Tag - national-film-center

 
 

NATIONAL FILM CENTER

Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jun 28, 2016
Admiring the tarnished silver screen
Old chewing gum, cheap carpet sticky from spilled drinks, sagging seats pitted with cigarette burns: Satoshi Chuma's photographs of old cinemas on show at the National Film Center are fantastically evocative of the decline and fall of celluloid.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film / Wide Angle
Jun 3, 2015
Festival of off-center European films comes to Tokyo and Kyoto
One of the main goals of a film festival is to show movies that audiences won't get to see otherwise. For the festival operators there's another objective: testing reactions to films and stories, and using that information for marketing purposes. And with the number of film festivals being held in Japan on the rise, it's a win-win. If you want to see quality movies that may not get a theatrical release (and to encourage distributors to bring over more interesting movies), visit your local film fest for a sampling of undiscovered gems.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Mar 5, 2015
Imagery that sings the praises of the musical
"They're Wooin' and Doin' the Things Boys and Girls Like to Do . . . ." This is the message of many of the posters made for Hollywood musicals currently being exhibited at the National Film Center in Tokyo. Liza Minnelli, Mitzi Gaynor and Gwen Verdon, among others, titillate with unfeasibly thin waists, long legs, accentuated breasts and catch lines like "I'll see you in my dreams" and "Les Girls (Rhymes With 'Playgirls')." This is surprising for a genre that is more usually considered light family entertainment, but it goes to show that the musical can be quite a flexible format.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Nov 13, 2014
Singing to quite a different tune
In the sense that "The Sound of Music" is not considered a reliable source for lessons about Nazism or that "My Fair Lady" is a profound analysis of class struggle, musicals do not generally spring to mind when considering the great achievements of French cinema. However, the National Film Center exhibition offering a retrospective overview of film director Jacques Demy's career is so entrancing it's not hard to see why the reputation of this auteur has been reassessed in recent years.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Aug 21, 2014
'The Enchanted World of Jacques Demy'
French filmmaker Jacques Demy's New Wave interpretation of the musical "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg" (1964) is perhaps his most famous film, but he made numerous other unusual musicals, including "The Young Girls of Rochefort" (1967) and "Lady Oscar" (1979), which was co-produced in Japan and France and inspired by Riyoko Ikeda's popular manga "The Rose of Versailles."
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Aug 21, 2013
'Czech Posters for Films From the Collection of Terry Posters'
The Czech Republic is often admired for its high-quality picture books, puppetry and animation, but it is perhaps less well-known as a nation that has produced many great movie-poster designs.

Longform

Historically, kabuki was considered the entertainment of the merchant and peasant classes, a far cry from how it is regarded today.
For Japan's oldest kabuki theater, the show must go on