The programme of films for this year’s Edinburgh Film Festival was announced on Wednesday and there’s a decent selection of Japanese films. No real surprises since most of these have been at various film festivals (most at Rotterdam) around the world and I have written about ALL of them at some point so I know which I’d want to watch if I had the choice.

For people interested in seeing some of the latest Japanese films who can’t make the Terracotta Far East Film Festival, they would do well to attend Edinburgh which shares Be My Baby an example of the latest trend in Japanese indie filmmaking. Anatomy of a Paperclip got an excellent write-up from Tony Rayns when it was at last year’s Vancouver International Film Festival. One title that has me super-intrigued is Miss Zombie by Sabu, a film director whose works I first became acquainted with when in high school and reacquainted myself with when I asked a friend to help me procure some of the 90’s titles. This is another title which got critics talking, an original take on the zombie genre.

Here are the Japanese films:

Be My Baby     

Japanese Title: 恋の渦

Romaji: Koi no Uzu

Screened: 22 June at 20:10, 28 June at 15:00

Running Time: 138 mins

Director: Hitoshi One

Cast: Kenta Niikura, Naoko Wakai, Chihiro Shibata, Yuumi Goto, Aya Kunitake, Hiroki Ueda, Daisuke Sawamura, Kenta Enya,

This Japanese film is a product of the ‘workshop’ indie films that are released nearly every weekend in Tokyo. Be My Baby is a low-budget film shot I four days for under $10,000 in a couple of locations. It is based on a play by award-winning dramatist Daisuke Miura (which was screened at cinemas) and it’s directed by Hitoshi One, director of the big-budget Love Strikes!. It’s a very adult film about the aftermath of a party attended by a group of drop-out twenty-somethings who are all flawed and caught up in damaging relationships. It got its UK premiere at the Terracotta Far East Film Festival and Third Window Films are backing this.

Au revoir l’ete   

Japanese: ほとり　の　朔子

Romaji: Hotori no Sakuko

Screened: 24 June at 18:15, 26 June at 18:00

Running Time: 125 mins.

Director: Koji Fukada

Writer: Koji Fukada (Screenplay)

Starring: Fumi Nikaido, Mayu Tsuruta, Kanji Furutachi, Taiga, Ena Koshino, Makiko Watanabe, Kiki Sugino

Fumi Nikaido takes the lead as a girl named Noriko who is preparing to take her university entrance exam and on the advice of her aunt Kie (Tsuruta) stays over at a relative’s house where she meets her aunt’s childhood friend Usagikichi (Furutachi), his daughter Tatsuko (Sugino) and his nephew Takashi (Taiga) who is from Fukushima. A great cast of actors and an intriguing trailer have me interested in this one.

Anatomy of a Paperclip                 

Japanese Title:  山守クリップ工場の辺り

Romaji: Yamamori Kurippu Koujou no Atari

Screened: 22 June at 16:15. 28 June at 13:15

Running Time: 99 mins.

Director: Akira Ikeda

Writer: Akira Ikeda (Screenplay),

Starring: Sakae Tomomatsu, Kazutoshi Kato, Yukari Hara, Toshiyuki Takahashi, Akiko An, Hirofumi Shiba, Wani Kansai, Shu Ono.

This is a droll, deadpan-comedy fantasy story about a man named Kogure who has a McJob on the production line of a small workshop which makes paperclips by hand. His boss is a bully, and Kogure is also bullied by two thugs, one tall, one short, who keep ambushing him on the street and routinely steal his clothes. The butterfly shows up in his room one night, and when he releases it back into the wild it returns as a woman speaking an unknown language and consuming unknown food and drink. Soon the woman’s father settles in Kogure’s apartment as well. Through the relationship with the girl he finds his life improving and liberation is not far away.

Miss Zombie   

Japanese Title:  Miss Zombie

Romaji: Miss Zombie

Screened: 22 June at 20:10, 28 June at 20:30

Running Time: 85 mins.

Director: SABU

Writer: SABU (Screenplay),

Starring: Ayaka Komatsu, Makoto Togashi, Riku Ohnishi, Taro Suruga, Tateto Serizawa, Takaya Yamauchi, Toru Tezuka

SABU, a man who made quirky gangster films in the 90’s, is back and with an original take on the zombie movie thanks to the script. The film’s trailer has crisp visuals thanks to the use of black and white and the interesting camera movements.  Gravure idol Ayaka Komatsu plays a zombie named Sara (resists urge to Google her name) and she has a cast including Makoto Togashi (Cure), Tateto Serizawa (Isn’t Anyone Alive?) and Toru Tezuka (Noriko’s Dinner Table,The Land of Hope).

Sara (Komatsu) rocks up at a in a town in a cage wth numerous scars on her body and glazed eyes. She’s a zombie. Also in the cage is a gun and a note that reads “Do not give it meat”. The people around her are disgusted and treat her cruelly but a doctor takes her in. His son bonds with the zombie but the doctor has other plans… 

There’s also a Chinese film which has Japanese (and French) backers called ‘Til Madness Do Us Part which documents the inhabitants of a mental asylum which the Chinese state uses to get rid of people who might not have psychological problems. It seems like some choose to live there as well.

There are so many films released this weekend I have split this post into two.  Here are a mixture of some of the big hitters for this weekend with some documentaries.  Sunday’s post will contain another mix.

Monsterz  

Japanese Title:モンスターズ

Romaji: Monsuta-zu

Running Time: 112 mins

Release Date: May 30^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Hideo Nakata

Writer: Yusuke Watanabe (Screenplay), Kim Min-seok (Original Script)

Starring: Tatsuya Fujiwara, Takayuki Yamada, Satomi Ishihara, Tomorowo Taguchi, Yutaka Matsushige, Tae Kimura,

Hideo Nakata of Ringu fame is back with an adaptation of a 2010 Korean film called Haunters which starred Gang Dong-Won (Duelist). Anyway, the story is about the battle between two men with special abilities. The film stars Tatsuya Fujiwara (Parade) and Takayuki Yamada (13 Assassins) who looks even more handsome with his neat haircut. Also in the film is Tomorowo Taguchi who is a legend thanks to his performance in Tetsuo: The Iron Man.

A Man (Fujiwara) possesses the ability to manipulate others with his eyes. With his ability he killed his abusive step-father but was abandoned by his mother. He now lives the life of a loner. His life changes again when he encounters a man he cannot manipulate. That man is Shuichi Tanaka (Yamada) who lives with his friends and works a dead-end job. He may not have money but his voice has special abilities…

Website

Rose Color’s Buko  

Japanese Title:薔薇色のブー子

Romaji: Bara Iro no Buko

Running Time: 93 mins

Release Date: May 30^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Yuichi Fukuda

Writer: Yuichi Fukuda (Screenplay),

Starring: Rino Sashihara, Yusuke Santamaria, Tsuyoshi Muro, Fuku Suzuki, Tomorowo Taguchi, Kotaro Shiga

HKT48’s Rino Sashihara stars as a female college student named Sachiko. Her nickname is Buko because she is a pessimist but she holds out hope that she will meet a man like in one of the many romance manga she reads to spice up her boring life. One day, on Twitter, she meets a guy with the ID Sparrow. He likes manga and looks like Johnny Depp. SCORE! Rino sets up a date with the guy but getting there will be fraught with many difficult events…

Website

The Assorted Horizon   

Japanese Title:劇場版 The Assorted Horizons

Romaji: Gekijouban The Assorted Horizons

Running Time: 126 mins

Release Date: May 30^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Hideaki Yoshikawa

Writer: N/A

Starring: Sound Horizon

GET READY VIDEO GAME AND ANIME FANS! Sound Horizon, the world’s best fantasy band, led by composer Revo are getting a movie. We’re talking about the guys behind the hit themes for Attack on Titan and the score for the 3DS game Bravely Default! This film is released to commemorate the 10^th anniversary of their debut. No trailer.

Website

Nemurihime: Dream On Dreamer  

Japanese Title:眠り姫 Dream On Dreamer

Romaji: Nemurihime: Dream On Dreamer

Running Time: 111 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Kooichi Ueno

Writer: Kooichi Ueno (Screenplay),

Starring: Reina Fujie, Miyu Takeuchi, Junichi Gamou, Erina Nakayama, Shota Miyamoto, Mika Katsumura, Ryoma Ishikawa

Idol horror again. Dream Princess. This trailer looks stylish with cute idols and menacing sets and then the dudes with exposed brains and old people vomiting blood show up. Darn old people taking up valuable minutes in the film where I could be watching beautiful young women (grumble, grumble).

Ayame (Fujie of NMB48) play a bunch of high school girls attacked by a mysterious disease which causes her to feel sleepy regardless of the time and endure a reoccurring daydream where her sister Hiiragi (Takeuchi) dies. Ayame must fight against the dream and the disease!

Website

June Light’s 3 Sisters   

Japanese Title:六月燈の三姉妹

Romaji: Rokugatsudou no Sanshimai

Running Time: 104 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Kiyoshi Sasabe

Writer: Ryuji Mizutani (Screenplay),

Starring: Kazue Fukiishi, Eri Tokunaga, Yo Yoshida, Kanji Tsuda, Yoshie Ichige, Jun Inoue

Toraya is a family run sweet shop that faces disaster thanks to the appearance of a large shopping centre. The unusual family that run it are the divorced parents, a divorced eldest daughter, a middle daughter in the process of getting divorced and a younger daughter who is a bit of a black sheep because she has just broken off her engagement. The daughters and the husband of the middle daughter decide to try and save the shop.

Apparently, “Rokugatsudou” in the Japanese title refers to a lantern festival held throughout Kagoshima Prefecture annually. Also, apparently, there’s a guy out there crazy enough to divorce Kazue Fukiishi (star of Noriko’s Dinner Table). Now unless she was beating me up every day like the lady in Kotoko does to her beau, I’d stick it out.

Website

SAYAMA Mienai Tejo o Hazusu Made  

Japanese Title: SAYAMA みえない手錠をはずすまで

Romaji: SAYAMA Mienai Tejo o Hazusu Made

Running Time: 105 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Ki Hijio

Writer: N/A

Starring: N/A

The Sayama Incident and the fallout from the botched police investigation is the subject of this film. After the brutal murder of a girl, Kazuo Ishikawa was framed for the crime by police who was targeted because he was a member of iscriminated against burakumin social minority. He spent a number of years in prison and was released in 1994. He is seeking a retrial. We see Kazuo and his wife Sachiko who supported him and showed support and love even in the direst circumstances.

Website

Gekijouban Yuto-Kun Ga Iku   

Japanese Title:劇場版　ゆうとくんがいく

Romaji: Gekijouban Yuto-Kun Ga Iku

Running Time: 52 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Ryo Higuchi, Aya Otawa

Writer: Eiichi Mizoi (Screenplay),

Starring: Junko Takeuchi (Yuto), Kenichi Ogata (Nonno), M A O (Lulu)

Yuto Nagatomo plays for Inter Milan and gets a short anime kinda based on him. When he encounters tough rivals he has to train hard and hangs out with a girl and a mysterious old man who was once a football legend. 

Website

Uwakoi   

Japanese Title:うわこい

Romaji: Uwakoi

Running Time: 111 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Norihisa Yoshimura

Writer: Hitoshi Ishikawa, Chihiro Nakamura, Norihisa Yoshimura (Screenplay), Masahiro Itosugi (Original Manga)

Starring: Yurina Yanagi, Tomoyuki Ishida, Nami Motoyama, Nao Eguchi

An adaptation of an ecchi manga.

When Yukiteru (Ishida) burns his house down he has to move into the house of his friend Yuno (Yanagi). As they have grown up they have become known as a couple but a transfer student in Yuno’s class, Rena (Motoyama), becomes interested in Yukiteru and the two become intimate…

Yukiteru, dude. That new girl doesn’t hold a candle to Yuno in terms of looks.

Website

Sad Tea                                 

Japanese: サッドティー

Romaji: Saddo Tei

Running Time: 120 mins.

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014

Director: Rikiya Imaizumi

Writer: Rikiya Imaizumi

Starring: Shunya Abe, Fumiko Aoyagi, Takuya Fuji, Kayo Hoshino, Aya Kunitake, Chihiro Nagao, Seiji Okabe, Ryutaro Ninomya, Yumi Sato

This was released last year and is part of the ENBU seminar workshop and screened at the Tokyo International Film Festival. A love story about a group of people including an idol, a shop clerk and a salaryman who hangs out at a coffee shop. Will they meet the loves of their lives?

Website

The Next Generation Patlabor Chapter 2  

Japanese: THE NEXT GENERATION パトレイバー　第2章

Romaji: THE NEXT GENERATION‐Patlaborー Dai 2 Sho

Running Time: N/A

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Mamoru Oshii

Writer: Mamoru Oshii, (Screenplay), Masami Yuki(Original Novel)

Starring: Erina Mano, Toshio Kakei, Seiji Fukushi, Rina Ohta, Shigeru Chiba, Yoshinori Horimoto, Yoshikatsu Fujiki, Kouhei Shiotsuka, Shigekazu Tajiri

This is the first in a seven-part series of films that act as a continuation of the Patlabor series with a brand new set of characters. Kenji Kawai is returning to the franchise to compose the music. Apparently, there’s going to be a lot of slapstick humour amidst the robot action.

Labors are robots used in various industries like construction. With their introduction to Japan, a new type of crime became prevalent: Labor Crime. To combat this, the Tokyo Metropolitan Police created a unit of Patrol Labors to help. The story is set in Tokyo in 2013, and we follow “third generation” of Patlabor. The Tokyo Metropolitan Police has disbanded Section 2 Division 1 of police robots, and Section 2 Division 2 barely has survived the budget cuts forced upon the police due to the long recession. What problems will the unit face now?

Website

There are so many films released this weekend that I have had to split the trailer post into two (which I was doing a few months ago). I have had everything scheduled because I am down in London for the Terracotta Far East Film Festival where I’ll be watching three or four Japanese films, all of them released in Japanese cinemas this year – talk about fresh out of the oven. 

As far as this/last week’s blogging goes, I ended up posting reviews for Blue Ruin and Real, the Japanese line-up for the Edinburgh Film Festival and I posted trailers yesterday. So there. That’s your lot. You can breathe a sigh of relief over the fact that you don’t have to read any more badly spelled posts from me… Until Wednesday. 

All-Round Appraiser Q: The Eyes of Mona Lisa    

Japanese Title:万能鑑定士Q モナ・リザの瞳

Romaji: Bannou Kanteishi Q Monariza no Hitomi

Running Time: 119 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Shinsuke Sato

Writer: Manabu Uda (Screenplay), Keisuke Matsuoka (Original Novel)

Starring: Haruka Ayase, Tori Matsuzaka, Eriko Hatsune, Hiroaki Murakami, Pierre Deladonchamps, Jun Hashimoto

Based on a popular mystery novel by Keisuke Matsuoka, the story follows Riko Rinda (Ayase) who is an appraiser with sound judgement and an excellent memory. She’s in Paris because she has been hired by The Louvre to help facilitate a Mona Lisa exhibition in Japan. Yuto Ogasawara (Matsuzaka) is a magazine writer who follows her as she tries to solve a mystery. It looks very much like the BBC’s modern adaptation of Sherlock Holmes what with the on-screen text and character who possesses super observational skills.

Website

A Minute More   

Japanese Title:一分間だけ

Romaji: Ippun Kan dake

Running Time: 112 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Chen Wei-Ling

Writer: N/A (Screenplay), Maha Harada (Original Novel)

Starring: Ning Chang, Peter Ho, Reina Ikehata

This is a Japanese-Taiwanese co-production about a couple who get a golden retriever and drift apart as they forget the important things in life… Next…

Website

Robot Girls Z   

Japanese Title:一分間だけ

Romaji: Ippun Kan dake

Running Time: 83 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Hiroshi Ikehata

Writer: Kazuho Hyodo (Screenplay),

Starring: Shinnosuke Tachibana (Akira Soma), Takahiro Mizushima (Mitsuki Kamatani), Takashi Kondou (Takuma Hachimine), Masakazu Morita (Yukiya Minabe), Daisuke Namikawa (Akito Kimata), Go Inoue (Tetsu Suzuki)

The Robot Girls Z anime gets its movie premiere today and the girls in the story are Z-chan (Mazinger Z), Gre-Chan (Great Mazinger), and Grenda-san (UFO Robo Grendizer) and they are defending Photon Power Town from the mechanical beast girls Dou-Blas-chan and Garada-chan who are led by Baron Ashura, a megalomaniac.

I haven’t watched the anime but my favourite robot girl from the poster is the one with the 3DS. Everybody else is panicking and she’s totally like, “Guys, don’t interrupt, I’m playing Fire Emblem.”

Website

Prepare to have your mind blown by the freaking awesomeness of the next title!

Samurai Pirates    

Japanese Title:瀬戸内海賊物語

Romaji: Setouchi Kaizoku Monogatari

Running Time: 116 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Kenichi Ohmori

Writer: Kenichi Ohmori, Kaori Fujii, Hiroyasu Yuhara (Screenplay),

Starring: Kyoka Shibata, Masaki Izawa, Wakana Aoi, Kyoichi Omae, Takashi Naito, Kotaro Koizummi, Toshi Takeuchi

Holy smoke! Pirates who are also samurai. I think the only way this film could be more awesome is if it were Samurai VERSUS Pirates. The world would just end if that ever happened. In all seriousness, this is a kids film.

Kaede Murakami (Shibata) and her family live on an island in the Seto Inland Sea. They are the descendents of Takeyoshi Murakami who is also known as Murakami Suigun, general of the samurai pirates who battled Hideyoshi Toyotomi. When the closure of a ferry route to the island threatens her family’s livelihood, Kaede hears a tale of the samurai pirates stashing a secret treasure somewhere and heads out with three classmates to find it.

Website

Inabe      

Japanese Title:いなべ

Romaji: Inabe

Running Time: 38 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Koji Fukada

Writer: Koji Fukada (Screenplay),

Starring: Hiroaki Matsuda,Ami Kurata, Yui Ito, Minami Inoue,

This short film takes place in Inabe City, Mie Prefecture and on a pig farm. Tomohiro is working when his suster Naoko returns after 17 years away with a baby strapped to her. The two are uneasy with each other at first but begin to open up about the time they spent with each other and a mystery that looms large…

Website

Samurai Zombie Fragile   

Japanese Title:サムライゾンビ・フラジャイル

Romaji: Samurai Zonbi Furajairu

Running Time: 24 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Kentaro Yamagishi

Writer: Kentaro Yamagishi (Screenplay),

Starring: Kenji Suzumura, Daigo Ogawa, Souji Masaki, Anon Shiina

Samurai zombies and gangster zombies and an 80 year old private detective intrude in the life of a woman who just wants to get her shopping done when a science experiment goes wrong…

Website

Beauty Within

Japanese Title:美しいひと

Romaji: Utsukushii Hito

Running Time: 116 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Azuma Shizu

Writer: N/A

Starring: N/A

69 years have passed since the atom bomb was dropped on Nagasaki and the consequences are still being felt. Beautiful People unites victims of the bomb and they range from Japanese women to Dutch and Koreans who were in prison camps in the city.

Website

Oyako Present to the Future   

Running Time: 90 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Inomatatoshi

Writer: N/A

Starring: Bruce Osborn,

Oyako. The Japanese word translates as parents and children. The documentary follows an American photographer named Bruce Osborn who photographs parents and children. There is now an Oyako day in Japan and the film was made to celebrate the 10^th anniversary. We get lots of interviews with parents and children.

Website

Mother of the Bride   

Japanese Title:桂由美　マザーオブザブライド

Romaji: Katsura yumi mazā Obu za buraido

Running Time: 60 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Norihisa Yoshimura

Writer: Ichiro Ando (Screenplay),

Starring: Yumi Katsura

Fashion and weddings. Some may see romance, some see big business. Yumi Katsura is a titan in the Japanese bridal industry (is that even a phrase?) due to her fashion label which she established in the 1960s. She narrates this documentary.

Website

I submitted my Anime UK News Summer 2014 Preview last night and it’s awaiting a second pass in the validation queue from an editor. I wrote about 45 new shows airing on Japanese television and provided background and info and trailers on them. It might not look pretty but it gives info on what you might want to watch.

For the first time in a few seasons, I felt pretty light-hearted about writing up most of these shows and that’s mostly because of the diversity of shows.

Update: My Summer Anime Preview Part 1 and Part 2 are now out and forum discussion is here.

Previous seasons would see a deluge of titles where the females are depicted in rather questionable ways – subjects of a siscon’s desire, moe, loli, meganeko – to satisfy various fetishes that are found in the male target audience.

This season featured fewer shows where girls act silly in pointless clubs, no incest, fewer moe girls than ever before and less light novel adaptations (a source of some of the most overrated and awful shows in recent years) and less reasons for people to cry foul about how anime is being ruined by fan-service and sexual objectification.

The upcoming summer 2014 season features more shows aimed at fujoshi. There are more shounen-ai titles, there is a broader range of themes in the shows and some aimed at adults, and there are more women in the lead creative roles like writer and director. Perhaps that last point as made the biggest difference this season what with the increase in shows aimed at women. Two of my favourite shows from last year were written and/or directed by women (My Youth Rom-Com, Kyousogiga) so I’m happy. The trend continues probably because companies sense that the fujoshi market are willing to blow money on junk. I expect the next few years to see the anime world overwhelmed by ikemen shows and shounen-ai and for male bloggers to cry foul.

I don’t claim to be an expert (nope, I do that with films :P), I just write about this stuff I have watched since the late 80’s and I know what I like. This selection is what I like the look of.

Space Dandy Season 2  

Staff

Chief Director: Shinichiro Watanabe,Directors: Shingo Natsume, Eunyoung Choi, Hiroshi Shimizu,Scripts: Dai Sato, Keiko Nobumoto, Kimiko Ueno, Character Designer: Yoshiyuki Ito,

Voice Actors and Characters

Junichi Suwabe as Dandy, Uki Satake as QT, Hiroyuki Yoshino as Meow, Maasaki Yajima as Narrator,

Studio: Bones

Synopsis

Dandy is an alien-hunter who earns rewards by tracking down new species of aliens that have never been seen before. With the aid of a robot named QT and an alien cat from the Betelgeuse star named Meow, he journeys across the universe discovering weird and wonderful things and getting into all sorts of crazy adventures. When not hunting for aliens, the gang go to “Boobies,” a restaurant full of voluptuous waitresses.

Shinichiro Watanabe has two anime running this year which is something to be pleased about. Space Dandy was billed as a comedy and the first 13 episode of the 26 episode run proved to be comedy gold as it mixed high-concept sci-fi with low-brow comedy thanks to a bunch of loveable characters.

Despite a weak start, as the series progressed the direction and writing rapidly improved as the creative team assembled and orchestrated by Watanabe were allowed to have fun with the fact that each story could be a standalone story where characters could go on the strangest adventure, die and then come back in the next episode seemingly unaffected. One person’s fun might not appeal to others and it seems that for some people over the internet, the Dandy magic wasn’t quite working thanks to the lack of character development, an overarching narrative and what some on Tumblr and Twitter saw as the sexual objectification of women. Those complaints were overblown, in my opinion, and I expect the second half of the season to explain why the stories were unconnected to each other. Even if it doesn’t I don’t care since loved the set-up of the series.

I believe that  it could be the anime of the year but Watanabe has another, grander looking anime waiting in the wings.    

Website

Psycho-Pass   

Staff

Chief Director: Katsuyuki Motohiro, Director: Naoyoshi Shiotani, Series Composition: Gen Urobuchi, 

Voice Actors and Characters

Tomokazu Seki as Shinya Kougami, Kana Hanzawa as Akane Tsunemori, Kenji Nojima as Nobuchika Ginoza, Akira Ishida as Shuusei Kagari, Shizuka Itou as Yayoi Kuizuka, Noriko Hidaka as Dominator, 

Studio: Production I.G. 

Synopsis

In the future, the police have guns named Dominators. What makes them special is that they can detect a suspect’s “crime factor” by measuring their state of mind and personality. This technique is termed “Psycho-Pass” and if the suspect’s crime factor is above a certain limit, the gun will fire. One of the enforcement officers is Shinya Kougami and he finds himself drawn into a deadly conspiracy.  

I’m all for a second round of this. This is an edited version of the original 2012 series which is prepping for the next series which is due to air in the autumn. Essentially the show has been re-cut into 11 one-hour episodes with some new footage created and edits made. Alongside this new version of the first season there will be a manga, novel and movie.

Psycho-Pass was one of the break-out anime of the last few years where it, alongside Madoka Magica, Attack on Titan and Sword Art Online, managed to appeal to go beyond the core anime audience and appeal to an international one. This is thanks to the storyline which is adult, intelligent hard sci-fi coupled coming from Gen Urobuchi, a new voice in anime with a range of titles under his belt that includes Madoka Magica and the next anime.

Website

Aldnoah.Zero  

Staff

Director: Ei Aoki, Original Creator: Gen Urobuchi, Screenplay: Katsuhiko Takayama, Character Designer: Takako Shimura

Voice Actors and Characters

Kensho Ono as Slaine Troyard, Sora Amamiya as Asseylum Vers Allusia, Natsuki Hanae as Inaho Kaiduka, Yuka Otsubo asAi,

Studio

A-1 Pictures/Troyca

Synopsis

In 1972, a hypergate was discovered on the surface of the moon but then, humankind came into contact with beings from Mars, and a war between humanity and the aliens began…

This is an original idea from Gen Urobuchi and a sign of his growing influence in the industry. As mentioned previously, he is extremely genre-savvy and does those post-modern twists on familiar concepts. This is his second macha anime after the so-so Gargantia (which he didn’t write the majority of) and I like the look of the alternate history concept. I’m enjoying Knights of Sidonia so more dark mecha anime suits me.

Website

Terror of Resonance (Zankyou no Terror)   

Staff

Director: Shinichiro Watanabe, Character Designer: Kazuto Nakazawa, Music: Yoko Kanno, Main Theme: Yuuki Ozaki,

Voice Actors: Soma Sato as Nine/Shin Kokone, Kaito Ishikawa as Twelve/Fuyuji Kumi, Atsumi Tanezaki as Risa Mishima,

Studio

Mappa

Synopsis

On a quiet summer day Tokyo was rocked by a massive terrorist bombing which struck out of nowhere. Nobody knows who did it and a video uploaded to the internet is the only clue. The culprits were two high school boys who go under the codenames Nine and Twelve. They became known as “Sphinx” and started to play a deadly game with a nation that was once complacent but now lives in terror of them… One girl, mercilessly bullied by classmates, finds herself becoming close to them.

