Madness Godfather Takashi Miike.

It has been a long time since the master of Midnight Madness has been in Toronto. Last night with the premiere of Yakuza Apocalypse the long wait was over and Takashi Miike took the stage of the Ryerson theater to a standing ovation. Robert A. Mitchell was on the red carpet and spoke with Mr. Miike about his latest film, the yakuza and filmmaking.




You can still the catch the film and Takashi Miike if you hurry!!!

YAKUZA APOCALYPSE FINAL SCREENING:
Sat, Sept 19, 3:00 PM SCOTIABANK

Gentlemen of Asskickery: "Mad Dog" Yayan Ruhian

When The Raid premiered at Midnight Madness in 2011, Maniacs went wild at the amazing, brutal set-pieces. Yayan Ruhian is returning to the Madness tonight with Takashi Miike's Yakuza Apocalypse. Before he was cast as Eric in Gareth Evans' Merantau (2009), fight choreographer and actor Yayan Ruhian was a pencak silat teacher and even taught police martial arts techniques. Actually, that makes it sound like Yayan is no longer an instructor, but he still teaches silat. He told The Jakarta Post how he became involved in silat.

“There was a new school [of pencak silat] that was experiencing quite a boom and I tried to enroll there … now it is called PTSD [Pencak Silat Tenaga Dasar] Indonesia. I finally became assistant coach and then I was summoned to Jakarta to become a professional trainer,” he said.

Unfortunately, he was unaware that his training to be a jury referee (wasit juri) in Jakarta would prevent him from participating in future tournaments. He was only told of the prohibition later when he tried to register for a tournament.

“It’s all right. If I can’t be an athlete, I’ll create athletes,” Yayan said, smiling. 

Yayan participated in a documentary fellow Midnight Madness Alumnus Gareth Evans was making about silat. And the next thing you know, we have Merantau and this excellent elevator fight.

Here he's working on fight choreography with Iko Uwais for The Raid / The Raid: Redemption.

And the  choreography comes to fruition in this fight with Joe Taslim in The Raid / The Raid: Redemption.

Yayan Ruhian gets up to some brutal business as hitman Prakoso in The Raid 2 / Berandal (2014)

And finally, never forget Mad Dog's"fluorescent tube" fight in The Raid.

See Yayan Ruhian's return to Midnight Madness tonight in Yakuza Apocalypse!

YAKUZA APOCALYPSE Screening Times:
Fri, Sept 18, 11:59 PM RYERSON
Sat, Sept 19, 3:00 PM SCOTIABANK