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September 09, 2024
 

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Mark Schilling
A cold and self-centered 21-year-old (Yuumi Kawai) drifts through life in Yoko Yamanaka's “Desert of Namibia.”
CULTURE / Film
Sep 5, 2024
'Desert of Namibia' makes its difficult protagonist hard to hate
Yoko Yamanaka's enigmatically titled drama is true to the messy complexity of human beings and their relationships in its own quirky and sharply observant way.
Hiroshi Sunairi’s documentary “From Okinawa with Love” follows the unwavering Okinawan photographer Mao Ishikawa, who made her name documenting the relationships between Japanese bar girls and African American servicemen.
CULTURE / Film
Aug 30, 2024
‘From Okinawa with Love’: A revealing documentary about a true original
Hiroshi Sunairi takes a fly-on-the-wall approach to explore the life of Mao Ishikawa, who photographed Okinawans and the effects of the U.S. military.
A grandmother fights back when the angry ghost of a social recluse starts killing off family members in “House of Sayuri.”
CULTURE / Film
Aug 29, 2024
'House of Sayuri': J-horror fights ghosts with pitch-black humor
Koji Shiraishi’s horror comedy matches the darkness of the deeds on display with a fiery grandma who takes on a wicked spirit with her tai chi skills.
A Tokyo man who scuttles around the city in a dirty cardboard box finds himself fighting off odd characters in Gakuryu Ishii’s “The Box Man.”
CULTURE / Film
Aug 17, 2024
'The Box Man': Absurdist Kobo Abe adaptation speaks to the present
Director Gakuryu Ishii makes the novel’s philosophical musings and metaphorical conundrums more audience-friendly while saying something true about the modern day.
An unemployed man (Eita Okuno) whose community was decimated by the Great East Japan Earthquake grapples with rebuilding his life in “Shinpei.”
CULTURE / Film
Aug 8, 2024
‘Shinpei’ takes on 3/11 disaster with a fresh angle
Tatsuro Yamashiro infuses his drama centered on a complex protagonist struggling with the Great East Japan Earthquake’s aftermath with humor and visual beauty.
Talented radio announcer Nobutaka Wada (Go Morita) becomes conscience-stricken about pushing the Japanese government’s propaganda during World War II in “The Voices at War.”
CULTURE / Film
Aug 1, 2024
‘The Voices at War’ shines light on wartime radio announcers
The NHK film holds up a smudged mirror to the role its predecessor, Radio Japan, and its employees played in serving as government mouthpieces during World War II.
A substitute teacher (Nagisa Shibuya, center front) at a junior high school finds herself caught up in strange goings-on with violent outcomes in “Who’s That Girl?”
CULTURE / Film
Jul 26, 2024
‘Who’s That Girl?’: Junior high school antics just got scarier
J-horror master Takashi Shimizu’s latest offers familiar genre elements with a practiced hand and fresh twists.
Three sisters bicker over their resentments and frustrations during a weekend at a hot spring resort in Ryosuke Hashiguchi’s “To Mom, With Love.”
CULTURE / Film
Jul 18, 2024
'To Mom, With Love': Family drama cuts deep with stellar cast
Ryosuke Hashiguchi’s heartfelt love letter to the "home drama" genre resembles a screwball comedy while also unleashing eruptions of real pain and anger.
Actor Kim Dae-gun won a Korean Fantastic Actor award for his performance in Yoon Eunkyoung’s “The Tenants,” which takes a dark satirical look at the scarcity of decent affordable housing in Seoul.
CULTURE / Film
Jul 18, 2024
Bucheon film festival contemplates a future with AI
Dark comedy and surreal fantasy stood out at the genre film event that focused on the advent of generative AI.
When the effects of dementia cause Yohji (left, Tatsuya Fuji) to spiral out of control, it becomes clear to his son (Mirai Moriyama) that he has been absent from his life in more ways than one in Kei Chikaura’s “Great Absence.”
CULTURE / Film
Jul 11, 2024
‘Great Absence’: Poetic family drama follows downfall of dementia-plagued patriarch
A retired professor’s mind is slipping away from him, but there is more to unravel in Kei Chikaura’s dark family drama.
Takashi Yamazaki’s “Godzilla Minus One,” which won an Academy Award for best visual effects, was made for a reported $15 million — a small fraction of the budgets used by its Hollywood competitors.
CULTURE / Film
Jul 6, 2024
Japanese cinema is having a stand-out year. Here are some films to watch.
The success of "Godzilla Minus One" gave Japan's film industry a confidence boost, but we haven't been short on must-see hits in 2024.
Leying (played by Jia Ling) hasn't been living up to her potential, but is pushed into a radical transformation by hitting rock bottom in the Chinese remake of a hit Japanese boxing drama in "YOLO."
CULTURE / Film
Jul 4, 2024
‘YOLO’: A classic zero-to-hero story with a real-life body transformation
Actor and comedian Jia Ling dropped 50 kilograms for her role in a Chinese remake of a hit Japanese boxing drama.
Izumi (Hana Sugisaki, left) tries to get to the bottom of a murder case that ends up going all the way to the top of Japan’s national intelligence agency.