I like to apply auteur theory to everything. Films, anime, baking cakes. Shinichiro Watanabe makes auteur theory easy since his works have cool concepts and characters and are high quality. Other directors usually fall off at some point (Seiji Kishi, I’m looking at you) but Watanabe hasn’t. Indeed, I think I like his newest works more than Cowboy Bebop and Samurai Champloo. This one looks truly special.

Watanabe skips a fantasy/sci-fi adventure setting and makes a foray into contemporary Japan with a tale of terrorism in a thriller that seems set to examine some dark psychological corners of real people. Okay, I’m probably overhyping this a bit but the trailer, with its shocking images, awesome musical mix and excellent character designs make s this the summer 2014 anime that has me most intrigued. Joining Watanabe is the magnificent Yoko Kanno who will be composing the music. Kazuto Nakazawa is acting as character designer and he has worked on old school shows I like such as El Hazard, New Dominion Tank Police, and Roujin Z.

Website

Tokyo Ghoul   

Staff

Director: Shuhei Morita, Original Creator: Sui Ishida, Series Composition: Chuuji Mikasano, Character Designer: Kazuhiro Miwa,

Voice Actorsand Characters

Natsuki Hanae as Ken Kaneki, Kana Hanazawa as Rize Kamishiro, Sora Amamiya as Touka Kirishima, Mamoru Miyano as Shuu Tsukiyama, Takahiro Sakurai as Uta, Sumire Morohoshi as Hinami Fueguchi,

Studio

Studio Pierrot

Synopsis

Reports have it that “Ghouls” roam the streets of Tokyo and are devouring humans. Nobody has seen these things and lived until a college student named Kaneki encounters a girl named Rize who is obsessed with them. From that very moment his life takes a ghoulish turn…

In my Anime UK News preview I talked this up as H.P. Lovecraft’s Pickman’s Model set in contemporary Japan because of all of the ghouls and the human devouring and what not. There’s at least one ghoulish show in every season and this is it. I have not read Sui Ishida’s fantasy manga but I’m game for anything with horror in it. The director is Suhei Morita, famous for engaging in cool projects like the omnibus movie Short Peace and Freedom.

Website

Barakamon   

Staff

Director: Masaki Tachibana, Original Creator: Satsuki Yoshino, Scripts: Pierre Sugiura, Art Director: Hiroshi Kato, Character Designer: Majiro, Calligraphy: Ungai Hara, Music: Kenji Kawai,

Voice Actors

Daisuke Ono as Seishuu Handa, Suzuko Hara as Naru Kotoishi, Fumihiko Tachiki as Vice Principal, Junichi Suwabe as Takasei Kawafuji, Rumi Ookubo as Tamako Arai,

Studio: Kinema Citrus

Synopsis

Seishuu Handa is a 23-year-old handsome calligrapher who has been forced to move to the remote Gotou Islands off the western coast of Kyushu after punching a famous colleague. He now has to deal with rustic people who drive tractors on roads, barge into his house and they all have strange local customs. Worse is to come as Seishuu’s house becomes the place the local kids use his home as a playground.

The final anime I’m going to pick is a slice-of-life about a sophisticated handsome urban male who practices calligraphy and he’s stuck in rural Japan. The selling-point for many is that the guy is an ikemen (handsome dude) and he gets into funny situations. I have seen it compared to Yotsuba& and I love that manga series. It is based on Satsuki Yoshino’s manga and it is being adapted by director Masaki Tachibana who handled Tokyo Magnitude 8.0, a series which I thought was pretty gripping. Another thing that sells this to me is that Kenji Kawai is composing the music and I loe his work at Production I.G with Patlabor and Ghost in the Shell.

Website

The 13^th Asian Film Festival of Dallas will be launched in just over a month’s time and I have been contacted with some of the line-up. Looking at last year’s festival one can see a rich mix of titles from East Asia with anime making a huge impact. I like the look of the Japanese selection which included Berserk: Golden Age Arc I, Rurouni Kenshin, and Key of Life. The films I have been told about point to a diverse bunch which means that there should be something for everyone.

This year’s festival takes place from July 10^th to July 17^th at the Angelika Theatre which will be the place that Asian film fans can watch 40 feature films and shorts. There is a mixture of titles from Japan and Korea, some of which have been featured on this blog. Here are the films that were revealed so far:

Geki x Cine’s Seven Souls in Skull Castle                 

Japanese Title: ゲキ　X　シネ髑髏城城　の　七　にん

Romaji: Geki x Shine Dokuro Shiro no Shichi nin

Release Date: January 12^th 2013 (Japan)

Running Time: 179 mins.

Director: Kazuki Nakajima, Hidenori Inoue

Writer: Kazuki Nakajima, Hidenori Inoue

Starring: Shun Oguri, Mirai Moriyama, Taichi Saotome, Eiko Koike, Ryo Katsuji, Riisa Naka

If you want to do a historical epic, why not try doing it by maing a stageplay? This is the big-screen showing of the Gekidan Shinkansen theatre troupe’s production and it stars big names like Shun Oguri, Eiko Koike and Mirai Moriyama.

It is the Sengoku Period and Oda Nobunaga is old news as Toyotomi Hideyoshi tries to unify Japan. Hideyoshi (Moriyama) finds his path to glory taking a sticky turn when he runs into a group of samurai holed up in a fortress known as Skull Castle which stands near a village known as Salvation which has overthrown its feudal lord. Cue epic siege and a cast of characters including a wandering samurai (Oguri), a prostitute (Eiko) and a girl (Naka) who knows the secrets of the seven samurai. 

Bushido (Japanese title: Squirming)                                                

Japanese Title: 蠢動　しゅんどう

Romaji: Shundō

Release Date: October 19th, 2013

Running Time: 102 mins.

Director: Yasuo Mikami

Writer: Yasuo Mikami (Screenplay),

Starring: Yuki Meguro, Tamao Sato, Takehiro Hira, Go Wakabayashi, Tomohito Wakizaki

This is a serious samurai film written directed and self-financed by former industrialist Yasuo Mikami and a remake of a 16mm film of the same title which he produced when he was 24 years old. Set after a time of famine when the Shogunate was cracking down on potential unrest by sending warriors to different clans to check on their loyalty.

Black Butler        

Japanese: 黒執事

Romaji: Kuroshitsuji

Running Time: 119 mins.

Release Date: January 18^th, 2014

Director: Kentaro Otani, Keiichi Sato

Writer: Tsutomu Kuroiwa (Screenplay), Yana Toboso (Original Manga)

Starring: Hiro Mizushima, Ayame Gouriki, Mizuki Yamamoto, Takuro Ohno, Yuka, Ken Yasuda

Just in time for the new series of Black Butler, this is a great chance to see the live-action movie adaptation of Yana Toboso’s hugely popular manga. It deviates considerably since the original was set in 19th Century England and this one is set in the present day but the characters are still the same.

The year is 2020 and the place is an Asian city where western and Asian cultures mix. In this society exist the ancient English aristocratic Phantomhive family and it’s a very traditional one (especially for 2020!) where only males can run the family business. Alas, the only person available for the job is a woman named Shiori (Gouriki) who dresses as a boy and takes the name Kyoharu and takes on the job of solving cases for the Queen who now rules the Western nations who wants to unify the world. Cases like a “Serial mummified murder spree” and the disappearances of women. Shiori finds evidence that links the two together but requires the help of her demonic butler Sebastien (Mizushima) who is awesome in every aspect from cooking to good looks but comes with the downside of devouring Shiori’s soul! 

The Fatal Encounter   

Running Time: 135 mins

Release Date: April 30^th, 2014 (Korea)

Director: Lee Jae-Kyu

Writer: Choi Sung-Hyun (Original Screenplay)

Starring: Hyun-Bin, Jung Jae-Young, Cho Jung-Seok, Han Ji-Min, Cho Jae-Hyun, Park Sung-Woong, Kim Sung-Ryoung, Jung Eun-Chae

The first entry from Korea is a historical epic which looks just as lavish and as familiar as all the rest.

King Jeongjo (Hyun-Bin) has been targeted for assassination several times despite the fact he has been in power for only one year. His hold on power is fragile at best and the only person he trusts is his eunuch named Sang-Chaek (Jung Jae-Young) and a military officer named Hong Kook-Young (Park Sung-Woong).

Who wants him dead? Queen Jungsoon (Han Ji-Min)!

Enter another assassin in the form of Eul-Soo (Cho Jung-Seok) who is forced to do this mission otherwise his love Wol-Hye (Jung Eun-Chae) will be killed.

Satellite Girl and Milk Cow       

Running Time: N/A

Release Date: February 20^th, 2014 (Korea)

Director: Jang Hyeong-yoon

Writer: Jang Hyeong-yoon (Original Screenplay)

Starring: Jung Yu-mi, Yoo Ah-in

The Satellite Girl and Milk Cow is the debut animation by Jang Hyeong-Yoon and stars the voices of Jung Yu-mi and Yoo Ah-in.

Il-ho is a satellite who gazes down on Earth and is curious about people and love. When she falls to Earth she transforms into the Satellite Girl. Meanwhile, a shy songwriter named Kyung-chun is turned into a cow when he suffers heartbreak after his girlfriend leaves him. Worse is to come when an evil machine known as Incinerator chases him. Fortunately, Merlin the Wizard shows up to enlist Kyung-chun and Il-Ho in his campaign to save the world from a black monster.

Sweet Alibis    

Running Time: 112 mins.

Release Date: February 20^th, 2014 (Taiwan)

Director: Yi-chi Lien

Writer: Shang-min Yu, Jia-jhen Chen, Yi-chi Lien (Original Screenplay)

Starring: Alec Su, Ariel Lin, Chung-tien Wu, Tsu-Jun Lang, Ruby Lin,

Fresh from Taiwan is a police comedy where a cowardly and thus inefficient veteran detective named Chi-yi (Su) and his overzealous rookie partner Yi-ping (Lin), who just happens to be the daughter of the head of the National Police Agency, are teamed up to fight crime. Alas, Chi-yi’s poor record and the possibility of anything bad happening to Yi-ping, means their chief gives the pointless cases such as one involving a puppy dying after eating chocolate… Investigating this leads to a series of mysterious deaths…

This time last week I was at the Terracotta Far East Film Festival where I was going to experience the awesomeness that is The Snow White Murder Case and other titles.I’ve got those reviews in the pipe-line and they are due next week. The Japanese selection was awesome and I am glad that I went, watched the films and hung out with fellow bloggers. Today I am going to another film festival which is screening nothing but anime like Patema Inverted, one of my most titles from 2013 I wanted to see but missed. Alas, the weather isn’t as good but I’ll be indoors for most of the day.

This week was spent gobbling chocolates and biscuits I got from the Japan  Centre and posting about some my Summer 2014 anime picks. I also put together a number of articles for Anime UK News about the Summer 2014 anime and they have gone down well on the forums. I also posted about a film festival happening in Dallas where one can watch some cool looking East Asian films!

What’s released in Tokyo this week?

Jossy’s   

Japanese Title:女子―ズ

Romaji: Joshi-zu

Running Time: 97 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Yuichi Fukuda

Writer: Yuichi Fukuda (Screenplay),

Starring: Mirei Kiritani, Mina Fujii, Mitsuki Takahata, Kasumi Arimura, Mizuki Yamamoto, Ken Yasuda, Jiro Yasuda, Sautoki Minagawa,

Super Sentai shows… I’m no fan. With its mix of the fantastical and reality this might be funny in a way that the second half of Samurai Flamenco wasn’t… Samurai Flamenco, you broke my heart by taking that Super Sentai stuff seriously.

Monsters are attacking Earth and only heroes can save the day. These heroes are women whose surnames refer to colours – for example, Kanoko Midoriyama and Naoko Akagi – and these colours will be the uniforms they wear. Under the leadership of Commander Charles, these dames use their special “Women Tornado” to beat the crap out of monsters. The only problem is that they need to be together to use their special power and with love lives, shopping and personal things going on… Getting their schedules to synch might be a problem…

Website

Disregarded People   

Japanese Title:捨てがたき人々

Romaji: Sutegataki Hitobito

Running Time: 123 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Hideo Sakaki

Writer: Inochi Akiyama (Screenplay), George Akiyama (Original Manga)

Starring: Nao Omori, Hitomi Miwa, Jun Miho, Tomorowo Taguchii, Susumu Terajima, Kenichi Takito, Gajiro Satoh, Taro Suwa, Chika Uchida, Kenichi Endo,

This film is based on a manga series of the same name by George Akiyama, a  guy who specialises in exploring morality and tough subjects. You may be familiar with Ashura which was turned into a harrowing anime a couple of years ago. This is the latest adaptation of his work and it has a star-packed cast with Nao Omori (The Ravine of Goodbye), Tomorowo Taguchi (Tetsuo: The Iron Man, Strange Circus) and Susumu Terajima (Sonatine). Coming to a film festival near you? I can see it happening.

Yuusuke Mamiana (Omori) is broke and unemployed and stuck thinking about sex and money. Sick of his life, he heads back to his hometown but finds a cold reception waiting from the people of his past. The only exception is Kyoko Okabe (Miwa), a beautiful girl with a bruised face. Yuusuke wants to discover happiness, wants to forget the misery of his life and wants to prove that he is alive and so he wants to have sex with Kyoko and maybe seek more…

Website

Ninjani Sanjo! Mirai e no Tatakai   

Japanese Title:忍ジャニ参上!未来への戦い

Romaji: Ninjani Sanjo! Mirai e no Tatakai

Running Time: 86 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Masanori Inoue

Writer: Hiroya Taka (Screenplay),

Starring: Daiki Shigeoka, Nozomu Kotaki, Sho Hirano, Tomohiro Kamiyama, Koji Mukai, Akitao Kiriyama, Shintaro Morimoto, Taigo Kyomoto,

After the early months of 2014 saw female idols put in work with horror films and teen romance dramas, the male idols step up to the plate. It’s the boys of Johnny’s Jr. group “7 WEST” and they play ninjas in the Edo period who have little to do now that Tokugawa Ieyasu has united Japan. They get the order to disband, but do they want to stop having fun being ninjas? I wouldn’t!

Website

Otaku’s Daughter   

Japanese Title:あの娘、早くババアになればいいのに

Romaji: Ano ko, Hayaku Babaa ni Nareba Iinoni

Running Time: 70 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Yurui Koroyasu

Writer: Natsuki Terashima (Screenplay),

Starring: Takashi Omoto, Asaka Nakamura, Yui, Kirita Ryousuke, Ai Ozaki,

Hirata owns a books shop and has a daughter named Anna. She’s not his biological daughter. An old schoolmate left her to him. Despite this, Hirata cherishes Anna and his idea of raising a girl is to raise her like an idol. Is this sort of love proper?

Website

We Are the Reds the Movie    

Japanese Title: N/A

Romaji: N/A

Running Time: 70 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Shujin Ito, Yota Kaneko

Writer: N/A

Starring: N/A

Football. The World Cup is here and football will dominate EVERYTHING. It will be on the television and newspapers and conersations and be in everywhere in day to day life. The British media will go doolally over a bunch of guys kicking a ball around and people will freak out when England don’t win.

I actually like playing football but I find watching football boring. When those World Cup matches are on I’ll be at the ultimate counter-programming event – a museum – and I’ll be surrounded by lots of people who don’t care about football – beautiful women (hopefully…) – and when I’m at home I have my film collection. For those who like football, this documentary might be to your taste.

It’s all about the Urawa Red Diamonds, a J-League club, and we see the staff, players, supporters, and everybody drawn to the sport and the team.

Website

Persona 3 the Movie #2 Midsummer Knight’s Dream   

Japanese Title: N/A

Romaji: N/A

Running Time: N/A

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Tomohisa Taguchi

Writer: Jun Kumagai (Script)

Starring: Akira Ishida (Makoto Yuuki), Megumi Toyoguchi (Yukari Takeba),  Hikaru Midorikawa (Akihiko Sanada), Kazuya Nakai (Shinjiro Aragaki), Maaya Sakamoto (Aegis), Rie Tanaka (Mitsuru Kirijou), Miyuki Sawashiro (Elizabeth),

The easiest way to find me in my museum is to look for the guy drinking from the Persona 3 cup – Makoto and Yukari are on there. I’m a fan of Persona and I’m excited to see the second film from the Persona 3 adaptations and it follows on from last year’s Birth of Spring title. The poster is so cool, I want one!

There is a hidden time known as the “Dark Hour” that exists between one day and the next when all movement in the town of Iwatodai stops and terrible creatures known as Shadows room. A group of students from Moonlight Hall School are drawn to fight these creatures and explore the mysterious tower of Tartarus with their special weapons called Evokers which they use to summon Persona.

Website

ポルトレ PORTRAIT         

Japanese Title:ポルトレ PORTRAIT

Romaji: Porutore PORTRAIT

Running Time: 70 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Shuntaro Uchida

Writer: Shuntaro Uchida (Script)

Starring: Yoshimura Sakahito, Marika Matsumoto, Hideyuki Arai

16mm and digital film and Polaroids are cut together by Shuntaro Uchida as he creates a portrait of himself doing things like wandering the streets of Shibuya and encountering randoms including an attractive woman. Since I am useless in asking women out on dates perhaps I should roll with a digital camera and make a film… Actually, that would probably make me seem creepier than I actually am.

Website

Flower Life Nakagawa Yukio  

Japanese Title:華　いのち　中川幸夫

Romaji: Hana Inochi Nakagawa Yukio

Running Time: 92 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Tani Mitsuaki

Writer: N/A

Starring: Yukio Nakagawa, Nobuyoshi Araki, Kotaro Sawaki,

I’m sorry but some of the imagery and music in the film’s trailer… If this was about a pale madman stalking the countryside and collecting the gore and blood of people he has murdered to make sculptures while listening to opera… I wouldn’t be surprised. Perhaps it says more about my strange imagination and it’s interpretation of some performance art because this is about a respected ikebana artist named Yukio Nakagawa who has taken the traditional art of flower arranging and turned it into something far out and unique, where the flowers are crushed and turned into suggestive and sexualised images. His work was so out there that he was thrown out of an ikebana school because he was a rebel. This work celebrates the artist’s life.

Website

Godzilla    

Japanese Title:ゴジラ

Romaji: GOJIRA

Running Time: 97 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Ishiro Honda

Writer: Ishiro Honda, Takeo Murata (Script)

Starring: Akira Takarada, Momoko Kochi, Akihiko Hiata, Takashi Shimura,

Ishiro Honda’s 1954 classic, Godzilla, is re-released on its 60^th anniversary as a digitally remastered film in Japanese cinema.

Website

Watch Rakugo on the Cinema Screen: “Master Storytellers of the Showa Period”                                          

Japanese Title: スクリーンで観る高座　シネマ落語「落語研究会　昭和の名人　七　 古今亭志ん朝独演会」

Romaji: Sukurīn de miru kōza shinema rakugo `rakugo kenkyūkai Shōwa no meijin nana kokontei shinchō dokuen-kai’

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Running Time: 122 mins.

Director: N/A

Writer: N/A

Starring: Yanagiya Kosan, Kokontei Shinshō, Katsura Bunraku

This is the seventh in a series of films about Rakugo, a form of verbal entertainment where a lone storyteller sits on a stage and depicts a long and complicated comical story with nothing but a paper fan and a small cloth for props and a change in pitch and tone in voice to provide life to different characters. The film shows us the skills of Kokontei Shinshō.

Website

Tokyo Densetsu: Kyofu no Ningen Jigoku  

Japanese Title: 劇場版東京伝説恐怖の人間地獄

Romaji: Gekijouban Tokyo Densetsu: Kyofu no Ningen Jigoku

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Running Time: 66 mins.

Director: Seiji Chiba

Writer: Seiji Chiba (Screenplay), Yumeaki Hirayama (Original Manga),

Starring: Rika Adachi, Shiho Fujisawa, Junpei Hashino, Hiroko Hayashi, Kinari Hirano, Marin, Tomoaki Nakagawa, Kentaro Shimazu,

Yumeak Hirayama’s horror manga gets adapted into an omnibus film.

Website

Mrs. Inga wo Shitte Imasu ka?  

Japanese Title:いのちのコール　ミセスインガを知っていますか

Romaji: Inochi no Koru Misesu Inga wo Shitte Imasu ka

Running Time: 86 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Yasuyuki Ebihara

Writer: Akio Nanki (Screenplay),

Starring: Misako Yasuda, Kenki Yamaguchi, Shigeru Muroi,

Do You Know Mrs. Inga? A drama about a woman named Tamaki who is about to get married but discovers that she suffers from cervical cancer and has surgery to remove her womb. It has such a negative effect on her life that when she calls into a radio station under the name Inga, it is clear that her friends and family have abandoned her and she talks about suicide. Mayumi, the DJ, talks her out of it.

Website

Snow White Murder Case (2014) (International Premiere)  

Japanese Title: 白ゆき姫殺人事件

Romaji: Shira Yuki Hime Satsujin Jiken

Running Time: 126 mins.

Release Date: March 29^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Yoshihiro Nakamura

Writer: Tamio Hayashi (Screenplay), Kanae Minato (Original Novel)

Starring: Mao Inoue, Gou Ayano, Misako Renbutsu, Nanao, Shihori Kanjiya, Nobuaki Kaneko, Erena Ono, Mitsuki Tanimura, Shota Sometani, Katsuhisa Namase, Dankan,

Seen at the Terracotta Far East Film Festival 2014

Yoshihiro Nakamura’s latest film is a twisting murder tale which is less about who-dunnit and more about tearing open the glossy façade of contemporary media and revealing the lurid rumour-fuelled tabloid culture that festers underneath. As a Twitter-addict at a TV company uses social media to investigate a shocking death, he finds himself gaining what could be a massive scoop. With every Tweet he becomes the preacher to a growing congregation of gossips ready to praise him but his audience can turn and in his enthusiasm and efforts to catch a big news story he blithely ignores the damage that spreading rumours can do to promote his career.

Breaking news! Murder in Shigure Valley!

The Snow White Murder Case starts with the results of the crime. It is night time and a beautiful woman lies on a forest floor. As the camera pulls back, blood runs down her neck and we see multiple stab wounds gush forth with more blood.

By morning her burnt corpse has been found in the nature preserve in Shigure Valley. As the news of the dead body is revealed by police, Twitter users link it to the recently disappeared Noriko Miki (Nanao). When her death is confirmed the testimonies about Noriko flood in from co-workers and friends at the cosmetics company famous for Snow White soaps where she worked. We find out that she was the most beautiful girl at the company, well-liked, and respected and helpful, an innocent fairy-tale like beauty. All of that is in the past because she is now the subject of a massive tabloid scandal.

News slowly leaks out mostly because of Akahoshi (Ayano), a temporary news director addicted to Twitter.

We first see him in a television production control room but kept far away from the control deck and left with nothing to do. He is on his smartphone using his Twitter account @Red_Star_07 to Tweet restaurant reviews and odd bits of news to his small audience. He soon gets a tip on the Noriko case when an old university friend of Akahoshi’s sends him information which could lead to a scoop.

His old friend’s name is Risako Kano (Renbutsu). She harboured a crush on him and it turns out that she was a co-worker of Noriko’s. Her inside tip is that a dowdy co-worker named Miki Jono (Inoue) had a grudge against Noriko.

Risako clues Akahoshi into the gossip at the cosmetics company. Products were being stolen and Miki was massively unpopular, a loner who didn’t compare to the perfect Noriko who had recently stolen Miki’s boyfriend. As Akahoshi digs deeper the media frenzy begins as Akahoshi reveals the revelations on television shows and over the internet. Miki’s friends, family and anybody even vaguely associated with her start Tweeting, calling and giving their opinion on if she is a killer and how she did it as Miki coming under internet-fuelled suspicion of Noriko’s murder. As the rumours come out, Miki looks like a prime suspect and a witch hunt ensues…

This is a reconstruction

The Snow White Murder Case is based on a novel by Kanae Minamoto, one of Japan’s foremost thriller writers who has had her novels A Chorus of Angels, Confessions and Penance turned into television and film. This film is adapted by Nakamura’s familiar screenwriter Tamio Hayashi. It seems like the perfect title for Nakamura and Hayashi since it features nebulous plot points and a shifting narrative that comes into focus as the characterisation slowly changes and the ‘truth’ comes into focus.

The Snow White Murder Case is like a modern day morality tale about the poisonous effects of gossip and how the power of social media pumps up a guy’s pride and the hubris he suffers blinds him to the pitfalls of the medium.

Right now, I’m the only person in the world who is closing in on the dark crime.

Akahoshi is a young guy just out of university with only a temp job at a tabloid programme. He is left out of the action of the news reports and the senior director is irritated by his presence. With nothing to do, he is strapped to his smart-phone cultivating his Twitter account and Tweeting with his restaurant reviews. It is the only place he gets taken seriously as anything like a journalist.

Twitter has that power. With a series of Tweets you can appear interesting. With the right set of Tweets you can be famous. The news media are all over social networks but for a generation of young people raised on, and addicted to, social media they can use it to carve niche for themselves in traditional media and Akahoshi is one who senses this opportunity.

The murder case tip-off from his friend is his big chance to impress his bosses and maybe secure a permanent position with the production company. He has the bit between his teeth and one can sense his excitement as he drives to murder scenes and takes his Canon DV camera to interview anybody with any connection to Miki.

He enthusiastically gathers every slice of steaming gossip in an example of reckless sticky journalism to create a tale based on awfully flimsy circumstantial evidence for his hilariously tawdry and lurid reconstructions for his segment on a trashy TV programme.

As we see him get his ‘evidence’ we witness the build up to Noriko’s disappearance and parts from Miki’s childhood from different perspectives. Each person remembers different things, Miki’s isolation and odd behaviour from her childhood to the fateful night and everything plays out differently. Some remember Miki as a loner and miserable while others may remember her as a good friend. Akahoshi, desperate to make his stories stand up, engages in a lot of character assassination and uses the worst rumours to further his truth.

