Happy weekend!
I have been busy writing away this week for a season of film and manga reviews I will announce on Monday. I spent a couple of hours during the first part of this month updating old reviews with information and posters and whilst doing that I got a bit nostalgiac for a period four years ago (for various reasons) and decided I wanted to watch lots of films and write about them once again for fun so I hit my DVD/film backlog and purchased some new ones. I only watched one film this week and that was the Dutch horror film The Elevator (1983). Only one post this week and that was for Japan Cuts 2015.
What’s released in Japan this weekend?
Love Live! The School Idol Movie
Japanese: ラブライブ！The School Idol Movie
Romaji: Rabu Raibu! The School Idol Movie
Release Date: June 13th, 2015
Running Time: N/A
Director: Takahiko Kyogoku
Writer: Jukki Hanada (Original Screenplay), Sakurako Kimino (Original Concept), Hajie Yatate (Original Creator),
Starring: Aina Kusuda (Nozomi Tojo), Aya Uchida (Kotori Minami), Emi Nitta (Honoka Kosaka) Yoshino Nanjou (Eri Ayase),
The film begins directly after the second season, at the graduation ceremony of the third-year students. With the graduation of the third-year members, it looks like the group μ’s will be no more so the nine girls take one last walk around the school together but when they attempt to leave the school, a single email is sent to them, and the curtain on a new story for μ’s begins…
Yowamushi Pedal Re: ROAD
Japanese: 弱虫ペダル Re:ROAD
Romaji: Yowamushi Pedal Re: ROAD
Release Date: June 12th, 2015
Running Time: N/A
Director: Osamu Nabeshima
Writer: Reiko Yoshida (Series Composition), Wataru Watanabe (Original Creator),
Starring: Daiki Yamashita (Sakamichi Onoda), Jun Fukushima (Shokichi Naruko), Atsushi Abe (Touichirou Izumida) Kousuke Toriumi (Shunsuke Imaizumi),
Yowamushi Pedal is all about an otaku named Sakamichi Onoda who loves anime and games so much he rides his bicycle to and from Tokyo’s Akihabara shopping district on 60-mile round trip over steep slopes after school. Onoda’s life changes when he encounters his school’s cycling team, and he ends up joining the competitive sport of bicycle racing. The film compiles episodes from the second season of the TV anime and will also include new animation.
Sakana-kun Kenkyuujo Sakana no Sekai he Rettsugyo-! Tobu! Tatakau! Odoru! Hen
Japanese: さかなクン研究所 さかなの世界へレッツギョー！ 飛ぶ！闘う！踊る！編
Romaji: Sakana-kun Kenkyuujo Sakana no Sekai he Rettsugyo-! Tobu! Tatakau! Odoru! Hen
Release Date: June 12th, 2015
Running Time: 45 mins.
Director: Osamu Nabeshima
Writer: N/A
Starring: Sakana-kun, Naoki Tatsuta, Sara Nakayama,
Kids, this is your chance to see the popular television show Sakana-kun on the big screen and learn more about fish and researching them. The theme for this one is fly – Tobu, Fight – Tatakau, dance – odour and we see examples of that fro a fierce turf war in the seas to flying fish!
Our Little Sister (International Title) / Umimachi Diary
Japanese: 海街 Diary
Romaji: Umimachi Diary
Release Date: June 13th, 2015
Running Time: 126 mins.
Director: Hirokazu Koreeda
Writer: Shin Adachi (Screenplay), Akimi Yoshida (Original Manga)
Starring: Haruka Ayase, Masami Nagasawa, Kaho, Suzu Hirose, Shinobu Otake, Shinichi Tsutsumi, Ryo Kase, Jun Fubuki, Ryohei Suzuki, Oshiro Maeda, Lily Franky, Kirin Kiki
Our Little Sister/Umimachi Diary was at this year’s Cannes Film Festival where it impressed critics in the first week and then sank without a trace. Is the story too slight? It is based on an award-winning josei manga series created by Akimi Yoshida and the film is directed by Hirokazu Koreeda, the auteur behind Kiseki, Nobody Knows, After Life, Still Walking, and Like Father, Like Son, films which prove very popular with international audiences.. He brings back a lot of collaborators from previous films like Lily Franky (Judge!) and Jun Fubuki (Like Father, Like Son), Kirin Kiki, Oshiro Maeda (the cuter younger brother in Kiseki), and Haruka Ayase (Real). It looks like a solid drama.
29-year-old Sachi Kouda (Ayase), 22-year-old Yoshino Kouda (Nagasawa), and 19-year-old Chika Kouda (Kaho) live in a house once owned by their grandmother in Kamakura. Their parents are divorced, their father having left them fifteen years ago. When they learn of their father’s death they decide to attend his funeral where they meet their 14-year-old sister Suzu Asano (Hirose) who has nobody to care for her. Sachi invites her to join them in Kamakura.
Lyre no Inori
Japanese: ライアの祈り
Romaji: Raia no Inori
Release Date: June 13th, 2015
Running Time: 119 mins.
