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Mark Schilling
CULTURE / Film
Oct 9, 2009
Osamu Dazai: genius, but no saint
Major Japanese cultural figures often become subjects of films when big birth or death anniversaries roll around. The hero (far more rarely, the heroine) is usually portrayed as a sainted genius, tragic or otherwise. Osamu Dazai, however, was one such figure who didn't fit the saint template.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Oct 9, 2009
'Villon no Tsuma'/'Pandora no Hako'
Kichitaro Negishi's "Villon no Tsuma" ("Villon's Wife") is based on an Osamu Dazai short story with autobiographical overtones: An alcoholic writer steals a large sum of money from a small drinking establishment and, when he does a disappearing act, his wife offers to pay it back by working for the owners...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Oct 9, 2009
A twisted path to true love
Born in Tokyo in 1950, Kichitaro Negishi got his start in the film industry making soft-porn movies for the Nikkatsu studio. He directed his first film, "Orion no Satsui yori: Joji no Hoteishiki" ("From Orion's Testimony: Formula for Murder") in 1978 and in 1981 made his straight-feature debut with "Enrai"...
CULTURE / Film
Oct 2, 2009
'Akumu no Elevator'
Movies are confidence tricks played on willing victims. The bullets are blanks and the sex is faked, but we usually want to believe, as long as the lights are down, that it's all real. Creating that belief — or rather, that suspension of disbelief — has long been Hollywood's goal.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Sep 25, 2009
'Air Doll'
Hirokazu Kore'eda is the most internationally acclaimed Japanese director of his generation, whose films are regularly invited to major world festivals and receive the sort of respectful attention from foreign scholars and critics usually accorded only to dead Golden Age masters.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Sep 18, 2009
'Kamui Gaiden '
Producers, both here and abroad, have been busy scouting film properties among the anime and manga of the 1960s and 1970s, from kiddie cartoon fluff such as "Yattaman" to the apocalyptic thriller "MW," created by manga maestro Osamu Tezuka.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Sep 11, 2009
'Symbol'
Every once in a while, a distributor will ask audiences not to reveal anything about a film's ending — a gimmick that became popular with "The Crying Game" (1992).
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Sep 4, 2009
'Killer Virgin Road'
Are most single women obsessed with marriage despite their protests to the contrary? Disappointed in love, do they fall to insecure pieces, taking solace in late-night cartons of ice cream?
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 28, 2009
'Ballad: Namonaki Koi no Uta'
Takashi Yamazaki was known primarily as a computer-graphics whiz when he directed the ensemble drama "Always Sanchome no Yuhi" ("Always: Sunset on Third Street," 2005). True to form, the recreation of 1950s Tokyo by Yamazaki's team at the Shirogumi effects house was hyper-realistically detailed, while...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 21, 2009
'20-Seiki Shonen'
Yukihiko Tsutsumi's hit "20-Seiki Shonen" ("20th Century Boys") trilogy is based on one of those "what if" premises that may look almost childishly obvious, but, from a commercial standpoint, is simply brilliant.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 21, 2009
Indie hardman opens the tear ducts
Sion Sono is Japan's edgy indie director par excellence, whose internationally acclaimed films expose social ills and challenge taboos in a variety of genres and moods, from the death-trip chills of "Jisatsu Circle" ("Suicide Club," 2001) to the black-comic laughs of "Ai no Mukidashi" ("Love Exposure,"...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 14, 2009
'Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl'
Japanese filmmakers will almost always tell you that they make films for the domestic market first and foremost. If foreigners happen to like them too, that's a nice little bonus, like an after-dinner mint.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 7, 2009
'Summer Wars'
"Revenge," George Orwell once wrote, "is bitter," but it can also be sweet, can't it?
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jul 31, 2009
'Yamagata Scream'
Japanese horror movies, under the label J-Horror, were once quite the international thing. Hollywood remade the shockers "Ring" (1998) and "Juon" ("The Grudge," 2002), while foreign video labels snapped up rights to the originals. All that is now a distant memory, though. Fantastic film festivals in...
CULTURE / Books
Jul 26, 2009