Everybody has a tale to tell because they all want to be linked to the story. Every interviewee is very much aware of the mechanics of the media and loves getting some fame. Worryingly, Akahoshi never once questions whether any of the sources are trustworthy but he’s committed. There’s too much at stake. Everyone across the country, from salarymen to mothers nursing babies, is fascinated by the case and wants to join in the hunt for the murderer and take part in the media trial. It can make or break Akahoshi. With every tweet and TV show his enthusiasm exposes his status-anxiety and an incredible lack of ethics and he sets himself up for a hard fall.

The audience is aware of the hollowness of the stories and there is a lot of black comedy in seeing scenes play out bathetically in sly slices of satire. We see the inner workings of the television industry, the schlocky reconstructions and the silly allegations, the ‘experts’ who read scripted lines, the variety shows with lurid on-screen text and pixelated faces, but what haunts the most is the way the media adapts anything, including a person’s life, to create the narrative that it wants and the growing sense of a media storm brewing where everyone’s voice drowns out the real truth.

None of this would mean anything if the women at the centre of the case were one-dimensional.

Not being unique is what makes her unique

For two-thirds of the film Miki is painted as a mystery figure capable of evil acts (including curses!), but the audience gradually learns she is not the witch that Akahoshi paints her out to be. Every bit of evidence he gathers is flawed in some way, some of the sources are unreliable which makes the murder plot Akahoshi constructs also unreliable and meeting the real Miki leads to the heart strings being tugged.

As we learn more about Miki, the film begins to show something of a warm emotional core which is absent from other adaptations of Kanae’s works because the suspect is less an evil witch and more a quiet girl who has suffered a string of bad luck. It turns out that she is not a loner with a grudge but just very shy.

Mao Inoue playing a plain girl seems laughable but she manages to do it. The conservative clothes and plain ponytail go some way but it’s the physical performance.

She has the look of hesitancy and nervousness that accompanies those not used to taking centre stage. Her smile is hard won and she is reserved but if one breaks through they find a genuinely nice girl, indeed, an innocent who makes the idea that she committed the crime absurd. She is revealed to be a good and loyal friend with the sort of lack of sophistication in some areas that makes her feel natural and even unworldly at points, someone who can forget their troubles with something simple like music, someone still in love with fairytales well past the point most people would have stopped reading them. She is just a generally nice person and one who can easily be taken advantage of.

All of the bad things that people remember about her emerge from honest mistakes misinterpreted by others, men who view her sexually and a threat to their status, women who are competitive with her in the office space. But there are flashes of danger, moments when reality makes her act out in certain ways such as speeding in her car or openly grumbling. She is complicated like most people are.

This sharp sort of change of perspective extends to Noriko who is not as innocent as the testimonies claim. She, with her flawless beauty and clever, manipulative ways is resented by the other office ladies and a poisonous atmosphere of rumour and truth is revealed.

The more Miki’s character is revealed, her entire background and the more we see how insidiously evil gossip can be and how social media perpetuates this. The trial by media is shown up as being a highly destructive force but for all of the talk of social media, Nakamura and Minato know where their loyalty lies and that is with the flesh and blood friends people make, not the anonymous people online. When Miki’s friend is revealed it opens the film to an emotionally moving set of end sequences which reveal how strong and how important friendship can be, something Akahoshi might want to learn about.

Disappear into a fantasy world

Overall, the movie is enjoyable. Nakamura brilliantly brings to life this tale of truth and rumour and imaginatively picks apart social media and its problems by crafting scenes where people are forever on their mobiles, playing games where Twitter comments and constant chatter drown out the truth. He specialises in tales with late twists and sometimes they work, sometimes they don’t. Here, it’s perfectly poised and executed and creates a gripping story with a satisfying and well-earned emotional pay-off. Some may be disappointed by the mystery but getting to the answer is more important and the truth revealed rings true.

The truth is a relative term which makes the navigation of the film’s events feel like breaking through the wall of an echo chamber of rumours to get to an absolute truth. This is a perfect sensation for a story which investigates the modern malady of gossip and the mega-phone effect social media has and how it can destroy lives. Through a story which is equal parts satire and crime thriller and through the actions and fate of Akahoshi and Miki, The Snow White Murder Case is a highly enjoyable deliciously dark, bitter, serious but amusingly light critique of fame, social media, and gossip.

4.5/5

New York, New York, what a wonderful town. I have never wanted to live in New York as much as I did after reading the line-up for Japan Cuts 2014.

The Japan Society will host a series of awesome Japanese films from July 10^th to July 29^th with titles like Sion Sono’s ultra-violent black comedy Why Don’t You Play in Hell? coupled with crime thriller The Devil’s Path and recent (controversial) World War II blockbuster The Eternal Zero. These are just some of the headline titles, there are even more listed, many of which were released in the last few weeks and some of which are crazy and bizarre and speak to the sharp and unique sense of cinema that the curators have – respect has to be paid for the programming of the documentaries on this list. There’s definitely something for everyone! Here’s a trailer:

I am blown away by the titles and the guests that have been announced with many actors coming over for Q&As (FUMI NIKAIDO!!!). For a fan of cinema in general and Japanese cinema in particular, this is a festival rich with great films and events!

Here’s a list of the films and trailers with comments from me. Click on the title for more info such as times and buying tickets. Tickets are already on sale!

Thursday July 10th, Opening Night

6 P.M.

The Mole Song: Undercover Agent Reiji   

Japanese Title: 土竜の唄 潜入捜査官 REIJI

Romaji: Mogura no Uta Sennuu Sosakan REIJI

Running Time: 130 mins.

Director: Takashi Miike

Writer: Kudo Kankuro (Screenplay), Noboru Takahashi (Original Manga)

Starring: Toma Ikuta, Ren Osugi, Shinichi Tsutsumi, Riisa Naka, Takayuki Yamada, Mitsuru Fukikoshi

This is based on a comedy manga by Noboru Takahashi and directed by Takashi Miike (For Love’s Sake). The film has a great cast of characters like Shinichi Tsutsumi (Why Don’t You Play in Hell?), Ren Osugi (Exte) and Mitsuru Fukikoshi (Cold Fish). It seems like a great way to open the film festival since it looks absolutely funny.

Reiji Kikukawa (Ikuta) has a strong sense of justice but graduates at the bottom of his class from the police academy. He is so useless his superiors send him on what should be a suicide mission. First the police chief fires him for disciplinary issues and then sets him up as a mole in the Sukiyaki gang, the largest crime group in the Kanto area. His target is Shuho Todoroki, the boss, and so Reiji goes through hell to get his man!

8:30 P.M.

Why Don’t You Play in Hell?

Japanese Title: 地獄　で　なぜ　悪い Why Don’t You Play in Hell?

Romaji: Jigoku de Naze Warui Why Don’t You Play in Hell?

Running Time: 126 mins

Director: Sion Sono

Writer: Sion Sono (Screenplay),

Starring: Jun Kunimura, Shinichi Tsutsumi, Fumi Nikaido, Tomochika, Hiroki Hasegawa, Kotou Lorena, Gen Hoshino, Tak Sakaguchi

Sion Sono blew my mind with this one. After a short run of issue films like the critically lauded Himizu and The Land of Hope, he made this hilarious and blood-thirsty film which was both entertainment and a love letter to cult films and yakuza classics. I found it absolutely hilarious and one of the best films of last year.

Muto (Kunimura) and Ikegami (Tsutsumi) are rival gangsters who despise each other especially since Muto’s wife Shizue (Tomochika) butchered a boss in Ikegami’s gang. She gets sent to prison which jeopardises her daughter’s acting career. Ten years later and days before Shizue is due to be released, Muto is desperate to make his daughter a big-screen star as a reward for Shizue’s loyalty and kidnaps Koji (Hoshino), a timid passer-by who is mistaken for being a film director.

When dealing with gangsters you don’t mess about so Koji recruits the help of a mad-cinephile Hirata (Hasegawa) who dreams of being a movie director and has a ragtag film crew named The Fuck Bombers. Hirata seizes his chance and loses his mind as he casts Mitsuko in a fictional gang war but it soon goes wrong when it turns real.

Introduction and Q&A with actress Fumi Nikaido (I so want to be in her presence!!!)

Followed by the LET’S PLAY IN HELL Opening Night Party!

Friday July 11th,

6 P.M.

The Snow White Murder Case

Japanese: 白ゆき姫殺人事件

Romaji: Shira Yuki Hime Satsujin Jiken

Running Time: 126 mins.

Director: Yoshihiro Nakamura

Writer:Tamio Hayashi (Screenplay), Kanae Minato (Original Novel)

Starring: Mao Inoue, Gou Ayano, Misako Renbutsu, Nanao, Shihori Kanjiya, Nobuaki Kaneko, Erena Ono, Mitsuki Tanimura, Shota Sometani, Katsuhisa Namase, Dankan,

I reviewed this one on Monday and found it to be a gripping and blackly comic satire on contemporary Japanese media. I highly recommend it for people who want a nice twisting narrative with great performances. The crime isn’t so much the centre-piece, rather, it’s how everybody reacts to it!

The Show White Murder Case sees victim Noriko Miki (Nanao), the best looking girl at a cosmetics company, murdered and her co-worker Miki (Inoue) coming under suspicion. The media frenzy begins as television shows interview Miki’s friends, family and anybody even vaguely associated with her. Soon rumours of her being a wicked woman emerge. Are they true?

8:30 P.M.

Maruyama, The Middle Schooler

Japanese Title: 中学生　円山

Romaji: Chuugakusei Maruyama

Running Time: 199 mins.

Director: Kankuro Kudo

Writer: Kankuro Kudo (Screenplay)

Starring: Hiroaki Takuma, Tsuyoshi Kusanagi, Yang Ik-June, Maki Sakai, Toru Nakamura, Nanami Nabemoto, Yuiko Kariya,You, Fumina Hara,Kenji Endo, Tomorowo Taguchi, Maho Nonami

This is a comedy for which every review I have read has been glowing with praise. It’s directed by Kankuro Kuda, actor in Memories of Matsuko and Instant Swamp.

Katsuya Maruyama (Hiraoka) is 14, an age where a boys thoughts are consumed by carnal desires. Only his are strange. He wants to “to touch his own weeny with his tongue.” Perhaps his strangeness is a result of living a mundane life in a housing complex with his mother Mizuki (sakai)), a woman obsessed with Korean dramas, his fitness obsessed father Katsuyuki (Nakamura) and sharing his room with his sister Akane (Nabemoto). There are other, stranger characters around like Tatsuo Shimoi (Kusanagi), a single father who wheels his infant son in a buggy around everywhere and prying into his neighbours lives and irritating housewives and a Korean electrician named Park Hyeon-Hun (Yang Ik-June) who attracts the attention of Mizuki. When bodies start turning up in the apartment complex Maruyama begins to draw a manga about a superhero named Captain Fruit (based on his father) who comes to the rescue. He shares his crazy tales with Shimoi and the line between fantasy and reality become blurred.

Saturday, July 12^th

12:30 P.M. 

The Great Passage

Japanese Title: 舟を編む

Romaji: Fune wo Amu

Running Time: 133 mins.

Director: Yuya Ishii

Writer: Shion Miura (Original Novel), Kensaku Watanabe (Screenplay),

Starring: Ryuhei Matsuda, Aoi Miyazaki, Joe Odagiri, Haru Kuroki, Misako Watanabe, Kumiko Aso, Shingo Tsurumi, Chizuru Ikewaki, Hiroko Isayama, Kaouru Kobayashi, Go Kato, Kaoru Yachigusa, Ryu Morioka, Shohei Uno, Kazuki Namioka

Yuya Ishii is one of Japan’s new directors who is attracting attention. With titles like Sawako Decides and Mitsuko Delivers, he made an impact on the indie scene but made the leap with this comedy to the majors. I found it  warm and funny character comedy and recommend it. If my opinion doesn’t matter all that much to you (please humour me and pretend it does) then maybe the fact that it scored big at this year’s Japanese Academy Awards might!

Mitsuya Majime (Matsuda) has the talent to comprehend different languages and is the most important member of the editorial team of a dictionary but he struggles to tell Kaguya Hayashi (Miyazaki), a cook and the granddaughter of the owner of Majime’s boarding home, how he feels about her. Meanwhile, he has to lead a team in the creation of a new dictionary!

3:00 P.M.

The Eternal Zero

Japanese Title: 永遠の0

Romaji: Eien no Zero

Running Time: 144 mins.

Director: Takashi Yamazaki

Writer: Tamio Hayashi (Screenplay), Naoki Hyakuta (Original Novel)

Starring: Junichi Okada, Mao Inoue, Haruma Miura, Yuichiro Hirose, Nanaka Yagi, Hirofumi Arai, Min Tanaka, Kazue Fukiishi, Jun Fubuki, Isao Natsuyagi

It’s hard to ignore the controversy behind the author but this is supposed to be an excellent drama. The cast is certainly packed with first-rate talent.

A young man named Kentaro Saeki (Miura) has failed his bar test yet again. Confused about life he begins to research his family with his older sister Keiko (Fukiishi). They focus on their grandfather Kyuzo Miyabe (Okada) who fought in the Pacific War. He was a man scared of death and obsessed with life who volunteered to join a ‘special forces’ squad but as they encounter old colleagues of his they find a dark secret kept hidden for 60 years…

6:00 P.M.

The Devil’s Path

Japanese Title: 凶悪

Romaji: Kyouaku

Running Time: 128 mins.

Director: Kazuya Shiraishi

Writer: Kazuya Shiraishi, Izumi Takahashi (Screenplay),

Starring: Takayuki Yamada, Pierre Taki, Lily Franky, Chizuru Ikewaki, Kazuko Shirakawa, Yu Saito, Nozomi Muraoka

Takayuki Yamada (13 Assassins), Pierre Taki (Linda, Linda, Linda) and Lily Franky (Like Father, Like Son) star in this adaptation of a nonfiction novel which looks to be a neat little thriller.

Sudo (Taki) is a former yakuza and death-row inmate who contacts Fujii (Yamada), a magazine reporter by letter to tell him that a man named Kimura (Franky) a.k.a. “teacher” has killed numerous times for insurance money. Fujii begins his investigation and through his persistence and that of Sudo, the police begin to investigate.

8: 30 P.M.

Miss Zombie

Japanese Title: Miss Zombie

Romaji: Miss Zombie

Running Time: 85 mins.

Director: SABU

Writer: SABU (Screenplay),

Starring: Ayaka Komatsu, Makoto Togashi, Riku Ohnishi, Taro Suruga, Tateto Serizawa, Takaya Yamauchi, Toru Tezuka

SABU is a great filmmaker. One definitely worth checking out if you haven’t heard of him before. He made quirky gangster films in the 90’s, is back and with an original take on the zombie movie thanks to the script. Gravure idol Ayaka Komatsu plays a zombie named Sara who gets inserted into a family that is wary of her and a village that is frightened of her. Is she really that bad or are humans worse? She is cast alongside including Makoto Togashi (Cure) and Tateto Serizawa (Isn’t Anyone Alive?).

Sara (Komatsu) rocks up at a in a town in a cage wth numerous scars on her body and glazed eyes. She’s a zombie. Also in the cage is a gun and a note that reads “Do not give it meat”. The people around her are disgusted and treat her cruelly but a doctor takes her in. His son bonds with the zombie but the doctor has other plans…

10: 30 P.M.

The Pinkie

Running Time: 65 mins.

Director: Lisa Takeba

Writer: Lisa Takeba (Screenplay),

Starring: Ryota Ozawa, Miwako Wagatsuma, Haruka Suenaga, Kanji Tsuda

You people attending this festival are so fortunate… After a run of HYPE films you get this little gem from Lisa Takeba who has put together a great little indie romantic comedy which looks like so much fun.

Since they were both five, Ryosuke has been stalked by Momoko – the ugliest girl in the village. Momoko’s love for Ryosuke is so boundless that she has her face surgically altered to suit his taste – but still he wants nothing to do with her. Ryosuke is more interested in the girlfriend of a gangster boss. But when the boss finds out about their affair, he has Ryosuke’s little finger hacked off. Magically, the finger falls into Momoko’s hands, and she uses it to clone Ryosuke, so she can finally have him (or almost him) for herself – and that’s the first five minutes.

Sunday, July 12^th

12:30 

Wood Job!

Japanese Title:（ウッジョブ）　神去なあなあ日常

Romaji: (Ujjobu) kamisari nānā nichijō

Running Time: 116 mins

Director: Shinobu Yaguchi

Writer: Shinobu Yaguchi(Screenplay), Shion Miura (Original Novel)

Starring: Shota Sometani, Masami Nagasawa, Hideaki Ito, Yuka, Naomi Nishida, Makita Sports, Ken Mitsuishi, Akira Emoto

This is a comedy adapted from a novel by Shion Miura (Mahoro Eki Mae Bangaichi, The Great Passage) and it’s full of great actors like Shota Sometani (Himizu), Ken Mitsuishi (Rent-a-Cat, Noriko’s Dinner Table).

Yuki Hirano (Sometani) is a high school grad who has failed his university entrance exams. He expects to spend the near future working a part time job but sees a brochure for a year-long forestry training scheme and soon he’s in a remote mountain village called Kamusari which has none of the amenities of Tokyo but immense beauty and warm-hearted locals and a beautiful young woman named Naoki (Nagasawa) He just has to survive his rough and ready instructors like Yoki (Ito).

3:00 

Monsterz

Japanese Title:モンスターズ

Romaji: Monsuta-zu

Running Time: 112 mins

Director: Hideo Nakata

Writer: Yusuke Watanabe (Screenplay), Kim Min-seok (Original Script)

Starring: Tatsuya Fujiwara, Takayuki Yamada, Satomi Ishihara, Tomorowo Taguchi, Yutaka Matsushige, Tae Kimura,

Hideo Nakata of Ringu fame is back with an adaptation of a 2010 Korean film called Haunters.  The story is about the battle between two fabulously good-looking men with special abilities that allow them to control others!

A Man (Fujiwara) possesses the ability to manipulate others with his eyes. With his ability he killed his abusive step-father but was abandoned by his mother. He now lives the life of a loner. His life changes again when he encounters a man he cannot manipulate. That man is Shuichi Tanaka (Yamada) who lives with his friends and works a dead-end job. He may not have money but his voice has special abilities…

5:30 

All-Round Appraiser Q: The Eyes of Mona Lisa

Japanese Title:万能鑑定士Q モナ・リザの瞳

Romaji: Bannou Kanteishi Q Monariza no Hitomi

Running Time: 119 mins

Director: Shinsuke Sato

Writer: Manabu Uda (Screenplay), Keisuke Matsuoka (Original Novel)

Starring: Haruka Ayase, Tori Matsuzaka, Eriko Hatsune, Hiroaki Murakami, Pierre Deladonchamps, Jun Hashimoto

Based on a popular mystery novel by Keisuke Matsuoka, the story follows Riko Rinda (Ayase) a sexy and cute librarian with quasi-supernatural powers of deduction who is a brilliant appraiser with an “All-Round Appraiser Q” reputation that earns the attention of The Louvre as a Mona Lisa exhibition is to be held for the first time in Japan. Accompanied by magazine editor sidekick Yuto Ogasawara (Matsuzaka), she goes to Paris and finds her judgment challenged by the shroud of mystery and threats of theft surrounding the masterpiece as well as the Mona Lisa herself. 

8: 00 P.M.

Uzumasa Limelight

Japanese Title: 太秦ライムライト

Romaji: Uzumasa Laimulaito

Running Time: 103 mins

Director: Ken Ochiai

Writer: Hiroyuki Ono (Screenplay),

Starring: Seizo Fukumoto, Chihiro Yamamoto, Hiroki Matsukata, Masashi Goda, Hirotaro Honda, Hisako Manda.

This one is so new it hasn’t been released in Japan yet! Straight from the festival website:

 A moving, nostalgic portrait of the men behind the golden age of chanbara (sword-fighting dramas and films), Uzumasa Limelight goes behind the scenes of the distinctive film genre for which Japan is famous. A professional extra named Kamiyama (real-life kirare-yaku Seizo Fukumoto) has devoted 50 years of his life as a kirare-yaku in sword-fighting movies produced at Kyoto’s Uzumasa Studios. A master of the art, he lives to die–or more exactly “to be cut”–and show a beautiful, spectacular death on screen. Now an elderly man, Kamiyama lives very modestly but has earned immense respect from his peers, some of them movie stars. When the studio where he works decides to discontinue its chanbara productions, Kamiyama finds himself at a loss. Hope arrives in the form of a young girl named Satsuki, who soon becomes Kamiyama’s disciple. Will the art of dying by the sword live on?

 Introduction and Q&A with director Ken Ochiai and actress Chihiro Yamamoto

Tuesday, July 15^th

6:00 P.M.

The Horses of Fukushima

Japanese: 祭の馬

Romaji: Matsuri no Uma

Running Time: 74 mins.

Director: Yoju Matsubayashi

Writer: N/A

Starring: N/A

Japan produces many documentaries but few of the major festivals that I write about actually shows them which makes the inclusion of this and others on the list noteworthy.

Director Yoju Matsubayashi was behind the documentary  Fukushima: Memories of the Lost Landscape which was all about the Great East Japan Earthquake. He returns with a new work based on the story of a rancher named Shinichiro Tanaka who fled his farm after the nuclear disaster and returned to find his horses dead or starving, and refused to obey the government’s orders to kill them. While many racehorses are slaughtered for horsemeat, his horses had been subjected to radiation and were inedible. Yoju Matsubayashi spent the summer of 2011 helping Tanaka take care of his horses and documenting their efforts to rehabilitate the horses.

8:30 P.M.

Unforgiven

Japanese Title: 許されざる者

Romaji: Yurusarezaru Mono

Running Time: 135 mins.

Director: Lee Sang-Il

Writer: Lee Sang-Il (Adapted Screenplay), David Webb Peoples (Original Screenplay)

Starring: Ken Watanabe, Jun Kunimura, Eiko Koike, Yura Yagira, Koichi Sato, Akira Emoto, Shiono Kutsuna, Kenichi Takito, Youkiyoshi Ozawa, Takahiro Mirua, Sjiori Kutsuna

This is the remake of the 1992 Clint Eastwood film of the same name. It swaps out the US and cowboys for Japan in the late 1800’s and samurai and Warner Bros. rolled it out around the world for a limited time. This is another chance to see it. It is directed by Lee Sang-Il (Villain) and it stars Ken Watanabe (Letters from Iwo Jima, Inception, Tampopo), Akira Emoto (A Woman and War, Starfish Hotel), Koichi Sato (Infection), Eiko Koike (Rebirth, Penance, Kamikaze Girls, 2LDK) and Jun Kunimura (Outrage, Vital, Audition).

Jubei Kamata (Watanabe) was once a loyal samurai for the Edo shogunate government. Famous for being a skilled and deadly fighter he killed many and became infamous in Kyoto but disappeared during the battle of Goryoukaku. Ten years later and he is living with his child, looking after his wife’s grave in peace after vowing never to pick up his sword again but being in poverty forces him to do just that as he accepts the assignment of being a bounty hunter when an old comrade named Kingo Baba (Emoto) and young guy Goro (Yagira) turns up with a bounty for a man who mutilated a prostitute. They set off but will encounter a sadistic lawman (Sato) who has a distaste for mercenaries.

Wednesday, July 16th

6:30 P.M. 

The Extreme Sukiyaki

Japanese: ジ、　エクストリーム、　スキヤキ

Romaji: Ji, Ekusutori-mu, Sukiyaki

Running Time: 111 mins.

Director: Shiro Maeda

Writer: Shiro Maeda (Original Novel and Screenplay),

Starring: Arata, Yosuke Kubozuka, Mikako Ichikawa, Kana Kurashima, Kengo Kora, Shuichi Okita, Daisuke Kuroda, Toru Okada

This is the directorial debut of writer Shiro Maeda (The Story of Yonosuke and Isn’t Anyone Alive?) and it stars a plethora of top acting talent including Arata and Yosuke Kubozuka, both of whom starred in the hilarious comedy Ping Pong (watch the film and then the anime! Then read the manga!). Other names include Mikako Ichikawa (Tokyo Oasis), Kana Kurashina (Dreams for Sale), Kengo Kora (The Drudgery Train), and the director Shuichi Okita (The Woodsman & the Rain, The Story of Yonosuke).

Horaguchi (Arata) is a failure. 15 years after leaving university he has achieved nothing and let time pass. Time to give up. He tries to commit suicide but even that fails. For Horaguchi his best days were at uni and so he yearns for those days. Yearns for them so much that he finds an old friend from university Ohkawa (Kubozuke). Things are a little awkward between them because of an incident in their past but they soon warm up to each other and plan a trip to the sea. Ohkawa’s girlfriend Kaeda (Kurashina) and Horaguchi’s ex Kyoko (Ichikawa) join them and bring a sukiyaki pot. They start to get along on their trip but Horaguchi has a secret reason for seeing his friend…

The director will conduct a Q&A via video streaming

Thursday, July 17^th

6:30 P.M. 

0.5mm

Japanese Title: 0.5ミリ

Romaji: 0.5 mm

Running Time: 198 mins

Director: Momoko Ando

Writer: N/A

Starring: Sakura Ando, Junkichi Orimoto, Toshio Sakata, Masahiko Tsugawa, Akira Emoto.

This is a world premiere but even more intriguing than that is the fact that it is directed by Momoko Ando, the sister of super brilliant actress Sakura Ando! Alas, no trailer. Synopsis straight from the site:

Sawa, a home helper for a middle class family with an elderly infirm grandfather, is forced to stretch her morals to keep her job. As a result, she finds herself broke and out on the street. She survives her first night by striking up an ambiguous friendship with a kindly old man, gaining access to a portion of the immense wealth held by Japan’s aging population. She continues with similar encounters, and while these begin as scams or revenge on rampant sexism, they ultimately become vulnerable intergenerational exchanges.

Introduction and Q&A with director Momoko Ando

Followed by a reception with the director

Friday, July 18^th

6:30 P.M. 

Passion

Japanese: 受難

Romaji: Junan

Running Time: 95 mins.

Director: Ryoko Yoshida

Writer: Ryoko Yoshida (Screenplay), Kaoruko Himeno (Novel)

Starring: Mayuko Iwasa, Yasushi Fuchikami, Kumiko Ito, Kanji Furutachi,

Things get weird with this title…

The Passion tells a story of a young woman raised in a convent named Frances-ko (Mayuko Iwasa), after Saint Francesco. Distressed by not knowing about love and sex, she calls out for a sign from above, but instead hears a voice from below. A human-faced growth speaks to her from between her legs, constantly berating her, calling out “Woman, you are worthless!” Mr. Koga, as she names it, continues the verbal abuse, yet Frances-ko somehow adapts, forming an adversarial yet symbiotic relationship. 

8:30 P.M.

Love’s Whirlpool

Japanese Title: 愛の渦

Romaji: Ai no Uzu

Running Time: 123 mins.

Director: Daisuke Miura

Writer: Daisuke Miura (Script/Stage Play/Original Novel)

Starring: Yoko Mitsuya, Hirofumi Arai, Mugi Kadowaki, Sosuke Ikematsu, Kenichi Takito, Ryusuke Komakime, Tokio Emoto, Eriko Nakamura, Seri Akazawa

Daisuke Miura is a filmmaker and dramatist who likes to make films and plays that are full of complicated characters in erotic situations (2013 indie film Be My Baby was based on his stage-play and a review is ready for next week). Alas, the characters can be so complicated that the eroticism takes a back-seat to some nail bitingly unpleasant situations. See him expose the mores of a group of lustful Japanese in this film. This trailer is not safe for work so you have been warned.

In a fancy split-level condo in Tokyo’s Roppongi nightlife district, four women and four men gather from midnight to 5 am. They’ve all paid to be there (men more than women), and they have only one thing in common–they seek anonymous sex. Using no names, they’re known only by their types: freeter (temp or part-time worker), mild-mannered salaryman, duplicitous OL (office lady), self-conscious working class factory worker, perfectionist teacher, veteran pervert, shy NEET (“not in education, employment or training”) and bashful college student. Together, they unravel their identities in a night of increasing debauchery

10:45 P.M. 

Greatful Dead    

Japanese Title: グレイトフル デッド

Romaji: Gureitofuru Deddo

Running Time: 97 mins.

Director: Eiji Uchida

Writer: Eiji Uchida, Etsuo Hiratani (Screenplay),

Starring: Kumi Takiuchi, Takashi Sasano, Kkobbi Kim

Changing gears and going back into the wild we get this little indie. While I have not seen this a fellow blogger whose opinion I value highly has and she enjoyed this one. Greatful Dead is getting a DVD release later in the year courtesy of Third Window Films.

Nami’s childhood was brutal: her mother ran away to Sri Lanka to help poor kids, her sister skipped town with her boyfriend and her father descended into despair and got himself a gothic mistress who played on this. Now that she’s grown up she takes pleasure in spying on people. Watching loners in society and enjoying seeing their pain.

Saturday, July 19^th

12:0 P.M. 

Tale of a Butcher Shop

Japanese Title: ある精肉店のはな

Romaji: Aru Seinikuten no Hanashi

Running Time: 108 mins

Director: Aya Hanabusa

Writer: N/A

Starring: N/A

The Kitades run a butcher shop in Kaizuka City outside Osaka, raising and slaughtering cattle to sell the meat in their store. The seventh generation of their family’s business, they are descendants of the buraku people, a social minority held over from the caste system abolished in the 19th century that is still subject to discrimination. As the Kitades are forced to make the difficult decision to shut down their slaughterhouse, the question posed by the film is whether doing this will also result in the deconstruction of the prejudices imposed on them. Though primarily documenting the process of their work with meticulous detail, Aya Hanabusa also touches on the Kitades’ participation in the buraku liberation movement. Hanabusa’s heartfelt portrait expands from the story of an old-fashioned family business competing with corporate supermarkets, toward a subtle and sophisticated critique of social exclusion and the persistence of ancient prejudices.

2:15 P.M.

My Little Sweet Pea

Japanese Title: 麦子さんと

Romaji: Mugiko-san to

Running Time: 95 mins.

Director: Keisuke Yoshida

Writer: Keisuke Yoshida, Ryo Nishihara (Screenplay),

Starring: Maki Horikita, Ryuhei Matsuda, Kimiko Yo, Sayaka Tashiro, Amane Okayama, Eri Fuse, Yoichi Nukumizu

Experienced actor Ryuhei Matsuda, the pretty-boy in Gohatto and the unconventional hero in Nightmare Detective teams up with rising star Maki Horikita in this drama.

It isn’t easy to find a dream to chase when you’re young, but Mugiko (Horikita) has one: she can’t wait to become an anime voice actress. Saving up for classes while she works part time in a manga store, she lives with her older, gambler brother (Matsuda) after her father’s death. When the mother (Yo) she never knew turns up out of nowhere and moves in, it only causes irritation for the aspiring otaku. But when her mother just as quickly disappears, it leaves Mugiko (or “Sweet Pea”) searching for answers, bringing her back to her mother’s hometown to discover what happened to her mother’s own dream. 

4:30 P.M. 

Man from Reno

Japanese Title: リノから来た男

Romaji: Rino kara Kita Otoko

Running Time: 111 mins

Director: Dave Boyle

Writer: Dave Boyle, Joel Clark, Michael Lerman (Screenplay),

Starring: Ayako Fujitani, Kazuki Kitamura, Pepe Serna, Elisha Skorman, Hiroshi Watanabe.

No trailer but this one sounds interesting enough to post about anyway.

 A Japanese bestselling crime novelist visiting San Francisco finds herself embroiled in a real life mystery after a night with a handsome stranger. The man–Japanese and supposedly from Nevada–disappears the next morning, after which increasingly strange and dangerous events begin to occur. This beautifully photographed Japanese-American co-production overturns the gender stereotypes of the mystery thriller, casting international star Kazuki Kitamura as its homme fatale. Kitamura effortlessly slides between gentle and sinister, while Ayako Fujitani fits perfectly into the role of author-turned-detective. One of this accomplished transnational film’s greatest features is a rare leading turn from Pepe Serna, veteran character actor of over 100 Hollywood films (Scarface, The Black Dahlia). Set in San Francisco, this neo-noir offers not only a compelling portrayal of gender and globalization, but a model for vibrant independent filmmaking across borders.

Introduction and Q&A with director Dave Boyle and actor Kazuki Kitamura

7:30 P.M. 

Neko Samurai

Japanese Title: 猫侍

Romaji: Neko Samurai

Running Time: 100 mins.

Director: Yoshitaka Yamaguchi

Writer: Yuji Nagamori, Yoshitaka Yamaguchi

Starring: Kazuki Kitamura, Misako Renbutsu, Yasufumi Terawaki, Yosuke Asari, Kanji Tsuda, Megumi Yokoyama, Shingo Mizusawa,

Who can kill a cat? Cats rock! It seems this samurai agrees in this fun looking film which is based on a TV show. Cats rule so much that there’s going to be a CAT party afterwards…

Kyutaro (Kitamura) was once a fearsome samurai but has fallen on hard times and tries to keep a low profile. When a man named Sakichi (Mizusawa) sees an example Kyutaro’s swordsmanship he hires the samurai to kill a white cat named Tamanojoh who has bewitched his boss Yozaemon (Ito) and left him immature. Kyutaro takes the job but when he sees how lovely the white cat is he has a change of heart but still gets caught up in a war between a gang of cat lovers and a gang of dog lovers!

Introduction and Q&A with actor Kazuki 

Kitamura, with CUT ABOVE Award Ceremony

Followed by the Japan CATS Party!

Sunday, July 20^th

12:30 P.M.

Pecoross’ Mother and Her Days

Japanese: 新大久保　物語

Romaji: Shin Ookubo Monogatari

Running Time: 113 mins.

Director: Azuma Morisaki

Writer: Akune Tomoaki (Screenplay), Yuichi Okano (Original Manga)

Starring: Ryo Iwamatsu, Mitsuko Baisho, Naoto Takenaka, Kiwako Harada, Kensuke Owada, Toshie Negishi, Ryo Kase

Hats off to the organisers for throwing this one in. It looked so small when it was released that it seemed like a film that would disappear een in Japan but it’s here at the festival.

Laid-back baby boomer Yuichi (Iwamatsu) is a middle-aged manga artist and singer-songwriter when he isn’t at his salaryman day job or watching out for his elderly mother. Suffering from increasing dementia since her husband’s death, Mitsue (Akagi) is a constant source of comic energy or annoyance for Yuichi, and he and his son must soon decide if they should put her in a home for the elderly. Jumping back in time, we see how Mitsue (Harada) tracked the tumult of the latter half of the 20th century, being raised as one of 10 brothers and sisters, surviving the war, and having to push her alcoholic husband (Kase) along in life.

3:00 P.M. 

Hello! Junichi

Japanese Title: ハロー！　純一

Romaji: Hallo! Junichi

Running Time: 91 mins.

Release Date: February 15^th, 2014

Director: Katsuhito Ishii, Kanoko Kawaguchi, Atsushi Yoshioka

Writer: Atsushi Yoshioka, Kanoko Kawaguchi (Screenplay), Noriko Ishii (Original Novel)

Starring: Hikari Mitsushima, Amon Kabe, Ryushin Tei, Chizuru Ikewaki, Tatsuya Gashuin, Yoshiyuki Morishita

Junichi is a timid third grader who can’t muster the courage to return an eraser he borrowed from his secret crush–and turns it into a children’s rock ‘n’ roll comedy. Junichi’s world is turned upside down as apprentice teacher Anna-sensei (Mitsushima) scraps her lesson plan to show the rambunctious students about life as an adult. With Anna’s unorthodox style, Junichi and his friends are able to gain confidence and pursue their goal of putting on a big concert.

 6:00 P.M.

The Tale of Iya

Japanese Title: 祖谷物語 -おくのひと-

Romaji: Iya Monogatari – Oku no Hito

Running Time: 169 mins.

Director: Tetsuchiro Tsuta

Writer: Tetsuchiro Tsuta, Masayuki Ueda (Screenplay),

Starring: Rina Takeda, Shima Ohnishi, Sachi Ishimaru, Hitoshi Murakami, Min Tanaka, Reika Miwa, Takahiro Ono, Naomi Kawase, Christopher Pellegrii, Keiko Taoka, Shigeru Kimura

This one looks special and it is one I sorely miss watching but people attending the festival get the chance to experience what has been described as a film with a magical atmosphere.

It is winter. A man finds a baby girl in the snow by a freezing lake in the mountains of Tokushima and takes her in. He gives her the name Haruna and they live far away from other people. The baby grows into a caring woman (Rina Takeda) who looks after the man.

It is summer. A stranger from Tokyo arrived at “Iya”, where the riches of nature still abound. His name is Kudo, and he wants to start a new life in the country to refresh his tired soul. Unfortunately the reality was not as easy as he thought because there is a confliction between a local construction company and a group of nature conservationists.

One day, Kudo meets the old man and Haruna and finds out that they lead lives completely different from his own. The old man is a farmer who climbs up the mountain to go to the little shrine to offer Omiki (sake) to the mountain god and Haruna goes to high school an hour away from home, and after that, helps Grandpa to plow his field. Feeling his heart gradually healing, Kudo thought that he finally found what he was looking for in their calm life but a destructive winter occurs…

And that’s it! What an incredible festival. I try and write some stuff for every film but for some titles like The Man from Reno, I just copied and pasted from the site because it is so brand new. I even re-wrote some of my old synopses based on this new information. For better written explanations and nfo on how to get the tickets click on the titles and hurry because they are already selling!

E3 week! Yay! More hype about video games like Bayonetta 2 and The Evil Within! Also the World Cup started this week and I’m already sick of hearing about it. Football, please shut up!

Only one movie review this week and that was for The Snow White Murder Case on Monday. It turned out larger than expected and I enjoyed writing it and I’m glad to see that it’s getting comments. Be My Baby has been complete for at least a week and a half but that goes out next week Monday. Judge! the week after that. I also reported on Japan Cuts 2014 which looks awesome!

I’ve also update my summer 2014 anime picks with PVs for Space Dandy and the latest for Terror in Tokyo/Zankyou no Terror.

What’s released in Tokyo this weekend?

Climbing to Spring       

Japanese Title:春を背負って

Romaji: Haru wo Seotte

Running Time: 116 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Daisaku Kimura

Writer: Tomoyuki Takimoto (Screenplay), Ryouhei Sasamoto (Novel)

Starring: Kenichi Matsuyama, Yu Aoi, Etsushi Toyokawa, Fumi Dan, Kaoru Kobayashi, Sakura Ando,

Tooru (Matsuyama) grew up on the Tateyama Mountain Range but rebelled against his strict father and moved to the city to take up a job as a financial trader. When he discovers that his father has died, he travels back to the mountains for the funeral and decides to stay. At first he finds the transition from city to wilderness tough but he finds the place good for him. Then, a strange man named Goro (Toyokawa) appears and claims to be a friend of Tooru’s late father…

Website

Gift   

Japanese Title: Gift

Romaji: Gift

Running Time: 116 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Taro Miyaoka

Writer: Yukari Nakamura (Screenplay),

Starring: Kenichi Endo, Ren Matsui,

Zenzo Shinozaki (Endo) is retiring from his role as a company president but there’s nobody waiting for him since his bad temper alienated others. Saori Yaane (Matsui) is a hostess who killer her mother to protect a sibling. Zenzo pays Saori 100 million yen for 100 hours of her time for a journey they take together…

Website

High Kick Angels  

Japanese Title:ハイキック・エンジェルス

Romaji: Haikikku Enjerusu

Running Time: 90 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Kazuhiro Yokoyama

Writer: Fuyuhiko Nishi (Screenplay),

Starring: Kanon Miyahara, Risako Ito, Mayu Kawamoto, Hirona Nagashima, Ryu Nakatani, Chisato Morishita, Nana,

The girls of a high school’s action film club love Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan and head to an abandoned school to shoot their movie “High Kick Angels” but a gang breaks in and seals the place off! The girls have no choice but to break out and break some faces in the process!

Website

Fig Tree’s Forest    

Japanese Title:無花果の森

Romaji: Ichijiku no Mori

Running Time: 108 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Tomoyuki Furumaya

Writer: Makoto Hayashi (Screenplay), Mariko Koike (Novel)

Starring: Yoon Hak, Natsuki Harada, Masaki Miura, Kyoko Enami

Young-Ho (Yoon Hak) travelled from Korea to Japan to study journalism and found work as a paparazzi. His job got him involved in a domestic violence story involving an internationally famous conductor Yoshihiko Shintani (Miura) and his beautiful wife Izumi (Harada). She ran away and set herself up as a housekeeper with a painter named Yaeko Tenbo (Enami) in a rural town. Young-Ho meets Izumi again. Could they be in love and what will happen between them?

Website

My Man  

Japanese Title:私の男

Romaji: Watashi no Otoko

Running Time: 128 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Kazuyoshi Kumakiri

Writer: Takashi Ujita (Screenplay), Kazuki Sakuraba (Novel)

Starring: Tadanobu Asano, Fumi Nikaido, Kengo Kora, Tatsuya Fuji, Taiga, Itsuki Sagara, Aoba Kawai,

This looks like the release of the week what with the awesome cast with Tadanobu Asano (Vital) and Fumi Nikaido (Why Don’t You Play in Hell?) acting alongside each other.

When Hana (Nikaido) lost her family to an earthquake and tsunami at the age of 9 she is taken into care by a relative named Jungo (Asano). Hana declares that she will never leave Jungo but years later she marries a man named Yoshiro Ozaki (Kora). When she returns from her honeymoon, Jungo is missing…

Website

My Hawaiian Discovery   

Japanese Title:わたしのハワイの歩きかた

Romaji: Watashi no Hawaii no Arukikata

Running Time: 119 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Koji Maeda

Writer: Ryo Takada (Screenplay),

Starring: Rin Takanashi, Nana Eikura, Koji Seto Ryo Kase, Yuri Nakamura, Jun Yoshinaga, Shohei Uno, Sosuke Ikematsu, Misa Uehara, Miyuki Sato,

Minori (Eikura) is a magazine editor who is happy with life (what? No drama???). She heads off to Hawaii to help a friend out with her wedding. In Hawaii she meets Akane (Takanashi), a woman hunting for a husband, Tsutomu (Seto), a businessman pursuing a dream, and Tomoya (Kase), the son of a wealthy man. The four explore Hawaii together.

Website

Maria no Chibusa 

Japanese Title:マリアの乳房

Romaji: Maria no Chibusa

Running Time: 85 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Takahisa Zeze

Writer: Takahisa Zeze (Screenplay),

Starring: Shima Onishi, Kokone Sasaki, Daisuke Iijima, Kiyomi Ito, Taijiro Tamura, Yota Kawase, Takuya Matsunaga,

Kokone Sasaki stars as a girl named Masao who has ESP. She can detect when a person will die when she touches their skin. She disappears and takes up work as a prostitute but men who go with her wind up dying. A man name Tachibana (Onishi) tracks her down and revenge may be involved…

Website

Sweet Poolside   

Japanese Title:スイートプールサイド

Romaji: Sui-to Pu-rusaido

Running Time: 103 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Daigo Matsui

Writer: Daigo Matsui (Screenplay), Shuzo Oshimi (Manga)

Starring: Yuiko Kariya, Kenta Suga, Mitsuki Tanimura, Moe Arai, Motoki Ochiai, Shota Totsuka, Takayuki Kinoshita, Go Riju,

Toshihiko Ota is part of the male swim team and has so little hair he is bullied. Ayako Goto is a part of the female swim team ad has lots of hair. Presumably love blossoms…

Website

Oh! Invisible Man/ Invisible Girl Appearance?     

Japanese Title: Oh!透明人間　インビジブルガール登場!?

Romaji: Oh! Tohmei Ningen Inbijiburu Ga-ru Tojou!?

Running Time: 72 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Akiraman Magita

Writer: Akiraman Magita (Screenplay), Yasuhiro Nakanishi (Manga)

Starring: Asuka Kishi, Yoshikazu Kotani, Misato Hirata,

It’s an adaptation of a manga where a guy gets to be invisible after eating salmon roe or something and he spies on girls only it looks like there’s a girl with the same power and blah, blah, hentai, hentai. It looks like there’s some shounen ai as well. Serves the invisible guy right for sneaking into showers other people are using…

As should be clear from the above I’m not interested in this one in the slightest but it’s a popular manga/film series so maybe I’m missing out. Funnily enough, I was reading volume 9 of The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service and amidst all of the pop-culture references, there’s one for Oh! Invisible Man plus one of those awesome cultural notes from Carl Gustav Horn. In the same chapter, there’s a reference to Mamoru Oshii, one of my favourite directors.

Website

Tokyo Densetsu: Kyofu no Ningen Jigoku  

Japanese Title: 劇場版東京伝説歪んだ異形都市

Romaji: Gekijouban Tokyo Densetsu: Yuganda Igyou Toshi

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Running Time: 69 mins.

Director: Seiji Chiba

Writer: Seiji Chiba (Screenplay), Yumeaki Hirayama (Original Manga),

Starring: Mei Kurokawa, Airi Nakajima, Akira Onogawa,

Yumeaki Hirayama’s horror manga gets another adaptation where random young women get chased by psychotic and vaguely supernatural men. A guy in a wheelchair in a hotel, a guy looking for a stuffed bear and a guy in a forest with a baseball bat.

Website

Inazuma Eleven Hyperdimensional Dream Match   

Japanese Title: イナズマイレブン　超次元ドリームマッチ

Romaji: Inazuma Eleven Chou Jigen Dori-mu Macchi

Release Date: June 13^th, 2014 (Japan)

Running Time: 50 mins.

Director: Seiji Chiba

Writer: Seiji Chiba (Screenplay), Yumeaki Hirayama (Original Manga),

Starring: Junko Takeuchi (Mamoru Endou), Hirofumi Nojima (Shuuya Gouenji), Hiroyuki Yoshino (Yuuto Kidou),

The Level 5 football game Inazuma Eleven is released in a handful of cinemas in Tokyo.

Website

Real                                                                                 

Japanese Title: リアル　完全なる首長　竜の日

Romaji: Riaru Kanzen’naru Shuchou Ryuu no Hi

Release Date: June 01^st, 2013 (Japan)

Running Time: 127 mins.

Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa

Writer: Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Screenplay), Rokuro Inui (Original Novel)

Starring: Takeru Sato, Haruka Ayase, Jo Odagiri, Miki Nakatani, Shota Sometani, Keisuke Horibe, Kyoko Koizumi, Yuki Kan

Real was one of two films directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa that were released last year. It is Kurosawa’s biggest budgeted film in a long time. Based on an award-winning mystery novel and featuring two beautiful leads anchored by a supporting cast of familiar and excellent actors the biggest mystery is why the film turned out so dull.

Koichi (Sato), a physical fitness trainer, and Atsumi (Ayase), a manga artist, are beautiful people.

They met as children when Koichi’s father transferred to a small tropical island for work reasons and soon became friends and, as they matured, they became lovers. Despite this closeness when Atsumi apparently attempts suicide by leaping into a river. Koichi is at a loss as to what the reason that drove her to do such a thing could be. Now she is in a coma and Koichi needs to find out the reason. Koichi has access to a medical procedure that will allow him to enter Atsumi’s subconscious through her central nervous system.

Cue mind-hopping!

 Woosh

When Koichi touches down in Atsumi’s subconscious he finds her frantically she asks him to find a picture of a plesiosaur she drew as a child. It is the key to a suppressed memory connected to a childhood trauma. Finding this picture will allow Koichi to truly get close to knowing his true love and why suicide has come between them.

Fans of Kiyoshi Kurosawa will know him as an auteur who writes and directs most of his own films and has created a range of titles across a range of genres from.  More famous for psychological horror films like Cure (1997)and Pulse (2000) he has slowly moved away from the territory of yurei and serial killers into drama but despite the move he still retains an interest in the dark corners of the mind. Real is his first sci-fi title and the premise of delving into the mind of a suicide case sounds like typical Kurosawa. Alas, this film, his first film since Tokyo Sonata  (2009), turns out to be a damp squib thanks to its script.

Can we find that drawing together?

The cinema of Kiyoshi Kurosawa is marked by two strong themes; the pain of loss and the sicknesses caused by repression. He loves to explore how they warp an individual and has created a unique oeuvre where the characters endure the buffeting pressures of the contemporary world and their stresses are filtered into the mise-en-scene which generates a visual landscape littered with characters suffering some psychosis or being chased by demons. Those things are here to a certain extent but the problem is that the script does not explore them effectively.

The actual sci-fi conceit is neat and something seen in Inception (2010) but little is made of it rendering the film light sci-fi. This is not problematic, what is a problem is that the drama and characters lack an emotional grip and the mystery is limp.

Real has a dreamlike pace which is seemingly perfect for a story about examining someone’s memories but the pace, the lack of incident in the script and the lack of impact in the twists and turns makes the experience more soporific than dreamlike at points. Not a whole lot interesting happens as Takeru Sato glides through scenes and interacts with characters with some dull dialogue that explains the plot. When beginning the procedure to enter Atsumi’s mind he is told,

“To wake her up from this deep coma your emotional strength is essential.”

Ah, but I felt no emotional strength in the bland dialogue or the acting and the slow pace prevents the build-up of urgency.

Worse is to come when it is revealed what the inciting incident for the supposed suicide actually is. It came three quarters of the way into the film and I was stunned that something like that could have such long-reaching guilt and traumatic consequences and for that particular character. People who have watched the film may find that last sentence callous but in dramatic terms the incident isn’t really compelling or logical.

At this point I must admit that I have not read the book. What I do know is that Kurosawa regularly writes his own scripts and has dealt with far more disturbing subject-matter than what is on offer here. Apparently Kurosawa did copious amounts of rewrites of the original script so maybe something was lost in the process.

It’s a shame that the story is flawed because the atmosphere that Kurosawa is renowned for works well here and is beautiful at points.

The film has a strong air of artificiality which creates a mystery. It fits in with the technology exhibited in the film and the ability of being able to dive into a person’s subconscious, the stage is set to explore the façade and reality. Can we trust Atsumi’s memories? Can we trust the film?

The horror elements are familiar but well-executed especially when reality and dream begins to collide for Koichi through a series of hallucinations reminiscent of the ghosts seen in Seance. Sound-effects are played up for nerve-grinding moments but the film remains a drama for the most part and a well-mounted drama with a beautiful look that avoids being totally bland. Nope. That job is left for the script.

Bland is a word that is applicable to the lead actors. It would be unfair to criticise Takeru Sato and Haruka Ayase for their performances when the script asks for so little from them but when they are paired up with more experienced actors it is evident that they are being acted off the screen by people filling in little bit-parts like Shota Sometani and Jo Odagiri.

It’s a shame that Kurosawa’s big-budget return results in something that is rather bland. An audience unfamiliar with his films would never be able to tell how dark, disturbing, intelligent and surprising his films can be. One cannot write this film off completely because it is solidly made but I doubt I would ever watch more than once a year. There are more Kurosawa films deserving of a viewing like Séance, Cure, Retribution and Tokyo Sonata. Start with those and you can see why he is great.

3/5

The programme of films for this year’s Edinburgh Film Festival was announced on Wednesday and there’s a decent selection of Japanese films. No real surprises since most of these have been at various film festivals (most at Rotterdam) around the world and I have written about ALL of them at some point so I know which I’d want to watch if I had the choice.

For people interested in seeing some of the latest Japanese films who can’t make the Terracotta Far East Film Festival, they would do well to attend Edinburgh which shares Be My Baby an example of the latest trend in Japanese indie filmmaking. Anatomy of a Paperclip got an excellent write-up from Tony Rayns when it was at last year’s Vancouver International Film Festival. One title that has me super-intrigued is Miss Zombie by Sabu, a film director whose works I first became acquainted with when in high school and reacquainted myself with when I asked a friend to help me procure some of the 90’s titles. This is another title which got critics talking, an original take on the zombie genre.

Here are the Japanese films:

Be My Baby     

Japanese Title: 恋の渦

Romaji: Koi no Uzu

Screened: 22 June at 20:10, 28 June at 15:00

Running Time: 138 mins

Director: Hitoshi One

Cast: Kenta Niikura, Naoko Wakai, Chihiro Shibata, Yuumi Goto, Aya Kunitake, Hiroki Ueda, Daisuke Sawamura, Kenta Enya,

This Japanese film is a product of the ‘workshop’ indie films that are released nearly every weekend in Tokyo. Be My Baby is a low-budget film shot I four days for under $10,000 in a couple of locations. It is based on a play by award-winning dramatist Daisuke Miura (which was screened at cinemas) and it’s directed by Hitoshi One, director of the big-budget Love Strikes!. It’s a very adult film about the aftermath of a party attended by a group of drop-out twenty-somethings who are all flawed and caught up in damaging relationships. It got its UK premiere at the Terracotta Far East Film Festival and Third Window Films are backing this.

Au revoir l’ete   

Japanese: ほとり　の　朔子

Romaji: Hotori no Sakuko

Screened: 24 June at 18:15, 26 June at 18:00

Running Time: 125 mins.

Director: Koji Fukada

Writer: Koji Fukada (Screenplay)

Starring: Fumi Nikaido, Mayu Tsuruta, Kanji Furutachi, Taiga, Ena Koshino, Makiko Watanabe, Kiki Sugino

Fumi Nikaido takes the lead as a girl named Noriko who is preparing to take her university entrance exam and on the advice of her aunt Kie (Tsuruta) stays over at a relative’s house where she meets her aunt’s childhood friend Usagikichi (Furutachi), his daughter Tatsuko (Sugino) and his nephew Takashi (Taiga) who is from Fukushima. A great cast of actors and an intriguing trailer have me interested in this one.

Anatomy of a Paperclip                 

Japanese Title:  山守クリップ工場の辺り

Romaji: Yamamori Kurippu Koujou no Atari

Screened: 22 June at 16:15. 28 June at 13:15

Running Time: 99 mins.

Director: Akira Ikeda

Writer: Akira Ikeda (Screenplay),

Starring: Sakae Tomomatsu, Kazutoshi Kato, Yukari Hara, Toshiyuki Takahashi, Akiko An, Hirofumi Shiba, Wani Kansai, Shu Ono.

This is a droll, deadpan-comedy fantasy story about a man named Kogure who has a McJob on the production line of a small workshop which makes paperclips by hand. His boss is a bully, and Kogure is also bullied by two thugs, one tall, one short, who keep ambushing him on the street and routinely steal his clothes. The butterfly shows up in his room one night, and when he releases it back into the wild it returns as a woman speaking an unknown language and consuming unknown food and drink. Soon the woman’s father settles in Kogure’s apartment as well. Through the relationship with the girl he finds his life improving and liberation is not far away.

Miss Zombie   

Japanese Title:  Miss Zombie

Romaji: Miss Zombie

Screened: 22 June at 20:10, 28 June at 20:30

Running Time: 85 mins.

Director: SABU

Writer: SABU (Screenplay),

Starring: Ayaka Komatsu, Makoto Togashi, Riku Ohnishi, Taro Suruga, Tateto Serizawa, Takaya Yamauchi, Toru Tezuka

SABU, a man who made quirky gangster films in the 90’s, is back and with an original take on the zombie movie thanks to the script. The film’s trailer has crisp visuals thanks to the use of black and white and the interesting camera movements.  Gravure idol Ayaka Komatsu plays a zombie named Sara (resists urge to Google her name) and she has a cast including Makoto Togashi (Cure), Tateto Serizawa (Isn’t Anyone Alive?) and Toru Tezuka (Noriko’s Dinner Table,The Land of Hope).

Sara (Komatsu) rocks up at a in a town in a cage wth numerous scars on her body and glazed eyes. She’s a zombie. Also in the cage is a gun and a note that reads “Do not give it meat”. The people around her are disgusted and treat her cruelly but a doctor takes her in. His son bonds with the zombie but the doctor has other plans… 

There’s also a Chinese film which has Japanese (and French) backers called ‘Til Madness Do Us Part which documents the inhabitants of a mental asylum which the Chinese state uses to get rid of people who might not have psychological problems. It seems like some choose to live there as well.

There are so many films released this weekend I have split this post into two.  Here are a mixture of some of the big hitters for this weekend with some documentaries.  Sunday’s post will contain another mix.

Monsterz  

Japanese Title:モンスターズ

Romaji: Monsuta-zu

Running Time: 112 mins

Release Date: May 30^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Hideo Nakata

Writer: Yusuke Watanabe (Screenplay), Kim Min-seok (Original Script)

Starring: Tatsuya Fujiwara, Takayuki Yamada, Satomi Ishihara, Tomorowo Taguchi, Yutaka Matsushige, Tae Kimura,

Hideo Nakata of Ringu fame is back with an adaptation of a 2010 Korean film called Haunters which starred Gang Dong-Won (Duelist). Anyway, the story is about the battle between two men with special abilities. The film stars Tatsuya Fujiwara (Parade) and Takayuki Yamada (13 Assassins) who looks even more handsome with his neat haircut. Also in the film is Tomorowo Taguchi who is a legend thanks to his performance in Tetsuo: The Iron Man.

A Man (Fujiwara) possesses the ability to manipulate others with his eyes. With his ability he killed his abusive step-father but was abandoned by his mother. He now lives the life of a loner. His life changes again when he encounters a man he cannot manipulate. That man is Shuichi Tanaka (Yamada) who lives with his friends and works a dead-end job. He may not have money but his voice has special abilities…

Website

Rose Color’s Buko  

Japanese Title:薔薇色のブー子

Romaji: Bara Iro no Buko

Running Time: 93 mins

Release Date: May 30^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Yuichi Fukuda

Writer: Yuichi Fukuda (Screenplay),

Starring: Rino Sashihara, Yusuke Santamaria, Tsuyoshi Muro, Fuku Suzuki, Tomorowo Taguchi, Kotaro Shiga

HKT48’s Rino Sashihara stars as a female college student named Sachiko. Her nickname is Buko because she is a pessimist but she holds out hope that she will meet a man like in one of the many romance manga she reads to spice up her boring life. One day, on Twitter, she meets a guy with the ID Sparrow. He likes manga and looks like Johnny Depp. SCORE! Rino sets up a date with the guy but getting there will be fraught with many difficult events…

Website

The Assorted Horizon   

Japanese Title:劇場版 The Assorted Horizons

Romaji: Gekijouban The Assorted Horizons

Running Time: 126 mins

Release Date: May 30^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Hideaki Yoshikawa

Writer: N/A

Starring: Sound Horizon

GET READY VIDEO GAME AND ANIME FANS! Sound Horizon, the world’s best fantasy band, led by composer Revo are getting a movie. We’re talking about the guys behind the hit themes for Attack on Titan and the score for the 3DS game Bravely Default! This film is released to commemorate the 10^th anniversary of their debut. No trailer.

Website

Nemurihime: Dream On Dreamer  

Japanese Title:眠り姫 Dream On Dreamer

Romaji: Nemurihime: Dream On Dreamer

Running Time: 111 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Kooichi Ueno

Writer: Kooichi Ueno (Screenplay),

Starring: Reina Fujie, Miyu Takeuchi, Junichi Gamou, Erina Nakayama, Shota Miyamoto, Mika Katsumura, Ryoma Ishikawa

Idol horror again. Dream Princess. This trailer looks stylish with cute idols and menacing sets and then the dudes with exposed brains and old people vomiting blood show up. Darn old people taking up valuable minutes in the film where I could be watching beautiful young women (grumble, grumble).

Ayame (Fujie of NMB48) play a bunch of high school girls attacked by a mysterious disease which causes her to feel sleepy regardless of the time and endure a reoccurring daydream where her sister Hiiragi (Takeuchi) dies. Ayame must fight against the dream and the disease!

Website

June Light’s 3 Sisters   

Japanese Title:六月燈の三姉妹

Romaji: Rokugatsudou no Sanshimai

Running Time: 104 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Kiyoshi Sasabe

Writer: Ryuji Mizutani (Screenplay),

Starring: Kazue Fukiishi, Eri Tokunaga, Yo Yoshida, Kanji Tsuda, Yoshie Ichige, Jun Inoue

Toraya is a family run sweet shop that faces disaster thanks to the appearance of a large shopping centre. The unusual family that run it are the divorced parents, a divorced eldest daughter, a middle daughter in the process of getting divorced and a younger daughter who is a bit of a black sheep because she has just broken off her engagement. The daughters and the husband of the middle daughter decide to try and save the shop.

Apparently, “Rokugatsudou” in the Japanese title refers to a lantern festival held throughout Kagoshima Prefecture annually. Also, apparently, there’s a guy out there crazy enough to divorce Kazue Fukiishi (star of Noriko’s Dinner Table). Now unless she was beating me up every day like the lady in Kotoko does to her beau, I’d stick it out.

Website

SAYAMA Mienai Tejo o Hazusu Made  

Japanese Title: SAYAMA みえない手錠をはずすまで

Romaji: SAYAMA Mienai Tejo o Hazusu Made

Running Time: 105 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Ki Hijio

Writer: N/A

Starring: N/A

The Sayama Incident and the fallout from the botched police investigation is the subject of this film. After the brutal murder of a girl, Kazuo Ishikawa was framed for the crime by police who was targeted because he was a member of iscriminated against burakumin social minority. He spent a number of years in prison and was released in 1994. He is seeking a retrial. We see Kazuo and his wife Sachiko who supported him and showed support and love even in the direst circumstances.

Website

Gekijouban Yuto-Kun Ga Iku   

Japanese Title:劇場版　ゆうとくんがいく

Romaji: Gekijouban Yuto-Kun Ga Iku

Running Time: 52 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Ryo Higuchi, Aya Otawa

Writer: Eiichi Mizoi (Screenplay),

Starring: Junko Takeuchi (Yuto), Kenichi Ogata (Nonno), M A O (Lulu)

Yuto Nagatomo plays for Inter Milan and gets a short anime kinda based on him. When he encounters tough rivals he has to train hard and hangs out with a girl and a mysterious old man who was once a football legend. 

Website

Uwakoi   

Japanese Title:うわこい

Romaji: Uwakoi

Running Time: 111 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Norihisa Yoshimura

Writer: Hitoshi Ishikawa, Chihiro Nakamura, Norihisa Yoshimura (Screenplay), Masahiro Itosugi (Original Manga)

Starring: Yurina Yanagi, Tomoyuki Ishida, Nami Motoyama, Nao Eguchi

An adaptation of an ecchi manga.

When Yukiteru (Ishida) burns his house down he has to move into the house of his friend Yuno (Yanagi). As they have grown up they have become known as a couple but a transfer student in Yuno’s class, Rena (Motoyama), becomes interested in Yukiteru and the two become intimate…

Yukiteru, dude. That new girl doesn’t hold a candle to Yuno in terms of looks.

Website

Sad Tea                                 

Japanese: サッドティー

Romaji: Saddo Tei

Running Time: 120 mins.

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014

Director: Rikiya Imaizumi

Writer: Rikiya Imaizumi

Starring: Shunya Abe, Fumiko Aoyagi, Takuya Fuji, Kayo Hoshino, Aya Kunitake, Chihiro Nagao, Seiji Okabe, Ryutaro Ninomya, Yumi Sato

This was released last year and is part of the ENBU seminar workshop and screened at the Tokyo International Film Festival. A love story about a group of people including an idol, a shop clerk and a salaryman who hangs out at a coffee shop. Will they meet the loves of their lives?

Website

The Next Generation Patlabor Chapter 2  

Japanese: THE NEXT GENERATION パトレイバー　第2章

Romaji: THE NEXT GENERATION‐Patlaborー Dai 2 Sho

Running Time: N/A

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Mamoru Oshii

Writer: Mamoru Oshii, (Screenplay), Masami Yuki(Original Novel)

Starring: Erina Mano, Toshio Kakei, Seiji Fukushi, Rina Ohta, Shigeru Chiba, Yoshinori Horimoto, Yoshikatsu Fujiki, Kouhei Shiotsuka, Shigekazu Tajiri

This is the first in a seven-part series of films that act as a continuation of the Patlabor series with a brand new set of characters. Kenji Kawai is returning to the franchise to compose the music. Apparently, there’s going to be a lot of slapstick humour amidst the robot action.

Labors are robots used in various industries like construction. With their introduction to Japan, a new type of crime became prevalent: Labor Crime. To combat this, the Tokyo Metropolitan Police created a unit of Patrol Labors to help. The story is set in Tokyo in 2013, and we follow “third generation” of Patlabor. The Tokyo Metropolitan Police has disbanded Section 2 Division 1 of police robots, and Section 2 Division 2 barely has survived the budget cuts forced upon the police due to the long recession. What problems will the unit face now?

Website

There are so many films released this weekend that I have had to split the trailer post into two (which I was doing a few months ago). I have had everything scheduled because I am down in London for the Terracotta Far East Film Festival where I’ll be watching three or four Japanese films, all of them released in Japanese cinemas this year – talk about fresh out of the oven. 

As far as this/last week’s blogging goes, I ended up posting reviews for Blue Ruin and Real, the Japanese line-up for the Edinburgh Film Festival and I posted trailers yesterday. So there. That’s your lot. You can breathe a sigh of relief over the fact that you don’t have to read any more badly spelled posts from me… Until Wednesday. 

All-Round Appraiser Q: The Eyes of Mona Lisa    

Japanese Title:万能鑑定士Q モナ・リザの瞳

Romaji: Bannou Kanteishi Q Monariza no Hitomi

Running Time: 119 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Shinsuke Sato

Writer: Manabu Uda (Screenplay), Keisuke Matsuoka (Original Novel)

Starring: Haruka Ayase, Tori Matsuzaka, Eriko Hatsune, Hiroaki Murakami, Pierre Deladonchamps, Jun Hashimoto

Based on a popular mystery novel by Keisuke Matsuoka, the story follows Riko Rinda (Ayase) who is an appraiser with sound judgement and an excellent memory. She’s in Paris because she has been hired by The Louvre to help facilitate a Mona Lisa exhibition in Japan. Yuto Ogasawara (Matsuzaka) is a magazine writer who follows her as she tries to solve a mystery. It looks very much like the BBC’s modern adaptation of Sherlock Holmes what with the on-screen text and character who possesses super observational skills.

Website

A Minute More   

Japanese Title:一分間だけ

Romaji: Ippun Kan dake

Running Time: 112 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Chen Wei-Ling

Writer: N/A (Screenplay), Maha Harada (Original Novel)

Starring: Ning Chang, Peter Ho, Reina Ikehata

This is a Japanese-Taiwanese co-production about a couple who get a golden retriever and drift apart as they forget the important things in life… Next…

Website

Robot Girls Z   

Japanese Title:一分間だけ

Romaji: Ippun Kan dake

Running Time: 83 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Hiroshi Ikehata

Writer: Kazuho Hyodo (Screenplay),

Starring: Shinnosuke Tachibana (Akira Soma), Takahiro Mizushima (Mitsuki Kamatani), Takashi Kondou (Takuma Hachimine), Masakazu Morita (Yukiya Minabe), Daisuke Namikawa (Akito Kimata), Go Inoue (Tetsu Suzuki)

The Robot Girls Z anime gets its movie premiere today and the girls in the story are Z-chan (Mazinger Z), Gre-Chan (Great Mazinger), and Grenda-san (UFO Robo Grendizer) and they are defending Photon Power Town from the mechanical beast girls Dou-Blas-chan and Garada-chan who are led by Baron Ashura, a megalomaniac.

I haven’t watched the anime but my favourite robot girl from the poster is the one with the 3DS. Everybody else is panicking and she’s totally like, “Guys, don’t interrupt, I’m playing Fire Emblem.”

Website

Prepare to have your mind blown by the freaking awesomeness of the next title!

Samurai Pirates    

Japanese Title:瀬戸内海賊物語

Romaji: Setouchi Kaizoku Monogatari

Running Time: 116 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Kenichi Ohmori

Writer: Kenichi Ohmori, Kaori Fujii, Hiroyasu Yuhara (Screenplay),

Starring: Kyoka Shibata, Masaki Izawa, Wakana Aoi, Kyoichi Omae, Takashi Naito, Kotaro Koizummi, Toshi Takeuchi

Holy smoke! Pirates who are also samurai. I think the only way this film could be more awesome is if it were Samurai VERSUS Pirates. The world would just end if that ever happened. In all seriousness, this is a kids film.

Kaede Murakami (Shibata) and her family live on an island in the Seto Inland Sea. They are the descendents of Takeyoshi Murakami who is also known as Murakami Suigun, general of the samurai pirates who battled Hideyoshi Toyotomi. When the closure of a ferry route to the island threatens her family’s livelihood, Kaede hears a tale of the samurai pirates stashing a secret treasure somewhere and heads out with three classmates to find it.

Website

Inabe      

Japanese Title:いなべ

Romaji: Inabe

Running Time: 38 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Koji Fukada

Writer: Koji Fukada (Screenplay),

Starring: Hiroaki Matsuda,Ami Kurata, Yui Ito, Minami Inoue,

This short film takes place in Inabe City, Mie Prefecture and on a pig farm. Tomohiro is working when his suster Naoko returns after 17 years away with a baby strapped to her. The two are uneasy with each other at first but begin to open up about the time they spent with each other and a mystery that looms large…

Website

Samurai Zombie Fragile   

Japanese Title:サムライゾンビ・フラジャイル

Romaji: Samurai Zonbi Furajairu

Running Time: 24 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Kentaro Yamagishi

Writer: Kentaro Yamagishi (Screenplay),

Starring: Kenji Suzumura, Daigo Ogawa, Souji Masaki, Anon Shiina

Samurai zombies and gangster zombies and an 80 year old private detective intrude in the life of a woman who just wants to get her shopping done when a science experiment goes wrong…

Website

Beauty Within

Japanese Title:美しいひと

Romaji: Utsukushii Hito

Running Time: 116 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Azuma Shizu

Writer: N/A

Starring: N/A

69 years have passed since the atom bomb was dropped on Nagasaki and the consequences are still being felt. Beautiful People unites victims of the bomb and they range from Japanese women to Dutch and Koreans who were in prison camps in the city.

Website

Oyako Present to the Future   

Running Time: 90 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Inomatatoshi

Writer: N/A

Starring: Bruce Osborn,

Oyako. The Japanese word translates as parents and children. The documentary follows an American photographer named Bruce Osborn who photographs parents and children. There is now an Oyako day in Japan and the film was made to celebrate the 10^th anniversary. We get lots of interviews with parents and children.

Website

Mother of the Bride   

Japanese Title:桂由美　マザーオブザブライド

Romaji: Katsura yumi mazā Obu za buraido

Running Time: 60 mins

Release Date: May 31^st, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Norihisa Yoshimura

Writer: Ichiro Ando (Screenplay),

Starring: Yumi Katsura

Fashion and weddings. Some may see romance, some see big business. Yumi Katsura is a titan in the Japanese bridal industry (is that even a phrase?) due to her fashion label which she established in the 1960s. She narrates this documentary.

Website

I submitted my Anime UK News Summer 2014 Preview last night and it’s awaiting a second pass in the validation queue from an editor. I wrote about 45 new shows airing on Japanese television and provided background and info and trailers on them. It might not look pretty but it gives info on what you might want to watch.

For the first time in a few seasons, I felt pretty light-hearted about writing up most of these shows and that’s mostly because of the diversity of shows.

Update: My Summer Anime Preview Part 1 and Part 2 are now out and forum discussion is here.

Previous seasons would see a deluge of titles where the females are depicted in rather questionable ways – subjects of a siscon’s desire, moe, loli, meganeko – to satisfy various fetishes that are found in the male target audience.

This season featured fewer shows where girls act silly in pointless clubs, no incest, fewer moe girls than ever before and less light novel adaptations (a source of some of the most overrated and awful shows in recent years) and less reasons for people to cry foul about how anime is being ruined by fan-service and sexual objectification.

The upcoming summer 2014 season features more shows aimed at fujoshi. There are more shounen-ai titles, there is a broader range of themes in the shows and some aimed at adults, and there are more women in the lead creative roles like writer and director. Perhaps that last point as made the biggest difference this season what with the increase in shows aimed at women. Two of my favourite shows from last year were written and/or directed by women (My Youth Rom-Com, Kyousogiga) so I’m happy. The trend continues probably because companies sense that the fujoshi market are willing to blow money on junk. I expect the next few years to see the anime world overwhelmed by ikemen shows and shounen-ai and for male bloggers to cry foul.

I don’t claim to be an expert (nope, I do that with films :P), I just write about this stuff I have watched since the late 80’s and I know what I like. This selection is what I like the look of.

Space Dandy Season 2  

Staff

Chief Director: Shinichiro Watanabe,Directors: Shingo Natsume, Eunyoung Choi, Hiroshi Shimizu,Scripts: Dai Sato, Keiko Nobumoto, Kimiko Ueno, Character Designer: Yoshiyuki Ito,

Voice Actors and Characters

Junichi Suwabe as Dandy, Uki Satake as QT, Hiroyuki Yoshino as Meow, Maasaki Yajima as Narrator,

Studio: Bones

Synopsis

Dandy is an alien-hunter who earns rewards by tracking down new species of aliens that have never been seen before. With the aid of a robot named QT and an alien cat from the Betelgeuse star named Meow, he journeys across the universe discovering weird and wonderful things and getting into all sorts of crazy adventures. When not hunting for aliens, the gang go to “Boobies,” a restaurant full of voluptuous waitresses.

Shinichiro Watanabe has two anime running this year which is something to be pleased about. Space Dandy was billed as a comedy and the first 13 episode of the 26 episode run proved to be comedy gold as it mixed high-concept sci-fi with low-brow comedy thanks to a bunch of loveable characters.

Despite a weak start, as the series progressed the direction and writing rapidly improved as the creative team assembled and orchestrated by Watanabe were allowed to have fun with the fact that each story could be a standalone story where characters could go on the strangest adventure, die and then come back in the next episode seemingly unaffected. One person’s fun might not appeal to others and it seems that for some people over the internet, the Dandy magic wasn’t quite working thanks to the lack of character development, an overarching narrative and what some on Tumblr and Twitter saw as the sexual objectification of women. Those complaints were overblown, in my opinion, and I expect the second half of the season to explain why the stories were unconnected to each other. Even if it doesn’t I don’t care since loved the set-up of the series.

I believe that  it could be the anime of the year but Watanabe has another, grander looking anime waiting in the wings.    

Website

Psycho-Pass   

Staff

Chief Director: Katsuyuki Motohiro, Director: Naoyoshi Shiotani, Series Composition: Gen Urobuchi, 

Voice Actors and Characters

Tomokazu Seki as Shinya Kougami, Kana Hanzawa as Akane Tsunemori, Kenji Nojima as Nobuchika Ginoza, Akira Ishida as Shuusei Kagari, Shizuka Itou as Yayoi Kuizuka, Noriko Hidaka as Dominator, 

Studio: Production I.G. 

Synopsis

In the future, the police have guns named Dominators. What makes them special is that they can detect a suspect’s “crime factor” by measuring their state of mind and personality. This technique is termed “Psycho-Pass” and if the suspect’s crime factor is above a certain limit, the gun will fire. One of the enforcement officers is Shinya Kougami and he finds himself drawn into a deadly conspiracy.  

I’m all for a second round of this. This is an edited version of the original 2012 series which is prepping for the next series which is due to air in the autumn. Essentially the show has been re-cut into 11 one-hour episodes with some new footage created and edits made. Alongside this new version of the first season there will be a manga, novel and movie.

Psycho-Pass was one of the break-out anime of the last few years where it, alongside Madoka Magica, Attack on Titan and Sword Art Online, managed to appeal to go beyond the core anime audience and appeal to an international one. This is thanks to the storyline which is adult, intelligent hard sci-fi coupled coming from Gen Urobuchi, a new voice in anime with a range of titles under his belt that includes Madoka Magica and the next anime.

Website

Aldnoah.Zero  

Staff

Director: Ei Aoki, Original Creator: Gen Urobuchi, Screenplay: Katsuhiko Takayama, Character Designer: Takako Shimura

Voice Actors and Characters

Kensho Ono as Slaine Troyard, Sora Amamiya as Asseylum Vers Allusia, Natsuki Hanae as Inaho Kaiduka, Yuka Otsubo asAi,

Studio

A-1 Pictures/Troyca

Synopsis

In 1972, a hypergate was discovered on the surface of the moon but then, humankind came into contact with beings from Mars, and a war between humanity and the aliens began…

This is an original idea from Gen Urobuchi and a sign of his growing influence in the industry. As mentioned previously, he is extremely genre-savvy and does those post-modern twists on familiar concepts. This is his second macha anime after the so-so Gargantia (which he didn’t write the majority of) and I like the look of the alternate history concept. I’m enjoying Knights of Sidonia so more dark mecha anime suits me.

Website

Terror of Resonance (Zankyou no Terror)   

Staff

Director: Shinichiro Watanabe, Character Designer: Kazuto Nakazawa, Music: Yoko Kanno, Main Theme: Yuuki Ozaki,

Voice Actors: Soma Sato as Nine/Shin Kokone, Kaito Ishikawa as Twelve/Fuyuji Kumi, Atsumi Tanezaki as Risa Mishima,

Studio

Mappa

Synopsis

On a quiet summer day Tokyo was rocked by a massive terrorist bombing which struck out of nowhere. Nobody knows who did it and a video uploaded to the internet is the only clue. The culprits were two high school boys who go under the codenames Nine and Twelve. They became known as “Sphinx” and started to play a deadly game with a nation that was once complacent but now lives in terror of them… One girl, mercilessly bullied by classmates, finds herself becoming close to them.

I like to apply auteur theory to everything. Films, anime, baking cakes. Shinichiro Watanabe makes auteur theory easy since his works have cool concepts and characters and are high quality. Other directors usually fall off at some point (Seiji Kishi, I’m looking at you) but Watanabe hasn’t. Indeed, I think I like his newest works more than Cowboy Bebop and Samurai Champloo. This one looks truly special.

Watanabe skips a fantasy/sci-fi adventure setting and makes a foray into contemporary Japan with a tale of terrorism in a thriller that seems set to examine some dark psychological corners of real people. Okay, I’m probably overhyping this a bit but the trailer, with its shocking images, awesome musical mix and excellent character designs make s this the summer 2014 anime that has me most intrigued. Joining Watanabe is the magnificent Yoko Kanno who will be composing the music. Kazuto Nakazawa is acting as character designer and he has worked on old school shows I like such as El Hazard, New Dominion Tank Police, and Roujin Z.