Director: Hiroyuki Kurokawa
Writer: Toshio Terada (Screenplay), Akio Morisawa (Original Story)
Starring: Anju Suzuki, Takashi Ukaji, Rina Takeda, Takayuki Takuma Yoko Oshima, Takehiro,
Rina Takeda, the martial artist, continues to prove her acting abilities with an appearance in a love story centred on archeology. Takashi Ukaji (Wild 7). It’s all about people connecting with each other because of their interest in a historical era in Japan, the Jomon period. The last film I watched with this very theme was Mai Mai Miracle!
Goro (Ukaji) is an archeologist, fascinated with the Jomon period and the national treasure Gassho-Dogu clay figurine. Another person with an interest in the period is Momoko (Suzuki) who seems to have memories of a past life from the Jomon period. Goro is fascinated by these dreams and the two start a timid relationship.
Rolling
Japanese: ローリング
Romaji: Ro-ringu
Release Date: June 13th, 2015
Running Time: 93 mins.
Director: Masanori Tominaga
Writer: Masanori Tominaga (Screenplay),
Starring: Takahiro Miura, Elisa Yanage, Reiko Mori, Hirohiko Sugiyama,
This is an original film (not an adaptation of a book or dorama) from the director of Vengeance Can Wait and it looks really good!
The story takes place in a city called Mito and it concerns a man named Kanichi (Miura). He comes into contact with a former teacher named Gondo who was fired from his job as a teacher for secretly filming girls. Gonda seems to have reformed because he is in a relationship with a hostess named Mihari but Kanichi falls in love with her and this is the first part of a disastrous chain of events for Gondo who may not have given up old habits…
Aru Torishirabe
Japanese: ある取り調べ
Romaji: Aru Torishirabe
Release Date: June 13th, 2015
Running Time: 90 mins.
Director: Akio Murahashi
Writer: Ryota Nakanishi (Screenplay),
Starring: Ryota Nakanishi, Yoichiro Saito, Ayumi Nishi, B-saku Sato,
In this film we see a man arrested on suspicion of killing his wife and son and the guy pleads for the death penalty! A veteran detective is brought in to interrogate the man.
Shiro Majo Gakuen Owari to Hajimari (Innocent Lilies: The end and the beginning
Japanese: 白魔女学園 オワリトハジマリ
Romaji: Shiro Majo Gakuen Owari to Hajimari
Release Date: June 13th, 2015
Running Time: 90 mins.
Director: Koichi Sakamoto
Writer: Reiko Yoshida (Screenplay),
Starring: Dempagumi.inc members – Mirin Furukawa, Risa Aizawa, Nemu Yumemi, Eimi Naruse, Ayane Fujisaki and Moga Mogami, regular actors/seiyuu Fuuka Nishihira, Nina Endo, Shou Tomita, Ibuki Tsuji, Rin Honoka, Usa Sakurano, Kasumi Yamaya, Haruka Tomatsu, Shusuke Saitou, Rina Koike, Mao Shido, Miyuki Torii, Kasumi Yamaya, Haruka Tomatsu
Back in September 2013, TV Asahi and Toei partnered up to create the Innocent Lilies series and film which starred the members of the Japanese idol girl group Dempagumi.inc. The sequel gets released today!
The girls at the White Witch Academy all want to become a White Witch and are learning witchcraft techniques to develop their magical powers but there is a lot of danger involved!
NEET of the Living Dead
Japanese: ニート・オブ・ザ・デッド
Romaji: Nito Obu Za Deddo
Release Date: June 13th, 2015
Running Time: 38 mins.
Director: Akio Nanki
Writer: Akio Nanki (Screenplay),
Starring: Mariko Tsutsui, Houka Kinoshita, Suzuko Kaneko, Horiken.
A home drama about a family with a NEET in their midst mixed with the horror of a zombie siege. Is the NEET son a zombie already?
Yuigon
Japanese: 遺言
Romaji: Yuigon
Release Date: June 13th, 2015
Running Time: 32 mins.
Director: Kosuke Kibe
Writer: Kosuke Kibe, Naoyuk Sumita (Screenplay),
Starring: Zatsutaro Idenshi, Kazuo Kaneko, Motoi Koyanagi, Kyoko Matsumoto, Naho Nakajima, Nobuyoshi Nishida, Makoto Obata,
The cast for this is great because it includes the actor who performed motion capture procedures for Lightning Naho Nakashima (IMDB has her listed as Naho Nakajima), in Final Fantasy XIII and one of the seiyuu for the anime Shirobako, Motoi Koyanagi.
Kyoko coul not kill her husband who had been zombified, she found it too tough. Instead she gets a vigilante to do the deed and take her other half to an execution ground for zombies but the task proves far more difficult than any of them could have imagined…
The Guidepost
Japanese: 道しるべ
Romaji: Michishirube
Release Date: June 13th, 2015
Running Time: 97 mins.
Director: Shigeyuki Tanaka,
Writer: Mitsuru Osumi (Screenplay),
Starring: Makiko Watanabe, Mari Hideyuki Kanaya, Takashi Nishima,
This looks like a mistaken identity comedy where a fraudster and an apprentice care-giver with the same name and waaiting at the same spot get picked up by the wrong cars which were meant for the other guy and driven to the wrong workplace.
Random music video:
