'Lust in a Karaoke Box': Celebrating the joys of student life
When I taught at colleges here in the 1980s, I marveled at my students' freedom, including freedom from study. They could spend most of their waking hours at part-time jobs or club activities and still, somehow, graduate. But, as Shinya Tamada's ensemble drama, "Lust in ...
'The Wonderland': Surface-level charm, but no true wonder
"The Wonderland," the new film from director Keiichi Hara ("Miss Hokusai"), certainly has the building blocks of something wondrous: a skilled director, top production values, and a story by beloved children's author Sachiko Kashiwaba. One of Kashiwaba's admirers is Studio Ghibli's Hayao Miyazaki, whose Academy ...
'Kingdom': An admirable try at Chinese history
Why should Japanese kids care about a manga set in China's Warring States Period, (475-221 B.C.)? The players and power struggles are hard enough for professional historians (and this reviewer) to grasp, let alone 10-year-olds. Yasuhisa Hara found a winning answer in "Kingdom," a manga ...
'Just Only Love': Looking for romance in all the wrong places
If you believe everything you read in the news, Japanese romance movies should really belong in the science fiction category. Just last week, a new study estimated that a quarter of people aged 18 to 39 in Japan had never had heterosexual intercourse, feeding ...
'Love's Twisting Path': An old-school samurai swashbuckler
Now a spry 84, Sadao Nakajima is one of the few directors from Japan's studio era who is still active. After joining Toei in 1959 and making his directorial debut in 1964, Nakajima shot yakuza actioners and samurai swashbucklers (chanbara eiga) for more than ...
'A Gambler's Odyssey 2020': A lot of controversy about nothing
Given the timid, committee-driven nature of modern Japanese film production, it's rare for anything to make it into the cinemas with even the slightest whiff of controversy still clinging to it. "A Gambler's Odyssey 2020" is a pungent exception. Kazuya Shiraishi's movie has been cultivating ...
'JK Rock': A rock 'n' roll battle of the sexes
There are many Japanese musical films about aspiring rock and pop stars (though not Hollywood-style musicals, which are seldom made here.) Among the best-loved is "Linda, Linda, Linda," Nobuhiro Yamashita's 2005 film about four teenage girls who hastily form a band and wow the ...
'Marriage Hunting Beauty': When dating dilemmas fail to excite
Last year veteran director Akiko Ohku had a breakthrough hit with "Tremble All You Want," a romantic com edy about a 24-year-old office clerk still obsessed with her girlhood crush but yet to have an actual boyfriend. Played with discombobulated verve by Mayu Matsuoka, ...
'Makuko': Love, life and that same old E.T. story
The "visitor from another planet" story is doable, even for an indie filmmaker with no budget. All you need are aliens who have assumed human forms, but don't quite get the whole humanity thing. Two recent examples are Kiyoshi Kurosawa's 2017 films "Foreboding" and ...
'Shinjuku Tiger': A story of one man and his mask
Spend enough time on the streets of Shinjuku, and you'll eventually spot a flamboyantly dressed figure in a tiger mask carrying fake flowers, stuffed animals and a boombox. This is Shinjuku Tiger, the subject of a documentary of the same name out this week. Tiger-san, ...
'Ramen Shop': Finding your family through food
Food is sustenance, food is pleasure and, as Eric Khoo's nostalgia-drenched "Ramen Shop" reminds us, food is memory. The last is not often seen in Japanese foodie movies, which tend to focus on the hero's arduous journey to mastery of a culinary art. So when the ...
'Running Again': Solving problems with a good run
Running scenes have been a staple since the start of the movies, but in the silent days the fleet-footed hero was usually trying to outrun the police. Now, competitive running in its various forms, from the ekiden relay to the marathon, has become a ...