The quirky terrain of an otaku mind
"Otaku" is one of those Japanese words that has no precise equivalent in English. "Geek" translates the knowledgeability as well as the social ineptness of the stereotypical otaku, but not quite his (and, more rarely, her) intense interest in what so-called serious adults regard as trivial pursuits:...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jul 24, 2009
'Amalfi'
Films produced by Fuji TV — one of Japan's five national TV networks — have regularly hit the top of the box-office charts in the past decade. Fuji's biggest franchise started in 1998 with "Odoru Daisosasen The Movie" ("Bayside Shakedown"), a thriller starring Yuji Oda as a rambunctious detective...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jul 17, 2009
'Futoko'
Since its start in 1978, the Pia Film Festival has served as a proving ground for young Japanese indie filmmakers, with many of its prize winners going on to greater fame, if not always fortune. Among them are Ryosuke Hashiguchi ("Gururi no Koto"), Shinobu Yaguchi ("Happy Flight"), Naoko Ogigami ("Kamome...
CULTURE / Film
Jul 10, 2009
'Kani Kosen'
Why does a novel about exploited workers on a crab cannery boat, published 80 years ago by a young communist writer, later tortured to death by the police, become a hot movie property now?
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jul 3, 2009
'MW'
Japanese live-action films based on manga take various forms, from the silly to the serious, though few are anything like Hollywood comic-book movies, whose superheroes, with their CG-assisted superpowers, are pure wish fulfillment. It's not that the Japanese films are always less fantastic, but their...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jun 26, 2009
'Dear Doctor'
Movies about impostors and grifters tend to view their roguish heroes with everything from indulgence to outright admiration, but rarely disapproval. One reason, I think, is that the movie business attracts BS artists of every stripe, from the hustlers peddling grade-Z action pics in film market booths...
New ‘immigration minister’ post signals Takaichi Cabinet’s priorities
Kimi Onoda, economic security minister and minister for harmonious coexistence with foreign nationals, arrives at the prime minister's office in Tokyo on Tuesday.
Rare female yakuza walks path to redemption in Japan
Retired yakuza Mako Nishimura sorts fallen leaves during a clean-up activity at the Gifu Gokoku shrine in Gifu Prefecture on Sept. 28.
Takaichi to put defense push in spotlight in bid to satiate Trump demands
Japan's Ground Self-Defense Force personnel march during the joint multinational exercise Garuda Shield 2025 at the Baturaja combat training center in Lampung, Indonesia, last month.
Takaichi focuses on economic and security concerns in first policy speech
Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi delivers her first policy speech in the Lower House in Tokyo on Friday.
Driving in Japan isn’t hard. Getting the license is.
The byzantine process for converting a foreign driver’s license into a Japanese one entails mountains of paperwork and significant stamina — unless you're a lucky license holder from a country or region where these requirements are waived.
New ‘immigration minister’ post signals Takaichi Cabinet’s priorities
Kimi Onoda, economic security minister and minister for harmonious coexistence with foreign nationals, arrives at the prime minister's office in Tokyo on Tuesday.
The newly formed LDP-JIP coalition may not be as solid as it seems
Ruling Liberal Democratic Party President Sanae Takaichi and Japan Innovation Party leader Hirofumi Yoshimura sign a policy agreement between the two parties at the Diet in Tokyo on Monday.
AI-optimized cybercrime increasingly targeting Japan
A recent cyberattack on brewer Asahi Group Holdings resulted in the company suspending shipments.
K-pop idol Chanyeol does J-pop his own way on ‘Hibi’
South Korean singer Chanyeol made his Japanese-language solo debut with the EP “Hibi,” which features six tracks inspired by his love of Japanese music.
London exhibition perhaps sumo's most successful trip abroad
With the recent sumo jaunt to London being essentially a goodwill exercise, <i>rikishi</i> were far more outgoing and relaxed than normal.

Podcast

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

Longform

The byzantine process for converting a foreign driver’s license into a Japanese one entails mountains of paperwork and significant stamina — unless you're a lucky license holder from a country or region where these requirements are waived.
Driving in Japan isn’t hard. Getting the license is.
By Thu-Huong Ha and Mike Fu

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