Website

Tokyo Ghoul   

Staff

Director: Shuhei Morita, Original Creator: Sui Ishida, Series Composition: Chuuji Mikasano, Character Designer: Kazuhiro Miwa,

Voice Actorsand Characters

Natsuki Hanae as Ken Kaneki, Kana Hanazawa as Rize Kamishiro, Sora Amamiya as Touka Kirishima, Mamoru Miyano as Shuu Tsukiyama, Takahiro Sakurai as Uta, Sumire Morohoshi as Hinami Fueguchi,

Studio

Studio Pierrot

Synopsis

Reports have it that “Ghouls” roam the streets of Tokyo and are devouring humans. Nobody has seen these things and lived until a college student named Kaneki encounters a girl named Rize who is obsessed with them. From that very moment his life takes a ghoulish turn…

In my Anime UK News preview I talked this up as H.P. Lovecraft’s Pickman’s Model set in contemporary Japan because of all of the ghouls and the human devouring and what not. There’s at least one ghoulish show in every season and this is it. I have not read Sui Ishida’s fantasy manga but I’m game for anything with horror in it. The director is Suhei Morita, famous for engaging in cool projects like the omnibus movie Short Peace and Freedom.

Website

Barakamon   

Staff

Director: Masaki Tachibana, Original Creator: Satsuki Yoshino, Scripts: Pierre Sugiura, Art Director: Hiroshi Kato, Character Designer: Majiro, Calligraphy: Ungai Hara, Music: Kenji Kawai,

Voice Actors

Daisuke Ono as Seishuu Handa, Suzuko Hara as Naru Kotoishi, Fumihiko Tachiki as Vice Principal, Junichi Suwabe as Takasei Kawafuji, Rumi Ookubo as Tamako Arai,

Studio: Kinema Citrus

Synopsis

Seishuu Handa is a 23-year-old handsome calligrapher who has been forced to move to the remote Gotou Islands off the western coast of Kyushu after punching a famous colleague. He now has to deal with rustic people who drive tractors on roads, barge into his house and they all have strange local customs. Worse is to come as Seishuu’s house becomes the place the local kids use his home as a playground.

The final anime I’m going to pick is a slice-of-life about a sophisticated handsome urban male who practices calligraphy and he’s stuck in rural Japan. The selling-point for many is that the guy is an ikemen (handsome dude) and he gets into funny situations. I have seen it compared to Yotsuba& and I love that manga series. It is based on Satsuki Yoshino’s manga and it is being adapted by director Masaki Tachibana who handled Tokyo Magnitude 8.0, a series which I thought was pretty gripping. Another thing that sells this to me is that Kenji Kawai is composing the music and I loe his work at Production I.G with Patlabor and Ghost in the Shell.

Website

The 13^th Asian Film Festival of Dallas will be launched in just over a month’s time and I have been contacted with some of the line-up. Looking at last year’s festival one can see a rich mix of titles from East Asia with anime making a huge impact. I like the look of the Japanese selection which included Berserk: Golden Age Arc I, Rurouni Kenshin, and Key of Life. The films I have been told about point to a diverse bunch which means that there should be something for everyone.

This year’s festival takes place from July 10^th to July 17^th at the Angelika Theatre which will be the place that Asian film fans can watch 40 feature films and shorts. There is a mixture of titles from Japan and Korea, some of which have been featured on this blog. Here are the films that were revealed so far:

Geki x Cine’s Seven Souls in Skull Castle                 

Japanese Title: ゲキ　X　シネ髑髏城城　の　七　にん

Romaji: Geki x Shine Dokuro Shiro no Shichi nin

Release Date: January 12^th 2013 (Japan)

Running Time: 179 mins.

Director: Kazuki Nakajima, Hidenori Inoue

Writer: Kazuki Nakajima, Hidenori Inoue

Starring: Shun Oguri, Mirai Moriyama, Taichi Saotome, Eiko Koike, Ryo Katsuji, Riisa Naka

If you want to do a historical epic, why not try doing it by maing a stageplay? This is the big-screen showing of the Gekidan Shinkansen theatre troupe’s production and it stars big names like Shun Oguri, Eiko Koike and Mirai Moriyama.

It is the Sengoku Period and Oda Nobunaga is old news as Toyotomi Hideyoshi tries to unify Japan. Hideyoshi (Moriyama) finds his path to glory taking a sticky turn when he runs into a group of samurai holed up in a fortress known as Skull Castle which stands near a village known as Salvation which has overthrown its feudal lord. Cue epic siege and a cast of characters including a wandering samurai (Oguri), a prostitute (Eiko) and a girl (Naka) who knows the secrets of the seven samurai. 

Bushido (Japanese title: Squirming)                                                

Japanese Title: 蠢動　しゅんどう

Romaji: Shundō

Release Date: October 19th, 2013

Running Time: 102 mins.

Director: Yasuo Mikami

Writer: Yasuo Mikami (Screenplay),

Starring: Yuki Meguro, Tamao Sato, Takehiro Hira, Go Wakabayashi, Tomohito Wakizaki

This is a serious samurai film written directed and self-financed by former industrialist Yasuo Mikami and a remake of a 16mm film of the same title which he produced when he was 24 years old. Set after a time of famine when the Shogunate was cracking down on potential unrest by sending warriors to different clans to check on their loyalty.

Black Butler        

Japanese: 黒執事

Romaji: Kuroshitsuji

Running Time: 119 mins.

Release Date: January 18^th, 2014

Director: Kentaro Otani, Keiichi Sato

Writer: Tsutomu Kuroiwa (Screenplay), Yana Toboso (Original Manga)

Starring: Hiro Mizushima, Ayame Gouriki, Mizuki Yamamoto, Takuro Ohno, Yuka, Ken Yasuda

Just in time for the new series of Black Butler, this is a great chance to see the live-action movie adaptation of Yana Toboso’s hugely popular manga. It deviates considerably since the original was set in 19th Century England and this one is set in the present day but the characters are still the same.

The year is 2020 and the place is an Asian city where western and Asian cultures mix. In this society exist the ancient English aristocratic Phantomhive family and it’s a very traditional one (especially for 2020!) where only males can run the family business. Alas, the only person available for the job is a woman named Shiori (Gouriki) who dresses as a boy and takes the name Kyoharu and takes on the job of solving cases for the Queen who now rules the Western nations who wants to unify the world. Cases like a “Serial mummified murder spree” and the disappearances of women. Shiori finds evidence that links the two together but requires the help of her demonic butler Sebastien (Mizushima) who is awesome in every aspect from cooking to good looks but comes with the downside of devouring Shiori’s soul! 

The Fatal Encounter   

Running Time: 135 mins

Release Date: April 30^th, 2014 (Korea)

Director: Lee Jae-Kyu

Writer: Choi Sung-Hyun (Original Screenplay)

Starring: Hyun-Bin, Jung Jae-Young, Cho Jung-Seok, Han Ji-Min, Cho Jae-Hyun, Park Sung-Woong, Kim Sung-Ryoung, Jung Eun-Chae

The first entry from Korea is a historical epic which looks just as lavish and as familiar as all the rest.

King Jeongjo (Hyun-Bin) has been targeted for assassination several times despite the fact he has been in power for only one year. His hold on power is fragile at best and the only person he trusts is his eunuch named Sang-Chaek (Jung Jae-Young) and a military officer named Hong Kook-Young (Park Sung-Woong).

Who wants him dead? Queen Jungsoon (Han Ji-Min)!

Enter another assassin in the form of Eul-Soo (Cho Jung-Seok) who is forced to do this mission otherwise his love Wol-Hye (Jung Eun-Chae) will be killed.

Satellite Girl and Milk Cow       

Running Time: N/A

Release Date: February 20^th, 2014 (Korea)

Director: Jang Hyeong-yoon

Writer: Jang Hyeong-yoon (Original Screenplay)

Starring: Jung Yu-mi, Yoo Ah-in

The Satellite Girl and Milk Cow is the debut animation by Jang Hyeong-Yoon and stars the voices of Jung Yu-mi and Yoo Ah-in.

Il-ho is a satellite who gazes down on Earth and is curious about people and love. When she falls to Earth she transforms into the Satellite Girl. Meanwhile, a shy songwriter named Kyung-chun is turned into a cow when he suffers heartbreak after his girlfriend leaves him. Worse is to come when an evil machine known as Incinerator chases him. Fortunately, Merlin the Wizard shows up to enlist Kyung-chun and Il-Ho in his campaign to save the world from a black monster.

Sweet Alibis    

Running Time: 112 mins.

Release Date: February 20^th, 2014 (Taiwan)

Director: Yi-chi Lien

Writer: Shang-min Yu, Jia-jhen Chen, Yi-chi Lien (Original Screenplay)

Starring: Alec Su, Ariel Lin, Chung-tien Wu, Tsu-Jun Lang, Ruby Lin,

Fresh from Taiwan is a police comedy where a cowardly and thus inefficient veteran detective named Chi-yi (Su) and his overzealous rookie partner Yi-ping (Lin), who just happens to be the daughter of the head of the National Police Agency, are teamed up to fight crime. Alas, Chi-yi’s poor record and the possibility of anything bad happening to Yi-ping, means their chief gives the pointless cases such as one involving a puppy dying after eating chocolate… Investigating this leads to a series of mysterious deaths…

This time last week I was at the Terracotta Far East Film Festival where I was going to experience the awesomeness that is The Snow White Murder Case and other titles.I’ve got those reviews in the pipe-line and they are due next week. The Japanese selection was awesome and I am glad that I went, watched the films and hung out with fellow bloggers. Today I am going to another film festival which is screening nothing but anime like Patema Inverted, one of my most titles from 2013 I wanted to see but missed. Alas, the weather isn’t as good but I’ll be indoors for most of the day.

This week was spent gobbling chocolates and biscuits I got from the Japan  Centre and posting about some my Summer 2014 anime picks. I also put together a number of articles for Anime UK News about the Summer 2014 anime and they have gone down well on the forums. I also posted about a film festival happening in Dallas where one can watch some cool looking East Asian films!

What’s released in Tokyo this week?

Jossy’s   

Japanese Title:女子―ズ

Romaji: Joshi-zu

Running Time: 97 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Yuichi Fukuda

Writer: Yuichi Fukuda (Screenplay),

Starring: Mirei Kiritani, Mina Fujii, Mitsuki Takahata, Kasumi Arimura, Mizuki Yamamoto, Ken Yasuda, Jiro Yasuda, Sautoki Minagawa,

Super Sentai shows… I’m no fan. With its mix of the fantastical and reality this might be funny in a way that the second half of Samurai Flamenco wasn’t… Samurai Flamenco, you broke my heart by taking that Super Sentai stuff seriously.

Monsters are attacking Earth and only heroes can save the day. These heroes are women whose surnames refer to colours – for example, Kanoko Midoriyama and Naoko Akagi – and these colours will be the uniforms they wear. Under the leadership of Commander Charles, these dames use their special “Women Tornado” to beat the crap out of monsters. The only problem is that they need to be together to use their special power and with love lives, shopping and personal things going on… Getting their schedules to synch might be a problem…

Website

Disregarded People   

Japanese Title:捨てがたき人々

Romaji: Sutegataki Hitobito

Running Time: 123 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Hideo Sakaki

Writer: Inochi Akiyama (Screenplay), George Akiyama (Original Manga)

Starring: Nao Omori, Hitomi Miwa, Jun Miho, Tomorowo Taguchii, Susumu Terajima, Kenichi Takito, Gajiro Satoh, Taro Suwa, Chika Uchida, Kenichi Endo,

This film is based on a manga series of the same name by George Akiyama, a  guy who specialises in exploring morality and tough subjects. You may be familiar with Ashura which was turned into a harrowing anime a couple of years ago. This is the latest adaptation of his work and it has a star-packed cast with Nao Omori (The Ravine of Goodbye), Tomorowo Taguchi (Tetsuo: The Iron Man, Strange Circus) and Susumu Terajima (Sonatine). Coming to a film festival near you? I can see it happening.

Yuusuke Mamiana (Omori) is broke and unemployed and stuck thinking about sex and money. Sick of his life, he heads back to his hometown but finds a cold reception waiting from the people of his past. The only exception is Kyoko Okabe (Miwa), a beautiful girl with a bruised face. Yuusuke wants to discover happiness, wants to forget the misery of his life and wants to prove that he is alive and so he wants to have sex with Kyoko and maybe seek more…

Website

Ninjani Sanjo! Mirai e no Tatakai   

Japanese Title:忍ジャニ参上!未来への戦い

Romaji: Ninjani Sanjo! Mirai e no Tatakai

Running Time: 86 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Masanori Inoue

Writer: Hiroya Taka (Screenplay),

Starring: Daiki Shigeoka, Nozomu Kotaki, Sho Hirano, Tomohiro Kamiyama, Koji Mukai, Akitao Kiriyama, Shintaro Morimoto, Taigo Kyomoto,

After the early months of 2014 saw female idols put in work with horror films and teen romance dramas, the male idols step up to the plate. It’s the boys of Johnny’s Jr. group “7 WEST” and they play ninjas in the Edo period who have little to do now that Tokugawa Ieyasu has united Japan. They get the order to disband, but do they want to stop having fun being ninjas? I wouldn’t!

Website

Otaku’s Daughter   

Japanese Title:あの娘、早くババアになればいいのに

Romaji: Ano ko, Hayaku Babaa ni Nareba Iinoni

Running Time: 70 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Yurui Koroyasu

Writer: Natsuki Terashima (Screenplay),

Starring: Takashi Omoto, Asaka Nakamura, Yui, Kirita Ryousuke, Ai Ozaki,

Hirata owns a books shop and has a daughter named Anna. She’s not his biological daughter. An old schoolmate left her to him. Despite this, Hirata cherishes Anna and his idea of raising a girl is to raise her like an idol. Is this sort of love proper?

Website

We Are the Reds the Movie    

Japanese Title: N/A

Romaji: N/A

Running Time: 70 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Shujin Ito, Yota Kaneko

Writer: N/A

Starring: N/A

Football. The World Cup is here and football will dominate EVERYTHING. It will be on the television and newspapers and conersations and be in everywhere in day to day life. The British media will go doolally over a bunch of guys kicking a ball around and people will freak out when England don’t win.

I actually like playing football but I find watching football boring. When those World Cup matches are on I’ll be at the ultimate counter-programming event – a museum – and I’ll be surrounded by lots of people who don’t care about football – beautiful women (hopefully…) – and when I’m at home I have my film collection. For those who like football, this documentary might be to your taste.

It’s all about the Urawa Red Diamonds, a J-League club, and we see the staff, players, supporters, and everybody drawn to the sport and the team.

Website

Persona 3 the Movie #2 Midsummer Knight’s Dream   

Japanese Title: N/A

Romaji: N/A

Running Time: N/A

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Tomohisa Taguchi

Writer: Jun Kumagai (Script)

Starring: Akira Ishida (Makoto Yuuki), Megumi Toyoguchi (Yukari Takeba),  Hikaru Midorikawa (Akihiko Sanada), Kazuya Nakai (Shinjiro Aragaki), Maaya Sakamoto (Aegis), Rie Tanaka (Mitsuru Kirijou), Miyuki Sawashiro (Elizabeth),

The easiest way to find me in my museum is to look for the guy drinking from the Persona 3 cup – Makoto and Yukari are on there. I’m a fan of Persona and I’m excited to see the second film from the Persona 3 adaptations and it follows on from last year’s Birth of Spring title. The poster is so cool, I want one!

There is a hidden time known as the “Dark Hour” that exists between one day and the next when all movement in the town of Iwatodai stops and terrible creatures known as Shadows room. A group of students from Moonlight Hall School are drawn to fight these creatures and explore the mysterious tower of Tartarus with their special weapons called Evokers which they use to summon Persona.

Website

ポルトレ PORTRAIT         

Japanese Title:ポルトレ PORTRAIT

Romaji: Porutore PORTRAIT

Running Time: 70 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Shuntaro Uchida

Writer: Shuntaro Uchida (Script)

Starring: Yoshimura Sakahito, Marika Matsumoto, Hideyuki Arai

16mm and digital film and Polaroids are cut together by Shuntaro Uchida as he creates a portrait of himself doing things like wandering the streets of Shibuya and encountering randoms including an attractive woman. Since I am useless in asking women out on dates perhaps I should roll with a digital camera and make a film… Actually, that would probably make me seem creepier than I actually am.

Website

Flower Life Nakagawa Yukio  

Japanese Title:華　いのち　中川幸夫

Romaji: Hana Inochi Nakagawa Yukio

Running Time: 92 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Tani Mitsuaki

Writer: N/A

Starring: Yukio Nakagawa, Nobuyoshi Araki, Kotaro Sawaki,

I’m sorry but some of the imagery and music in the film’s trailer… If this was about a pale madman stalking the countryside and collecting the gore and blood of people he has murdered to make sculptures while listening to opera… I wouldn’t be surprised. Perhaps it says more about my strange imagination and it’s interpretation of some performance art because this is about a respected ikebana artist named Yukio Nakagawa who has taken the traditional art of flower arranging and turned it into something far out and unique, where the flowers are crushed and turned into suggestive and sexualised images. His work was so out there that he was thrown out of an ikebana school because he was a rebel. This work celebrates the artist’s life.

Website

Godzilla    

Japanese Title:ゴジラ

Romaji: GOJIRA

Running Time: 97 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Ishiro Honda

Writer: Ishiro Honda, Takeo Murata (Script)

Starring: Akira Takarada, Momoko Kochi, Akihiko Hiata, Takashi Shimura,

Ishiro Honda’s 1954 classic, Godzilla, is re-released on its 60^th anniversary as a digitally remastered film in Japanese cinema.

Website

Watch Rakugo on the Cinema Screen: “Master Storytellers of the Showa Period”                                          

Japanese Title: スクリーンで観る高座　シネマ落語「落語研究会　昭和の名人　七　 古今亭志ん朝独演会」

Romaji: Sukurīn de miru kōza shinema rakugo `rakugo kenkyūkai Shōwa no meijin nana kokontei shinchō dokuen-kai’

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Running Time: 122 mins.

Director: N/A

Writer: N/A

Starring: Yanagiya Kosan, Kokontei Shinshō, Katsura Bunraku

This is the seventh in a series of films about Rakugo, a form of verbal entertainment where a lone storyteller sits on a stage and depicts a long and complicated comical story with nothing but a paper fan and a small cloth for props and a change in pitch and tone in voice to provide life to different characters. The film shows us the skills of Kokontei Shinshō.

Website

Tokyo Densetsu: Kyofu no Ningen Jigoku  

Japanese Title: 劇場版東京伝説恐怖の人間地獄

Romaji: Gekijouban Tokyo Densetsu: Kyofu no Ningen Jigoku

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Running Time: 66 mins.

Director: Seiji Chiba

Writer: Seiji Chiba (Screenplay), Yumeaki Hirayama (Original Manga),

Starring: Rika Adachi, Shiho Fujisawa, Junpei Hashino, Hiroko Hayashi, Kinari Hirano, Marin, Tomoaki Nakagawa, Kentaro Shimazu,

Yumeak Hirayama’s horror manga gets adapted into an omnibus film.

Website

Mrs. Inga wo Shitte Imasu ka?  

Japanese Title:いのちのコール　ミセスインガを知っていますか

Romaji: Inochi no Koru Misesu Inga wo Shitte Imasu ka

Running Time: 86 mins

Release Date: June 07^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Yasuyuki Ebihara

Writer: Akio Nanki (Screenplay),

Starring: Misako Yasuda, Kenki Yamaguchi, Shigeru Muroi,

Do You Know Mrs. Inga? A drama about a woman named Tamaki who is about to get married but discovers that she suffers from cervical cancer and has surgery to remove her womb. It has such a negative effect on her life that when she calls into a radio station under the name Inga, it is clear that her friends and family have abandoned her and she talks about suicide. Mayumi, the DJ, talks her out of it.

Website

Snow White Murder Case (2014) (International Premiere)  

Japanese Title: 白ゆき姫殺人事件

Romaji: Shira Yuki Hime Satsujin Jiken

Running Time: 126 mins.

Release Date: March 29^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Yoshihiro Nakamura

Writer: Tamio Hayashi (Screenplay), Kanae Minato (Original Novel)

Starring: Mao Inoue, Gou Ayano, Misako Renbutsu, Nanao, Shihori Kanjiya, Nobuaki Kaneko, Erena Ono, Mitsuki Tanimura, Shota Sometani, Katsuhisa Namase, Dankan,

Seen at the Terracotta Far East Film Festival 2014

Yoshihiro Nakamura’s latest film is a twisting murder tale which is less about who-dunnit and more about tearing open the glossy façade of contemporary media and revealing the lurid rumour-fuelled tabloid culture that festers underneath. As a Twitter-addict at a TV company uses social media to investigate a shocking death, he finds himself gaining what could be a massive scoop. With every Tweet he becomes the preacher to a growing congregation of gossips ready to praise him but his audience can turn and in his enthusiasm and efforts to catch a big news story he blithely ignores the damage that spreading rumours can do to promote his career.

Breaking news! Murder in Shigure Valley!

The Snow White Murder Case starts with the results of the crime. It is night time and a beautiful woman lies on a forest floor. As the camera pulls back, blood runs down her neck and we see multiple stab wounds gush forth with more blood.

By morning her burnt corpse has been found in the nature preserve in Shigure Valley. As the news of the dead body is revealed by police, Twitter users link it to the recently disappeared Noriko Miki (Nanao). When her death is confirmed the testimonies about Noriko flood in from co-workers and friends at the cosmetics company famous for Snow White soaps where she worked. We find out that she was the most beautiful girl at the company, well-liked, and respected and helpful, an innocent fairy-tale like beauty. All of that is in the past because she is now the subject of a massive tabloid scandal.

News slowly leaks out mostly because of Akahoshi (Ayano), a temporary news director addicted to Twitter.

We first see him in a television production control room but kept far away from the control deck and left with nothing to do. He is on his smartphone using his Twitter account @Red_Star_07 to Tweet restaurant reviews and odd bits of news to his small audience. He soon gets a tip on the Noriko case when an old university friend of Akahoshi’s sends him information which could lead to a scoop.

His old friend’s name is Risako Kano (Renbutsu). She harboured a crush on him and it turns out that she was a co-worker of Noriko’s. Her inside tip is that a dowdy co-worker named Miki Jono (Inoue) had a grudge against Noriko.

Risako clues Akahoshi into the gossip at the cosmetics company. Products were being stolen and Miki was massively unpopular, a loner who didn’t compare to the perfect Noriko who had recently stolen Miki’s boyfriend. As Akahoshi digs deeper the media frenzy begins as Akahoshi reveals the revelations on television shows and over the internet. Miki’s friends, family and anybody even vaguely associated with her start Tweeting, calling and giving their opinion on if she is a killer and how she did it as Miki coming under internet-fuelled suspicion of Noriko’s murder. As the rumours come out, Miki looks like a prime suspect and a witch hunt ensues…

This is a reconstruction

The Snow White Murder Case is based on a novel by Kanae Minamoto, one of Japan’s foremost thriller writers who has had her novels A Chorus of Angels, Confessions and Penance turned into television and film. This film is adapted by Nakamura’s familiar screenwriter Tamio Hayashi. It seems like the perfect title for Nakamura and Hayashi since it features nebulous plot points and a shifting narrative that comes into focus as the characterisation slowly changes and the ‘truth’ comes into focus.

The Snow White Murder Case is like a modern day morality tale about the poisonous effects of gossip and how the power of social media pumps up a guy’s pride and the hubris he suffers blinds him to the pitfalls of the medium.

Right now, I’m the only person in the world who is closing in on the dark crime.

Akahoshi is a young guy just out of university with only a temp job at a tabloid programme. He is left out of the action of the news reports and the senior director is irritated by his presence. With nothing to do, he is strapped to his smart-phone cultivating his Twitter account and Tweeting with his restaurant reviews. It is the only place he gets taken seriously as anything like a journalist.

Twitter has that power. With a series of Tweets you can appear interesting. With the right set of Tweets you can be famous. The news media are all over social networks but for a generation of young people raised on, and addicted to, social media they can use it to carve niche for themselves in traditional media and Akahoshi is one who senses this opportunity.

The murder case tip-off from his friend is his big chance to impress his bosses and maybe secure a permanent position with the production company. He has the bit between his teeth and one can sense his excitement as he drives to murder scenes and takes his Canon DV camera to interview anybody with any connection to Miki.

He enthusiastically gathers every slice of steaming gossip in an example of reckless sticky journalism to create a tale based on awfully flimsy circumstantial evidence for his hilariously tawdry and lurid reconstructions for his segment on a trashy TV programme.

As we see him get his ‘evidence’ we witness the build up to Noriko’s disappearance and parts from Miki’s childhood from different perspectives. Each person remembers different things, Miki’s isolation and odd behaviour from her childhood to the fateful night and everything plays out differently. Some remember Miki as a loner and miserable while others may remember her as a good friend. Akahoshi, desperate to make his stories stand up, engages in a lot of character assassination and uses the worst rumours to further his truth.

Everybody has a tale to tell because they all want to be linked to the story. Every interviewee is very much aware of the mechanics of the media and loves getting some fame. Worryingly, Akahoshi never once questions whether any of the sources are trustworthy but he’s committed. There’s too much at stake. Everyone across the country, from salarymen to mothers nursing babies, is fascinated by the case and wants to join in the hunt for the murderer and take part in the media trial. It can make or break Akahoshi. With every tweet and TV show his enthusiasm exposes his status-anxiety and an incredible lack of ethics and he sets himself up for a hard fall.

The audience is aware of the hollowness of the stories and there is a lot of black comedy in seeing scenes play out bathetically in sly slices of satire. We see the inner workings of the television industry, the schlocky reconstructions and the silly allegations, the ‘experts’ who read scripted lines, the variety shows with lurid on-screen text and pixelated faces, but what haunts the most is the way the media adapts anything, including a person’s life, to create the narrative that it wants and the growing sense of a media storm brewing where everyone’s voice drowns out the real truth.

None of this would mean anything if the women at the centre of the case were one-dimensional.

Not being unique is what makes her unique

For two-thirds of the film Miki is painted as a mystery figure capable of evil acts (including curses!), but the audience gradually learns she is not the witch that Akahoshi paints her out to be. Every bit of evidence he gathers is flawed in some way, some of the sources are unreliable which makes the murder plot Akahoshi constructs also unreliable and meeting the real Miki leads to the heart strings being tugged.

As we learn more about Miki, the film begins to show something of a warm emotional core which is absent from other adaptations of Kanae’s works because the suspect is less an evil witch and more a quiet girl who has suffered a string of bad luck. It turns out that she is not a loner with a grudge but just very shy.

Mao Inoue playing a plain girl seems laughable but she manages to do it. The conservative clothes and plain ponytail go some way but it’s the physical performance.

She has the look of hesitancy and nervousness that accompanies those not used to taking centre stage. Her smile is hard won and she is reserved but if one breaks through they find a genuinely nice girl, indeed, an innocent who makes the idea that she committed the crime absurd. She is revealed to be a good and loyal friend with the sort of lack of sophistication in some areas that makes her feel natural and even unworldly at points, someone who can forget their troubles with something simple like music, someone still in love with fairytales well past the point most people would have stopped reading them. She is just a generally nice person and one who can easily be taken advantage of.

All of the bad things that people remember about her emerge from honest mistakes misinterpreted by others, men who view her sexually and a threat to their status, women who are competitive with her in the office space. But there are flashes of danger, moments when reality makes her act out in certain ways such as speeding in her car or openly grumbling. She is complicated like most people are.

This sharp sort of change of perspective extends to Noriko who is not as innocent as the testimonies claim. She, with her flawless beauty and clever, manipulative ways is resented by the other office ladies and a poisonous atmosphere of rumour and truth is revealed.

The more Miki’s character is revealed, her entire background and the more we see how insidiously evil gossip can be and how social media perpetuates this. The trial by media is shown up as being a highly destructive force but for all of the talk of social media, Nakamura and Minato know where their loyalty lies and that is with the flesh and blood friends people make, not the anonymous people online. When Miki’s friend is revealed it opens the film to an emotionally moving set of end sequences which reveal how strong and how important friendship can be, something Akahoshi might want to learn about.

Disappear into a fantasy world

Overall, the movie is enjoyable. Nakamura brilliantly brings to life this tale of truth and rumour and imaginatively picks apart social media and its problems by crafting scenes where people are forever on their mobiles, playing games where Twitter comments and constant chatter drown out the truth. He specialises in tales with late twists and sometimes they work, sometimes they don’t. Here, it’s perfectly poised and executed and creates a gripping story with a satisfying and well-earned emotional pay-off. Some may be disappointed by the mystery but getting to the answer is more important and the truth revealed rings true.

The truth is a relative term which makes the navigation of the film’s events feel like breaking through the wall of an echo chamber of rumours to get to an absolute truth. This is a perfect sensation for a story which investigates the modern malady of gossip and the mega-phone effect social media has and how it can destroy lives. Through a story which is equal parts satire and crime thriller and through the actions and fate of Akahoshi and Miki, The Snow White Murder Case is a highly enjoyable deliciously dark, bitter, serious but amusingly light critique of fame, social media, and gossip.

4.5/5

New York, New York, what a wonderful town. I have never wanted to live in New York as much as I did after reading the line-up for Japan Cuts 2014.

The Japan Society will host a series of awesome Japanese films from July 10^th to July 29^th with titles like Sion Sono’s ultra-violent black comedy Why Don’t You Play in Hell? coupled with crime thriller The Devil’s Path and recent (controversial) World War II blockbuster The Eternal Zero. These are just some of the headline titles, there are even more listed, many of which were released in the last few weeks and some of which are crazy and bizarre and speak to the sharp and unique sense of cinema that the curators have – respect has to be paid for the programming of the documentaries on this list. There’s definitely something for everyone! Here’s a trailer:

I am blown away by the titles and the guests that have been announced with many actors coming over for Q&As (FUMI NIKAIDO!!!). For a fan of cinema in general and Japanese cinema in particular, this is a festival rich with great films and events!

Here’s a list of the films and trailers with comments from me. Click on the title for more info such as times and buying tickets. Tickets are already on sale!

Thursday July 10th, Opening Night

6 P.M.

The Mole Song: Undercover Agent Reiji   

Japanese Title: 土竜の唄 潜入捜査官 REIJI

Romaji: Mogura no Uta Sennuu Sosakan REIJI

Running Time: 130 mins.

Director: Takashi Miike

Writer: Kudo Kankuro (Screenplay), Noboru Takahashi (Original Manga)

Starring: Toma Ikuta, Ren Osugi, Shinichi Tsutsumi, Riisa Naka, Takayuki Yamada, Mitsuru Fukikoshi

This is based on a comedy manga by Noboru Takahashi and directed by Takashi Miike (For Love’s Sake). The film has a great cast of characters like Shinichi Tsutsumi (Why Don’t You Play in Hell?), Ren Osugi (Exte) and Mitsuru Fukikoshi (Cold Fish). It seems like a great way to open the film festival since it looks absolutely funny.

Reiji Kikukawa (Ikuta) has a strong sense of justice but graduates at the bottom of his class from the police academy. He is so useless his superiors send him on what should be a suicide mission. First the police chief fires him for disciplinary issues and then sets him up as a mole in the Sukiyaki gang, the largest crime group in the Kanto area. His target is Shuho Todoroki, the boss, and so Reiji goes through hell to get his man!

8:30 P.M.

Why Don’t You Play in Hell?

Japanese Title: 地獄　で　なぜ　悪い Why Don’t You Play in Hell?

Romaji: Jigoku de Naze Warui Why Don’t You Play in Hell?

Running Time: 126 mins

Director: Sion Sono

Writer: Sion Sono (Screenplay),

Starring: Jun Kunimura, Shinichi Tsutsumi, Fumi Nikaido, Tomochika, Hiroki Hasegawa, Kotou Lorena, Gen Hoshino, Tak Sakaguchi

Sion Sono blew my mind with this one. After a short run of issue films like the critically lauded Himizu and The Land of Hope, he made this hilarious and blood-thirsty film which was both entertainment and a love letter to cult films and yakuza classics. I found it absolutely hilarious and one of the best films of last year.

Muto (Kunimura) and Ikegami (Tsutsumi) are rival gangsters who despise each other especially since Muto’s wife Shizue (Tomochika) butchered a boss in Ikegami’s gang. She gets sent to prison which jeopardises her daughter’s acting career. Ten years later and days before Shizue is due to be released, Muto is desperate to make his daughter a big-screen star as a reward for Shizue’s loyalty and kidnaps Koji (Hoshino), a timid passer-by who is mistaken for being a film director.

When dealing with gangsters you don’t mess about so Koji recruits the help of a mad-cinephile Hirata (Hasegawa) who dreams of being a movie director and has a ragtag film crew named The Fuck Bombers. Hirata seizes his chance and loses his mind as he casts Mitsuko in a fictional gang war but it soon goes wrong when it turns real.

Introduction and Q&A with actress Fumi Nikaido (I so want to be in her presence!!!)

Followed by the LET’S PLAY IN HELL Opening Night Party!

Friday July 11th,

6 P.M.

The Snow White Murder Case

Japanese: 白ゆき姫殺人事件

Romaji: Shira Yuki Hime Satsujin Jiken

Running Time: 126 mins.

Director: Yoshihiro Nakamura

Writer:Tamio Hayashi (Screenplay), Kanae Minato (Original Novel)

Starring: Mao Inoue, Gou Ayano, Misako Renbutsu, Nanao, Shihori Kanjiya, Nobuaki Kaneko, Erena Ono, Mitsuki Tanimura, Shota Sometani, Katsuhisa Namase, Dankan,

I reviewed this one on Monday and found it to be a gripping and blackly comic satire on contemporary Japanese media. I highly recommend it for people who want a nice twisting narrative with great performances. The crime isn’t so much the centre-piece, rather, it’s how everybody reacts to it!

The Show White Murder Case sees victim Noriko Miki (Nanao), the best looking girl at a cosmetics company, murdered and her co-worker Miki (Inoue) coming under suspicion. The media frenzy begins as television shows interview Miki’s friends, family and anybody even vaguely associated with her. Soon rumours of her being a wicked woman emerge. Are they true?

8:30 P.M.

Maruyama, The Middle Schooler

Japanese Title: 中学生　円山

Romaji: Chuugakusei Maruyama

Running Time: 199 mins.

Director: Kankuro Kudo

Writer: Kankuro Kudo (Screenplay)

Starring: Hiroaki Takuma, Tsuyoshi Kusanagi, Yang Ik-June, Maki Sakai, Toru Nakamura, Nanami Nabemoto, Yuiko Kariya,You, Fumina Hara,Kenji Endo, Tomorowo Taguchi, Maho Nonami

This is a comedy for which every review I have read has been glowing with praise. It’s directed by Kankuro Kuda, actor in Memories of Matsuko and Instant Swamp.

Katsuya Maruyama (Hiraoka) is 14, an age where a boys thoughts are consumed by carnal desires. Only his are strange. He wants to “to touch his own weeny with his tongue.” Perhaps his strangeness is a result of living a mundane life in a housing complex with his mother Mizuki (sakai)), a woman obsessed with Korean dramas, his fitness obsessed father Katsuyuki (Nakamura) and sharing his room with his sister Akane (Nabemoto). There are other, stranger characters around like Tatsuo Shimoi (Kusanagi), a single father who wheels his infant son in a buggy around everywhere and prying into his neighbours lives and irritating housewives and a Korean electrician named Park Hyeon-Hun (Yang Ik-June) who attracts the attention of Mizuki. When bodies start turning up in the apartment complex Maruyama begins to draw a manga about a superhero named Captain Fruit (based on his father) who comes to the rescue. He shares his crazy tales with Shimoi and the line between fantasy and reality become blurred.

Saturday, July 12^th

12:30 P.M. 

The Great Passage

Japanese Title: 舟を編む

Romaji: Fune wo Amu

Running Time: 133 mins.

Director: Yuya Ishii

Writer: Shion Miura (Original Novel), Kensaku Watanabe (Screenplay),

Starring: Ryuhei Matsuda, Aoi Miyazaki, Joe Odagiri, Haru Kuroki, Misako Watanabe, Kumiko Aso, Shingo Tsurumi, Chizuru Ikewaki, Hiroko Isayama, Kaouru Kobayashi, Go Kato, Kaoru Yachigusa, Ryu Morioka, Shohei Uno, Kazuki Namioka

Yuya Ishii is one of Japan’s new directors who is attracting attention. With titles like Sawako Decides and Mitsuko Delivers, he made an impact on the indie scene but made the leap with this comedy to the majors. I found it  warm and funny character comedy and recommend it. If my opinion doesn’t matter all that much to you (please humour me and pretend it does) then maybe the fact that it scored big at this year’s Japanese Academy Awards might!

Mitsuya Majime (Matsuda) has the talent to comprehend different languages and is the most important member of the editorial team of a dictionary but he struggles to tell Kaguya Hayashi (Miyazaki), a cook and the granddaughter of the owner of Majime’s boarding home, how he feels about her. Meanwhile, he has to lead a team in the creation of a new dictionary!

3:00 P.M.

The Eternal Zero

Japanese Title: 永遠の0

Romaji: Eien no Zero

Running Time: 144 mins.

Director: Takashi Yamazaki

Writer: Tamio Hayashi (Screenplay), Naoki Hyakuta (Original Novel)

Starring: Junichi Okada, Mao Inoue, Haruma Miura, Yuichiro Hirose, Nanaka Yagi, Hirofumi Arai, Min Tanaka, Kazue Fukiishi, Jun Fubuki, Isao Natsuyagi

It’s hard to ignore the controversy behind the author but this is supposed to be an excellent drama. The cast is certainly packed with first-rate talent.

A young man named Kentaro Saeki (Miura) has failed his bar test yet again. Confused about life he begins to research his family with his older sister Keiko (Fukiishi). They focus on their grandfather Kyuzo Miyabe (Okada) who fought in the Pacific War. He was a man scared of death and obsessed with life who volunteered to join a ‘special forces’ squad but as they encounter old colleagues of his they find a dark secret kept hidden for 60 years…

6:00 P.M.

The Devil’s Path

Japanese Title: 凶悪

Romaji: Kyouaku

Running Time: 128 mins.

Director: Kazuya Shiraishi

Writer: Kazuya Shiraishi, Izumi Takahashi (Screenplay),

Starring: Takayuki Yamada, Pierre Taki, Lily Franky, Chizuru Ikewaki, Kazuko Shirakawa, Yu Saito, Nozomi Muraoka

Takayuki Yamada (13 Assassins), Pierre Taki (Linda, Linda, Linda) and Lily Franky (Like Father, Like Son) star in this adaptation of a nonfiction novel which looks to be a neat little thriller.

Sudo (Taki) is a former yakuza and death-row inmate who contacts Fujii (Yamada), a magazine reporter by letter to tell him that a man named Kimura (Franky) a.k.a. “teacher” has killed numerous times for insurance money. Fujii begins his investigation and through his persistence and that of Sudo, the police begin to investigate.

8: 30 P.M.

Miss Zombie

Japanese Title: Miss Zombie

Romaji: Miss Zombie

Running Time: 85 mins.

Director: SABU

Writer: SABU (Screenplay),

Starring: Ayaka Komatsu, Makoto Togashi, Riku Ohnishi, Taro Suruga, Tateto Serizawa, Takaya Yamauchi, Toru Tezuka

SABU is a great filmmaker. One definitely worth checking out if you haven’t heard of him before. He made quirky gangster films in the 90’s, is back and with an original take on the zombie movie thanks to the script. Gravure idol Ayaka Komatsu plays a zombie named Sara who gets inserted into a family that is wary of her and a village that is frightened of her. Is she really that bad or are humans worse? She is cast alongside including Makoto Togashi (Cure) and Tateto Serizawa (Isn’t Anyone Alive?).

Sara (Komatsu) rocks up at a in a town in a cage wth numerous scars on her body and glazed eyes. She’s a zombie. Also in the cage is a gun and a note that reads “Do not give it meat”. The people around her are disgusted and treat her cruelly but a doctor takes her in. His son bonds with the zombie but the doctor has other plans…

10: 30 P.M.

The Pinkie

Running Time: 65 mins.

Director: Lisa Takeba

Writer: Lisa Takeba (Screenplay),

Starring: Ryota Ozawa, Miwako Wagatsuma, Haruka Suenaga, Kanji Tsuda

You people attending this festival are so fortunate… After a run of HYPE films you get this little gem from Lisa Takeba who has put together a great little indie romantic comedy which looks like so much fun.

Since they were both five, Ryosuke has been stalked by Momoko – the ugliest girl in the village. Momoko’s love for Ryosuke is so boundless that she has her face surgically altered to suit his taste – but still he wants nothing to do with her. Ryosuke is more interested in the girlfriend of a gangster boss. But when the boss finds out about their affair, he has Ryosuke’s little finger hacked off. Magically, the finger falls into Momoko’s hands, and she uses it to clone Ryosuke, so she can finally have him (or almost him) for herself – and that’s the first five minutes.

Sunday, July 12^th

12:30 

Wood Job!

Japanese Title:（ウッジョブ）　神去なあなあ日常

Romaji: (Ujjobu) kamisari nānā nichijō

Running Time: 116 mins

Director: Shinobu Yaguchi

Writer: Shinobu Yaguchi(Screenplay), Shion Miura (Original Novel)

Starring: Shota Sometani, Masami Nagasawa, Hideaki Ito, Yuka, Naomi Nishida, Makita Sports, Ken Mitsuishi, Akira Emoto

This is a comedy adapted from a novel by Shion Miura (Mahoro Eki Mae Bangaichi, The Great Passage) and it’s full of great actors like Shota Sometani (Himizu), Ken Mitsuishi (Rent-a-Cat, Noriko’s Dinner Table).

Yuki Hirano (Sometani) is a high school grad who has failed his university entrance exams. He expects to spend the near future working a part time job but sees a brochure for a year-long forestry training scheme and soon he’s in a remote mountain village called Kamusari which has none of the amenities of Tokyo but immense beauty and warm-hearted locals and a beautiful young woman named Naoki (Nagasawa) He just has to survive his rough and ready instructors like Yoki (Ito).

3:00 

Monsterz

Japanese Title:モンスターズ

Romaji: Monsuta-zu

Running Time: 112 mins

Director: Hideo Nakata

Writer: Yusuke Watanabe (Screenplay), Kim Min-seok (Original Script)

Starring: Tatsuya Fujiwara, Takayuki Yamada, Satomi Ishihara, Tomorowo Taguchi, Yutaka Matsushige, Tae Kimura,

Hideo Nakata of Ringu fame is back with an adaptation of a 2010 Korean film called Haunters.  The story is about the battle between two fabulously good-looking men with special abilities that allow them to control others!

A Man (Fujiwara) possesses the ability to manipulate others with his eyes. With his ability he killed his abusive step-father but was abandoned by his mother. He now lives the life of a loner. His life changes again when he encounters a man he cannot manipulate. That man is Shuichi Tanaka (Yamada) who lives with his friends and works a dead-end job. He may not have money but his voice has special abilities…

5:30 

All-Round Appraiser Q: The Eyes of Mona Lisa

Japanese Title:万能鑑定士Q モナ・リザの瞳

Romaji: Bannou Kanteishi Q Monariza no Hitomi

Running Time: 119 mins

Director: Shinsuke Sato

Writer: Manabu Uda (Screenplay), Keisuke Matsuoka (Original Novel)

Starring: Haruka Ayase, Tori Matsuzaka, Eriko Hatsune, Hiroaki Murakami, Pierre Deladonchamps, Jun Hashimoto

Based on a popular mystery novel by Keisuke Matsuoka, the story follows Riko Rinda (Ayase) a sexy and cute librarian with quasi-supernatural powers of deduction who is a brilliant appraiser with an “All-Round Appraiser Q” reputation that earns the attention of The Louvre as a Mona Lisa exhibition is to be held for the first time in Japan. Accompanied by magazine editor sidekick Yuto Ogasawara (Matsuzaka), she goes to Paris and finds her judgment challenged by the shroud of mystery and threats of theft surrounding the masterpiece as well as the Mona Lisa herself. 

8: 00 P.M.

Uzumasa Limelight

Japanese Title: 太秦ライムライト

Romaji: Uzumasa Laimulaito

Running Time: 103 mins

Director: Ken Ochiai

Writer: Hiroyuki Ono (Screenplay),

Starring: Seizo Fukumoto, Chihiro Yamamoto, Hiroki Matsukata, Masashi Goda, Hirotaro Honda, Hisako Manda.

This one is so new it hasn’t been released in Japan yet! Straight from the festival website:

 A moving, nostalgic portrait of the men behind the golden age of chanbara (sword-fighting dramas and films), Uzumasa Limelight goes behind the scenes of the distinctive film genre for which Japan is famous. A professional extra named Kamiyama (real-life kirare-yaku Seizo Fukumoto) has devoted 50 years of his life as a kirare-yaku in sword-fighting movies produced at Kyoto’s Uzumasa Studios. A master of the art, he lives to die–or more exactly “to be cut”–and show a beautiful, spectacular death on screen. Now an elderly man, Kamiyama lives very modestly but has earned immense respect from his peers, some of them movie stars. When the studio where he works decides to discontinue its chanbara productions, Kamiyama finds himself at a loss. Hope arrives in the form of a young girl named Satsuki, who soon becomes Kamiyama’s disciple. Will the art of dying by the sword live on?

 Introduction and Q&A with director Ken Ochiai and actress Chihiro Yamamoto

Tuesday, July 15^th

6:00 P.M.

The Horses of Fukushima

Japanese: 祭の馬

Romaji: Matsuri no Uma

Running Time: 74 mins.

Director: Yoju Matsubayashi

Writer: N/A

Starring: N/A

Japan produces many documentaries but few of the major festivals that I write about actually shows them which makes the inclusion of this and others on the list noteworthy.

Director Yoju Matsubayashi was behind the documentary  Fukushima: Memories of the Lost Landscape which was all about the Great East Japan Earthquake. He returns with a new work based on the story of a rancher named Shinichiro Tanaka who fled his farm after the nuclear disaster and returned to find his horses dead or starving, and refused to obey the government’s orders to kill them. While many racehorses are slaughtered for horsemeat, his horses had been subjected to radiation and were inedible. Yoju Matsubayashi spent the summer of 2011 helping Tanaka take care of his horses and documenting their efforts to rehabilitate the horses.

8:30 P.M.

Unforgiven

Japanese Title: 許されざる者

Romaji: Yurusarezaru Mono

Running Time: 135 mins.

Director: Lee Sang-Il

Writer: Lee Sang-Il (Adapted Screenplay), David Webb Peoples (Original Screenplay)

Starring: Ken Watanabe, Jun Kunimura, Eiko Koike, Yura Yagira, Koichi Sato, Akira Emoto, Shiono Kutsuna, Kenichi Takito, Youkiyoshi Ozawa, Takahiro Mirua, Sjiori Kutsuna

This is the remake of the 1992 Clint Eastwood film of the same name. It swaps out the US and cowboys for Japan in the late 1800’s and samurai and Warner Bros. rolled it out around the world for a limited time. This is another chance to see it. It is directed by Lee Sang-Il (Villain) and it stars Ken Watanabe (Letters from Iwo Jima, Inception, Tampopo), Akira Emoto (A Woman and War, Starfish Hotel), Koichi Sato (Infection), Eiko Koike (Rebirth, Penance, Kamikaze Girls, 2LDK) and Jun Kunimura (Outrage, Vital, Audition).

Jubei Kamata (Watanabe) was once a loyal samurai for the Edo shogunate government. Famous for being a skilled and deadly fighter he killed many and became infamous in Kyoto but disappeared during the battle of Goryoukaku. Ten years later and he is living with his child, looking after his wife’s grave in peace after vowing never to pick up his sword again but being in poverty forces him to do just that as he accepts the assignment of being a bounty hunter when an old comrade named Kingo Baba (Emoto) and young guy Goro (Yagira) turns up with a bounty for a man who mutilated a prostitute. They set off but will encounter a sadistic lawman (Sato) who has a distaste for mercenaries.

Wednesday, July 16th

6:30 P.M. 

The Extreme Sukiyaki

Japanese: ジ、　エクストリーム、　スキヤキ

Romaji: Ji, Ekusutori-mu, Sukiyaki

Running Time: 111 mins.

Director: Shiro Maeda

Writer: Shiro Maeda (Original Novel and Screenplay),

Starring: Arata, Yosuke Kubozuka, Mikako Ichikawa, Kana Kurashima, Kengo Kora, Shuichi Okita, Daisuke Kuroda, Toru Okada

This is the directorial debut of writer Shiro Maeda (The Story of Yonosuke and Isn’t Anyone Alive?) and it stars a plethora of top acting talent including Arata and Yosuke Kubozuka, both of whom starred in the hilarious comedy Ping Pong (watch the film and then the anime! Then read the manga!). Other names include Mikako Ichikawa (Tokyo Oasis), Kana Kurashina (Dreams for Sale), Kengo Kora (The Drudgery Train), and the director Shuichi Okita (The Woodsman & the Rain, The Story of Yonosuke).

Horaguchi (Arata) is a failure. 15 years after leaving university he has achieved nothing and let time pass. Time to give up. He tries to commit suicide but even that fails. For Horaguchi his best days were at uni and so he yearns for those days. Yearns for them so much that he finds an old friend from university Ohkawa (Kubozuke). Things are a little awkward between them because of an incident in their past but they soon warm up to each other and plan a trip to the sea. Ohkawa’s girlfriend Kaeda (Kurashina) and Horaguchi’s ex Kyoko (Ichikawa) join them and bring a sukiyaki pot. They start to get along on their trip but Horaguchi has a secret reason for seeing his friend…

The director will conduct a Q&A via video streaming

Thursday, July 17^th

6:30 P.M. 

0.5mm

Japanese Title: 0.5ミリ

Romaji: 0.5 mm

Running Time: 198 mins

Director: Momoko Ando

Writer: N/A

Starring: Sakura Ando, Junkichi Orimoto, Toshio Sakata, Masahiko Tsugawa, Akira Emoto.

This is a world premiere but even more intriguing than that is the fact that it is directed by Momoko Ando, the sister of super brilliant actress Sakura Ando! Alas, no trailer. Synopsis straight from the site:

Sawa, a home helper for a middle class family with an elderly infirm grandfather, is forced to stretch her morals to keep her job. As a result, she finds herself broke and out on the street. She survives her first night by striking up an ambiguous friendship with a kindly old man, gaining access to a portion of the immense wealth held by Japan’s aging population. She continues with similar encounters, and while these begin as scams or revenge on rampant sexism, they ultimately become vulnerable intergenerational exchanges.

Introduction and Q&A with director Momoko Ando

Followed by a reception with the director

Friday, July 18^th

6:30 P.M. 

Passion

Japanese: 受難

Romaji: Junan

Running Time: 95 mins.

Director: Ryoko Yoshida

Writer: Ryoko Yoshida (Screenplay), Kaoruko Himeno (Novel)

Starring: Mayuko Iwasa, Yasushi Fuchikami, Kumiko Ito, Kanji Furutachi,

Things get weird with this title…

The Passion tells a story of a young woman raised in a convent named Frances-ko (Mayuko Iwasa), after Saint Francesco. Distressed by not knowing about love and sex, she calls out for a sign from above, but instead hears a voice from below. A human-faced growth speaks to her from between her legs, constantly berating her, calling out “Woman, you are worthless!” Mr. Koga, as she names it, continues the verbal abuse, yet Frances-ko somehow adapts, forming an adversarial yet symbiotic relationship. 

8:30 P.M.

Love’s Whirlpool

Japanese Title: 愛の渦

Romaji: Ai no Uzu

Running Time: 123 mins.

Director: Daisuke Miura

Writer: Daisuke Miura (Script/Stage Play/Original Novel)

Starring: Yoko Mitsuya, Hirofumi Arai, Mugi Kadowaki, Sosuke Ikematsu, Kenichi Takito, Ryusuke Komakime, Tokio Emoto, Eriko Nakamura, Seri Akazawa

Daisuke Miura is a filmmaker and dramatist who likes to make films and plays that are full of complicated characters in erotic situations (2013 indie film Be My Baby was based on his stage-play and a review is ready for next week). Alas, the characters can be so complicated that the eroticism takes a back-seat to some nail bitingly unpleasant situations. See him expose the mores of a group of lustful Japanese in this film. This trailer is not safe for work so you have been warned.