CULTURE / Film
Jun 27, 2024
‘Sakura’: Secret agents, a murder mystery and one very determined young sleuth
Hana Sugisaki’s performance as a lowly employee in a prefectural police department stands out from typical portrayals in a domestic whodunit.
The experiences of our protagonist (Yukino Takahashi, right) and her fellow sex workers lead them to wonder if they still have some spark of humanity left in Shimpei Yamasaki’s “During the Rains.”
CULTURE / Film
Jun 20, 2024
‘During the Rains’ captures a blunt, modern glimpse of Japan’s sex industry
Yukino Takahashi’s self-immolating performance makes her character hard to like but also forces the viewer to contend with the reality of her line of work.
Tomoyo (Mei Nagano)'s life is suddenly turned upside down when she learns about the suicide of a childhood friend, in Yuki Tanada’s “My Broken Mariko."
CULTURE / Film
Jun 15, 2024
Japanese Film Festival Online gives old and new titles a second life overseas
The festival will unfold in two sessions: the first from June 5 to 19 with 23 films, and the second from June 19 to July 3 with 25 films and two TV drama series.
Why is Sayoko (Ko Shibasaki), a psychiatrist, helping a journalist torture people for revenge? Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s “Serpent’s Path” leaves you wondering which way is up as the sinister plot unfolds.
CULTURE / Film
Jun 13, 2024
Kurosawa’s cult classic gets a French makeover in ‘Serpent’s Path’
Ko Shibasaki’s basilisk-like stare underpins a remake which leaves the audience unable to solve the whodunit.
After a teenage girl loses her parents, she grapples with her new reality under an aunt’s guardianship in “Worlds Apart.”
CULTURE / Film
Jun 6, 2024
‘Worlds Apart’ explores family, loss and unconventional ideas of love
A 15-year-old girl is orphaned when her parents die right before her eyes.
Saori (Satomi Ishihara) is thrust into a parent’s worst nightmare when her daughter goes missing, and her socially awkward brother emerges as the prime suspect.
CULTURE / Film
May 30, 2024
‘Missing’: A kidnapping story fully aware of loss
Keisuke Yoshida’s “Missing” explores a mother’s anguish (without overdoing it), commenting on modern Japan’s dark media landscape.
The documentary short “Now and Then" traces how the Beatles honored John Lennon after his death by crafting a tune he wrote into the “last Beatles song.”
CULTURE / Film
May 30, 2024
Eight standout films to catch at this year's Short Shorts Film Festival
The event will screen roughly 270 films that range from dramas about current social issues to animations that push the limits of the imagination.
Takashi Miike (front left) is among the big-name directors slated to work with K2 Pictures, a new film production startup that aims to disrupt the Japanese film industry.
CULTURE / Film / Wide Angle
May 25, 2024
Can K2's goal of creating a better film industry in Japan win over skeptics?
While established auteurs such as Takashi Miike, Miwa Nishikawa and Hirokazu Kore-eda are slated to work with the startup, it still faces an uphill struggle.
Unpacking Japan’s messy leadership election
The Liberal Democratic Party's presidential race is expected to have a record number of candidates.
Nippon Steel's U.S. setback a wake-up for Japan Inc.'s foreign forays
A water tower at a U.S. Steel mill in Braddock, Pennsylvania, on Wednesday
Kyiv hits Russian ammo depot as Moscow advances in east
A boy stands on a destroyed Russian tank on display at Mykhailivska Square in Kyiv on Saturday.
‘When I die, I would like to come back as a rice ball’
Few in Japan may be more passionate about the 'onigiri' (rice ball) than Yumiko Ukon, owner of an onigiri specialty shop in Tokyo's Otsuka neighborhood.
As the Amazon’s biggest champion approaches 100, he’s still fighting
Brazil's Indigenous Chief Raoni Metuktire at Igarape Park in the country's Para state in 2023
Almodovar wins top Venice prize for end-of-life film
Director Pedro Almodovar poses with his Golden Lion Award during the 81st Venice Film Festival on Saturday.
U.S. and U.K. spy chiefs warn of deepening Iran-Russia military links
Director of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) William Burns arrives to testify before a closed Senate Appropriations Defense Subcommittee hearing on U.S. President Joe Biden's proposed budget request for the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency, on Capitol Hill in Washington on June 12.
No talking, no eating, no standing: Inside sumo's ring purification ceremony
A sumo referee performs the dohyō matsuri, or ring purification ceremony, in January 2017 at Ryogoku Kokugikan in Tokyo.
Demand for Calrose rice rises amid Japanese rice shortage
Shuzo Fukushi, who heads Rice Meister Kojimachi in Tokyo, shows a bag of Calrose mixed with domestic rice at his store on Thursday.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

A store clerk tries to cool things down in front of their shop by spraying a hose.
Is extreme weather changing the way Japan shops?
By Alex K.T. Martin

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