In a fancy split-level condo in Tokyo’s Roppongi nightlife district, four women and four men gather from midnight to 5 am. They’ve all paid to be there (men more than women), and they have only one thing in common–they seek anonymous sex. Using no names, they’re known only by their types: freeter (temp or part-time worker), mild-mannered salaryman, duplicitous OL (office lady), self-conscious working class factory worker, perfectionist teacher, veteran pervert, shy NEET (“not in education, employment or training”) and bashful college student. Together, they unravel their identities in a night of increasing debauchery

10:45 P.M. 

Greatful Dead    

Japanese Title: グレイトフル デッド

Romaji: Gureitofuru Deddo

Running Time: 97 mins.

Director: Eiji Uchida

Writer: Eiji Uchida, Etsuo Hiratani (Screenplay),

Starring: Kumi Takiuchi, Takashi Sasano, Kkobbi Kim

Changing gears and going back into the wild we get this little indie. While I have not seen this a fellow blogger whose opinion I value highly has and she enjoyed this one. Greatful Dead is getting a DVD release later in the year courtesy of Third Window Films.

Nami’s childhood was brutal: her mother ran away to Sri Lanka to help poor kids, her sister skipped town with her boyfriend and her father descended into despair and got himself a gothic mistress who played on this. Now that she’s grown up she takes pleasure in spying on people. Watching loners in society and enjoying seeing their pain.

Saturday, July 19^th

12:0 P.M. 

Tale of a Butcher Shop

Japanese Title: ある精肉店のはな

Romaji: Aru Seinikuten no Hanashi

Running Time: 108 mins

Director: Aya Hanabusa

Writer: N/A

Starring: N/A

The Kitades run a butcher shop in Kaizuka City outside Osaka, raising and slaughtering cattle to sell the meat in their store. The seventh generation of their family’s business, they are descendants of the buraku people, a social minority held over from the caste system abolished in the 19th century that is still subject to discrimination. As the Kitades are forced to make the difficult decision to shut down their slaughterhouse, the question posed by the film is whether doing this will also result in the deconstruction of the prejudices imposed on them. Though primarily documenting the process of their work with meticulous detail, Aya Hanabusa also touches on the Kitades’ participation in the buraku liberation movement. Hanabusa’s heartfelt portrait expands from the story of an old-fashioned family business competing with corporate supermarkets, toward a subtle and sophisticated critique of social exclusion and the persistence of ancient prejudices.

2:15 P.M.

My Little Sweet Pea

Japanese Title: 麦子さんと

Romaji: Mugiko-san to

Running Time: 95 mins.

Director: Keisuke Yoshida

Writer: Keisuke Yoshida, Ryo Nishihara (Screenplay),

Starring: Maki Horikita, Ryuhei Matsuda, Kimiko Yo, Sayaka Tashiro, Amane Okayama, Eri Fuse, Yoichi Nukumizu

Experienced actor Ryuhei Matsuda, the pretty-boy in Gohatto and the unconventional hero in Nightmare Detective teams up with rising star Maki Horikita in this drama.

It isn’t easy to find a dream to chase when you’re young, but Mugiko (Horikita) has one: she can’t wait to become an anime voice actress. Saving up for classes while she works part time in a manga store, she lives with her older, gambler brother (Matsuda) after her father’s death. When the mother (Yo) she never knew turns up out of nowhere and moves in, it only causes irritation for the aspiring otaku. But when her mother just as quickly disappears, it leaves Mugiko (or “Sweet Pea”) searching for answers, bringing her back to her mother’s hometown to discover what happened to her mother’s own dream. 

4:30 P.M. 

Man from Reno

Japanese Title: リノから来た男

Romaji: Rino kara Kita Otoko

Running Time: 111 mins

Director: Dave Boyle

Writer: Dave Boyle, Joel Clark, Michael Lerman (Screenplay),

Starring: Ayako Fujitani, Kazuki Kitamura, Pepe Serna, Elisha Skorman, Hiroshi Watanabe.

No trailer but this one sounds interesting enough to post about anyway.

 A Japanese bestselling crime novelist visiting San Francisco finds herself embroiled in a real life mystery after a night with a handsome stranger. The man–Japanese and supposedly from Nevada–disappears the next morning, after which increasingly strange and dangerous events begin to occur. This beautifully photographed Japanese-American co-production overturns the gender stereotypes of the mystery thriller, casting international star Kazuki Kitamura as its homme fatale. Kitamura effortlessly slides between gentle and sinister, while Ayako Fujitani fits perfectly into the role of author-turned-detective. One of this accomplished transnational film’s greatest features is a rare leading turn from Pepe Serna, veteran character actor of over 100 Hollywood films (Scarface, The Black Dahlia). Set in San Francisco, this neo-noir offers not only a compelling portrayal of gender and globalization, but a model for vibrant independent filmmaking across borders.

Introduction and Q&A with director Dave Boyle and actor Kazuki Kitamura

7:30 P.M. 

Neko Samurai

Japanese Title: 猫侍

Romaji: Neko Samurai

Running Time: 100 mins.

Director: Yoshitaka Yamaguchi

Writer: Yuji Nagamori, Yoshitaka Yamaguchi

Starring: Kazuki Kitamura, Misako Renbutsu, Yasufumi Terawaki, Yosuke Asari, Kanji Tsuda, Megumi Yokoyama, Shingo Mizusawa,

Who can kill a cat? Cats rock! It seems this samurai agrees in this fun looking film which is based on a TV show. Cats rule so much that there’s going to be a CAT party afterwards…

Kyutaro (Kitamura) was once a fearsome samurai but has fallen on hard times and tries to keep a low profile. When a man named Sakichi (Mizusawa) sees an example Kyutaro’s swordsmanship he hires the samurai to kill a white cat named Tamanojoh who has bewitched his boss Yozaemon (Ito) and left him immature. Kyutaro takes the job but when he sees how lovely the white cat is he has a change of heart but still gets caught up in a war between a gang of cat lovers and a gang of dog lovers!

Introduction and Q&A with actor Kazuki 

Kitamura, with CUT ABOVE Award Ceremony

Followed by the Japan CATS Party!

Sunday, July 20^th

12:30 P.M.

Pecoross’ Mother and Her Days

Japanese: 新大久保　物語

Romaji: Shin Ookubo Monogatari

Running Time: 113 mins.

Director: Azuma Morisaki

Writer: Akune Tomoaki (Screenplay), Yuichi Okano (Original Manga)

Starring: Ryo Iwamatsu, Mitsuko Baisho, Naoto Takenaka, Kiwako Harada, Kensuke Owada, Toshie Negishi, Ryo Kase

Hats off to the organisers for throwing this one in. It looked so small when it was released that it seemed like a film that would disappear een in Japan but it’s here at the festival.

Laid-back baby boomer Yuichi (Iwamatsu) is a middle-aged manga artist and singer-songwriter when he isn’t at his salaryman day job or watching out for his elderly mother. Suffering from increasing dementia since her husband’s death, Mitsue (Akagi) is a constant source of comic energy or annoyance for Yuichi, and he and his son must soon decide if they should put her in a home for the elderly. Jumping back in time, we see how Mitsue (Harada) tracked the tumult of the latter half of the 20th century, being raised as one of 10 brothers and sisters, surviving the war, and having to push her alcoholic husband (Kase) along in life.

3:00 P.M. 

Hello! Junichi

Japanese Title: ハロー！　純一

Romaji: Hallo! Junichi

Running Time: 91 mins.

Release Date: February 15^th, 2014

Director: Katsuhito Ishii, Kanoko Kawaguchi, Atsushi Yoshioka

Writer: Atsushi Yoshioka, Kanoko Kawaguchi (Screenplay), Noriko Ishii (Original Novel)

Starring: Hikari Mitsushima, Amon Kabe, Ryushin Tei, Chizuru Ikewaki, Tatsuya Gashuin, Yoshiyuki Morishita

Junichi is a timid third grader who can’t muster the courage to return an eraser he borrowed from his secret crush–and turns it into a children’s rock ‘n’ roll comedy. Junichi’s world is turned upside down as apprentice teacher Anna-sensei (Mitsushima) scraps her lesson plan to show the rambunctious students about life as an adult. With Anna’s unorthodox style, Junichi and his friends are able to gain confidence and pursue their goal of putting on a big concert.

 6:00 P.M.

The Tale of Iya

Japanese Title: 祖谷物語 -おくのひと-

Romaji: Iya Monogatari – Oku no Hito

Running Time: 169 mins.

Director: Tetsuchiro Tsuta

Writer: Tetsuchiro Tsuta, Masayuki Ueda (Screenplay),

Starring: Rina Takeda, Shima Ohnishi, Sachi Ishimaru, Hitoshi Murakami, Min Tanaka, Reika Miwa, Takahiro Ono, Naomi Kawase, Christopher Pellegrii, Keiko Taoka, Shigeru Kimura

This one looks special and it is one I sorely miss watching but people attending the festival get the chance to experience what has been described as a film with a magical atmosphere.

It is winter. A man finds a baby girl in the snow by a freezing lake in the mountains of Tokushima and takes her in. He gives her the name Haruna and they live far away from other people. The baby grows into a caring woman (Rina Takeda) who looks after the man.

It is summer. A stranger from Tokyo arrived at “Iya”, where the riches of nature still abound. His name is Kudo, and he wants to start a new life in the country to refresh his tired soul. Unfortunately the reality was not as easy as he thought because there is a confliction between a local construction company and a group of nature conservationists.

One day, Kudo meets the old man and Haruna and finds out that they lead lives completely different from his own. The old man is a farmer who climbs up the mountain to go to the little shrine to offer Omiki (sake) to the mountain god and Haruna goes to high school an hour away from home, and after that, helps Grandpa to plow his field. Feeling his heart gradually healing, Kudo thought that he finally found what he was looking for in their calm life but a destructive winter occurs…

And that’s it! What an incredible festival. I try and write some stuff for every film but for some titles like The Man from Reno, I just copied and pasted from the site because it is so brand new. I even re-wrote some of my old synopses based on this new information. For better written explanations and nfo on how to get the tickets click on the titles and hurry because they are already selling!

E3 week! Yay! More hype about video games like Bayonetta 2 and The Evil Within! Also the World Cup started this week and I’m already sick of hearing about it. Football, please shut up!

Only one movie review this week and that was for The Snow White Murder Case on Monday. It turned out larger than expected and I enjoyed writing it and I’m glad to see that it’s getting comments. Be My Baby has been complete for at least a week and a half but that goes out next week Monday. Judge! the week after that. I also reported on Japan Cuts 2014 which looks awesome!

I’ve also update my summer 2014 anime picks with PVs for Space Dandy and the latest for Terror in Tokyo/Zankyou no Terror.

What’s released in Tokyo this weekend?

Climbing to Spring       

Japanese Title:春を背負って

Romaji: Haru wo Seotte

Running Time: 116 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Daisaku Kimura

Writer: Tomoyuki Takimoto (Screenplay), Ryouhei Sasamoto (Novel)

Starring: Kenichi Matsuyama, Yu Aoi, Etsushi Toyokawa, Fumi Dan, Kaoru Kobayashi, Sakura Ando,

Tooru (Matsuyama) grew up on the Tateyama Mountain Range but rebelled against his strict father and moved to the city to take up a job as a financial trader. When he discovers that his father has died, he travels back to the mountains for the funeral and decides to stay. At first he finds the transition from city to wilderness tough but he finds the place good for him. Then, a strange man named Goro (Toyokawa) appears and claims to be a friend of Tooru’s late father…

Website

Gift   

Japanese Title: Gift

Romaji: Gift

Running Time: 116 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Taro Miyaoka

Writer: Yukari Nakamura (Screenplay),

Starring: Kenichi Endo, Ren Matsui,

Zenzo Shinozaki (Endo) is retiring from his role as a company president but there’s nobody waiting for him since his bad temper alienated others. Saori Yaane (Matsui) is a hostess who killer her mother to protect a sibling. Zenzo pays Saori 100 million yen for 100 hours of her time for a journey they take together…

Website

High Kick Angels  

Japanese Title:ハイキック・エンジェルス

Romaji: Haikikku Enjerusu

Running Time: 90 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Kazuhiro Yokoyama

Writer: Fuyuhiko Nishi (Screenplay),

Starring: Kanon Miyahara, Risako Ito, Mayu Kawamoto, Hirona Nagashima, Ryu Nakatani, Chisato Morishita, Nana,

The girls of a high school’s action film club love Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan and head to an abandoned school to shoot their movie “High Kick Angels” but a gang breaks in and seals the place off! The girls have no choice but to break out and break some faces in the process!

Website

Fig Tree’s Forest    

Japanese Title:無花果の森

Romaji: Ichijiku no Mori

Running Time: 108 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Tomoyuki Furumaya

Writer: Makoto Hayashi (Screenplay), Mariko Koike (Novel)

Starring: Yoon Hak, Natsuki Harada, Masaki Miura, Kyoko Enami

Young-Ho (Yoon Hak) travelled from Korea to Japan to study journalism and found work as a paparazzi. His job got him involved in a domestic violence story involving an internationally famous conductor Yoshihiko Shintani (Miura) and his beautiful wife Izumi (Harada). She ran away and set herself up as a housekeeper with a painter named Yaeko Tenbo (Enami) in a rural town. Young-Ho meets Izumi again. Could they be in love and what will happen between them?

Website

My Man  

Japanese Title:私の男

Romaji: Watashi no Otoko

Running Time: 128 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Kazuyoshi Kumakiri

Writer: Takashi Ujita (Screenplay), Kazuki Sakuraba (Novel)

Starring: Tadanobu Asano, Fumi Nikaido, Kengo Kora, Tatsuya Fuji, Taiga, Itsuki Sagara, Aoba Kawai,

This looks like the release of the week what with the awesome cast with Tadanobu Asano (Vital) and Fumi Nikaido (Why Don’t You Play in Hell?) acting alongside each other.

When Hana (Nikaido) lost her family to an earthquake and tsunami at the age of 9 she is taken into care by a relative named Jungo (Asano). Hana declares that she will never leave Jungo but years later she marries a man named Yoshiro Ozaki (Kora). When she returns from her honeymoon, Jungo is missing…

Website

My Hawaiian Discovery   

Japanese Title:わたしのハワイの歩きかた

Romaji: Watashi no Hawaii no Arukikata

Running Time: 119 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Koji Maeda

Writer: Ryo Takada (Screenplay),

Starring: Rin Takanashi, Nana Eikura, Koji Seto Ryo Kase, Yuri Nakamura, Jun Yoshinaga, Shohei Uno, Sosuke Ikematsu, Misa Uehara, Miyuki Sato,

Minori (Eikura) is a magazine editor who is happy with life (what? No drama???). She heads off to Hawaii to help a friend out with her wedding. In Hawaii she meets Akane (Takanashi), a woman hunting for a husband, Tsutomu (Seto), a businessman pursuing a dream, and Tomoya (Kase), the son of a wealthy man. The four explore Hawaii together.

Website

Maria no Chibusa 

Japanese Title:マリアの乳房

Romaji: Maria no Chibusa

Running Time: 85 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Takahisa Zeze

Writer: Takahisa Zeze (Screenplay),

Starring: Shima Onishi, Kokone Sasaki, Daisuke Iijima, Kiyomi Ito, Taijiro Tamura, Yota Kawase, Takuya Matsunaga,

Kokone Sasaki stars as a girl named Masao who has ESP. She can detect when a person will die when she touches their skin. She disappears and takes up work as a prostitute but men who go with her wind up dying. A man name Tachibana (Onishi) tracks her down and revenge may be involved…

Website

Sweet Poolside   

Japanese Title:スイートプールサイド

Romaji: Sui-to Pu-rusaido

Running Time: 103 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Daigo Matsui

Writer: Daigo Matsui (Screenplay), Shuzo Oshimi (Manga)

Starring: Yuiko Kariya, Kenta Suga, Mitsuki Tanimura, Moe Arai, Motoki Ochiai, Shota Totsuka, Takayuki Kinoshita, Go Riju,

Toshihiko Ota is part of the male swim team and has so little hair he is bullied. Ayako Goto is a part of the female swim team ad has lots of hair. Presumably love blossoms…

Website

Oh! Invisible Man/ Invisible Girl Appearance?     

Japanese Title: Oh!透明人間　インビジブルガール登場!?

Romaji: Oh! Tohmei Ningen Inbijiburu Ga-ru Tojou!?

Running Time: 72 mins

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Director: Akiraman Magita

Writer: Akiraman Magita (Screenplay), Yasuhiro Nakanishi (Manga)

Starring: Asuka Kishi, Yoshikazu Kotani, Misato Hirata,

It’s an adaptation of a manga where a guy gets to be invisible after eating salmon roe or something and he spies on girls only it looks like there’s a girl with the same power and blah, blah, hentai, hentai. It looks like there’s some shounen ai as well. Serves the invisible guy right for sneaking into showers other people are using…

As should be clear from the above I’m not interested in this one in the slightest but it’s a popular manga/film series so maybe I’m missing out. Funnily enough, I was reading volume 9 of The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service and amidst all of the pop-culture references, there’s one for Oh! Invisible Man plus one of those awesome cultural notes from Carl Gustav Horn. In the same chapter, there’s a reference to Mamoru Oshii, one of my favourite directors.

Website

Tokyo Densetsu: Kyofu no Ningen Jigoku  

Japanese Title: 劇場版東京伝説歪んだ異形都市

Romaji: Gekijouban Tokyo Densetsu: Yuganda Igyou Toshi

Release Date: June 14^th, 2014 (Japan)

Running Time: 69 mins.

Director: Seiji Chiba

Writer: Seiji Chiba (Screenplay), Yumeaki Hirayama (Original Manga),

Starring: Mei Kurokawa, Airi Nakajima, Akira Onogawa,

Yumeaki Hirayama’s horror manga gets another adaptation where random young women get chased by psychotic and vaguely supernatural men. A guy in a wheelchair in a hotel, a guy looking for a stuffed bear and a guy in a forest with a baseball bat.

Website

Inazuma Eleven Hyperdimensional Dream Match   

Japanese Title: イナズマイレブン　超次元ドリームマッチ

Romaji: Inazuma Eleven Chou Jigen Dori-mu Macchi

Release Date: June 13^th, 2014 (Japan)

Running Time: 50 mins.

Director: Seiji Chiba

Writer: Seiji Chiba (Screenplay), Yumeaki Hirayama (Original Manga),

Starring: Junko Takeuchi (Mamoru Endou), Hirofumi Nojima (Shuuya Gouenji), Hiroyuki Yoshino (Yuuto Kidou),

The Level 5 football game Inazuma Eleven is released in a handful of cinemas in Tokyo.

Website

Be My Baby (2014) (UK Premiere)   

Japanese Title: 恋の渦

Romaji: Koi no Uzu

Release Date: March 30^th 2013 (Japan)

Running Time: 138 mins

Director: Hitoshi Ōne

Writer: Daisuke Miura (Original work/Screenplay),

Starring: Kenta Niikura, Naoko Wakai, Chihiro Shibata, Yuumi Goto, Kenta Enya, Hiroki Ueda, Daisuke Sawamura, Aya Kunitake, Sadaharu Matsushita,

Seen at Terracotta Far East Film Festival 2014.

Audiences used to the stereotypes of Japan where everything is kawaii and the people are all formality, blushing confessions, shyness and kindness, all the desu and degozaimasu heard in keigo (honorific language) will be in for a shock as “Be My Baby” exposes an unpleasant underbelly of J-pop culture with a bruising blue-black comedy about a group of fashion-conscious sex obsessed characters with more interest in carnal pleasures than their futures. “Be My Baby”  is a razor-sharp satire of “gyaru” culture which sticks the camera into the steamy and grimy love lives of a group of sleazy, emotionally damaged and desperate characters who betray each other with hilarious and scary ease.

The film opens in a cramped Tokyo apartment which is going to be the location of a potluck party for a group of twenty-somethings.

The hosts are the desperately congenial Tomoko (Wakai) and her alpha-male boyfriend Koji (Niikura). They hope to set up Koji’s friend Osamu (Enya) with Tomoko’s co-worker Yuko (Goto) who is billed as looking like the AKB48 idol Mariko Shinoda.

Also invited is Tomoko’s friend, the rather foxy and rather forward and seemingly sophisticated Kaori (Shibata) and Koji’s friend Yuta (Matsuzawa) who brings his childhood friend and flat mate Takashi (Sawamura), a puppyish clown fresh from the countryside who is trying to make it in Tokyo. They are soon joined by Koji’s cool brother Naoki (Ueda) and his docile girlfriend Satomi (Kunitake).

Everybody at this party has part-time jobs, most working during the night, so this is their chance to don gaudy clothes, party, blow off steam and have fun. It sounds innocent enough until the boys start talking and their idea of fun is revealed as being loud and obnoxious and Osamu is the punchline of every joke. The biggest joke for the guys soon appears when Yuko shows up and she proves to be less sexy than advertised.

The guys are beside themselves at the prospect of seeing Osamu and Yuko together and when he shows up they launch into a tirade of jokes aimed at Yuko and Osamu. The night ends awkwardly.

Things get a lot messier hours later and the guys and girls are back in their own apartments and relationships are examined. Takashi is obsessed with Kaori and seemingly catches her heart while Koji’s domineering attitude results in him emotionally bullying and arguing with Tomoko over a social slight and she responds with nothing but apologies. Satomi is bothered by Naoki’s inattention. Meanwhile, Osamu, seemingly dead-set against Yuko, takes her home. 

And things get even messier as the film proceeds…

“Be My Baby” is an indie film with a cast of excellent actors who deliver convincing performances in a scourging black comedy. It is also an important title because it gives an insight into a new trend emerging in Japanese cinema with the workshop system, an alternative to the traditional studio system that quickly produces fresh work.

“Be My Baby” is the latest release from Cinema Impact, a filmmaking workshop where actors pay money to a producer who hires an experienced director and crew and gets the film shot. The actors find themselves the stars of a feature with a degree of buzz attached to it, thanks to the hired talent involved whilst also gaining valuable experience.

In the tough and highly competitive world of Japanese filmmaking where actors are worked hard in multiple features and salaries are low, this is a guarantee of an appearance in a feature and it acts as a calling card for the actors.

“Be My Baby” was shot in four days in a few in-door sets for a budget of under $10,000 with Hitoshi One, director of the mainstream big budget mega-hit Moteki (Love Strikes!) crossing over to the indie world to provide the actors with the best stage to display their craft. His direction and the film’s screenplay provides the actors with the best calling card to introduce the actors to the movie world.

Give us a bit of a laugh

The script has its roots in a theatre production by the director and dramatist Daisuke Miura and its theatre origins are clear from the way the film is dialogue heavy, demanding that the actors be pitch-perfect in the way they deliver their rapid-fire lines if they are to maintain character.

The actors do maintain it and with skill. They don the tacky and trashy fashion and they dye their hair and adopt the vocal intonations with such skill that they disappear into the roles which are tragi-comic as we see a bunch of twenty-somethings act like overgrown teens  bouncing into and out of bad relationships and deriving a degree of entertainment from it.

Physically and verbally, the actors hit the mark. Their behaviour reminds one of vulgar teenagers who are simultaneously hyper self-aware and self-conscious. They project big personas full of bravado but are essentially unsure of themselves. Boys may spout misogynistic lines and berate their girls, but behind the macho façade is the fear of losing them as is revealed by the way they can switch from yelling abuse to being love-sick puppies or begging for forgiveness and the stares they have when their partner talks to another guy. The girls demean themselves by clinging on to the men, appealing to their egos by being nymphos or apologising relentlessly to the point of incoherence but when not with their guys, they can be quite ruthless in their dealings with each other.

The way characters can change roles is intense and intensely insane but totally in character.

The characters barrage each other with quick-fire lines full of latent hatred and desperate desire delivered in every vocal register. They conform to types such as domineering and submissive, sex-mad and romantic but it’s all a facade and it soon becomes clear that the characters are manipulative, superficial, parasitical, and insecure to a grimly and amusingly absurd degree as they spin back and forth betraying each other.

Characters can be self-demeaning and duplicitous and there is comedy seeing the constantly changing situations and characters switch personas from friends to enemies, aggressive to apologetic.

One gets the sense that these youngsters are ignoring growing up so they can keep playing a role but there’s also the feeling that the characters seem profoundly broken, the women needy to the point of helplessness and the men immature and all refusing to grow up and become adults. It makes the comedy so jet-black as to be indistinguishable from a tragedy and laughing felt difficult.

What makes it even more intense is the way the film has been caught by the camera which is why an experienced director like Hitoshi One was hired. He takes a relentlessly close approach to filming the scenes and we feel like we’re ploughing into the intimate lives of a group of no-hopers. The few locations and tight, cluttered sets where the walls are plastered with posters of gravure idols are a sign of the low-budget put to good use as it forces the actors to be constantly on top of each other.

We are trapped in the tiny rooms littered with items that tell so much about the character’s consumerist lifestyles. They love their gaudy gyaru get-ups, the sparkly clothes and the dyed hair, the video games and smart phones with which they constantly check up on each other and this all serves as a distraction from the fact that, despite putting on confident fronts, they don’t really know what they want and have avoided thinking about their futures. The only thing they care about is their image and sex and those tight sets ensure that the erotic frisson is delivered as they paw each other.

For actors who need to be put on display so their talent can shine, the script is perfect since it gives them a series of such talky and callous, insincere characters in a series of scenes that expose their falseness and inner troubles both physically and verbally. The constant use of close-ups and mid-shots reveal a group of actors who have become absorbed in their characters. These are products of gyaru culture.

The only downside is that spending over two hours with these people can be trying and twenty minutes could be shaved off.

The ending is very open. None of the characters looks to be in possession of anything like a new perspective on life or maturity and it is troubling and realistic to see the lack of resolution. One hopes that they grow up. One also hopes that the actors get more work from this title because the idea that any of these actors had to pay to work is frankly insane as they are so massively talented that they create characters who are scarily believable. See this film if you want to witness a tour-de-force in acting, directing and set design.

4/5