Tag - japanese-film

 
 

JAPANESE FILM

Takashi Yamazaki’s “Godzilla Minus One,” which won an Academy Award for best visual effects earlier this week, was made for a reported $15 million — a small fraction of the budgets used by its Hollywood competitors.
CULTURE / Film
Mar 14, 2024
'Godzilla Minus One' fought the odds and won big at the Oscars
Once mocked, the long-running monster franchise took on Hollywood's behemoths — and won.
"Tsushima: Fukushima Speaks Part 2" is directed by freelance journalist Toshikuni Doi, featuring the testimonies of people seeking the return of their hometown, which has been deemed uninhabitable for a century after the Fukushima nuclear meltdown.
JAPAN / Society
Mar 12, 2024
Film poses moral questions about 2011 Fukushima disaster displacement
The 187-minute documentary focuses on the impact the accident had on the daily lives of people who are unable to return to their hometown.
Masaki Takahashi, Takashi Yamazaki, Kiyoko Shibuya and Tatsuji Nojima celebrated winning the Oscar for best visual effects on the Dolby Theatre stage in Los Angeles, California, on Sunday.
CULTURE / Film
Mar 11, 2024
Oscars 2024: A night to remember for Japanese cinema
Filmmaking peers in Hollywood honor the excellence of two Japanese titans: Studio Ghibli and Godzilla
Wim Wenders (left) co-wrote the script for “Perfect Days” with top advertising creative Takuma Takasaki. Japanese star Koji Yakusho (right) won best actor at Cannes last year for his performance as the film’s protagonist, a taciturn toilet cleaner in Tokyo.
CULTURE / Film
Feb 27, 2024
Oscar-nominated 'Perfect Days' is 'not about toilets,' Wenders says
The director's film about a taciturn cleaner who keeps Tokyo's public toilets spotless prompts reflections on urban solitude, community and growing older.
Film director Hideo Sakaki leaves the Akasaka Police Station in Tokyo on Wednesday as police take him to prosecutors.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Feb 21, 2024
Film director Hideo Sakaki held on suspicion of sexual assault
While allegations of sexual abuse were made against Sakaki as far back as March 2022, this is the first time that the director has been taken into custody.
Women in a cotton field at a welfare facility in Yamanashi Prefecture in the film "Fujiyama Cottonton." The film aims to show audiences the everyday lives of people with disabilities.
CULTURE / Film
Feb 20, 2024
New documentary offers a look at life with disabilities in Japan
"Fujiyama Cottonton" shows how people at a welfare facility live full lives by communicating and pursuing simple passions.
"The Boy and the Heron" won the Animated Film prize at the 2024 British Academy of Film and Television Arts.
CULTURE / Entertainment news
Feb 19, 2024
Hayao Miyazaki's 'The Boy and the Heron' wins BAFTA
The film also won the Animated Prize at the Golden Globes and is a nominee for Best Animated Feature at the U.S. Academy Awards.
Diagnosed at a young age with a rare variant of glycogen storage disease type IV, Mark Bookman went on to distinguish himself in academia in both the United States and Japan.
COMMUNITY / Issues / The Foreign Element
Feb 19, 2024
New film honors life and legacy of disability pioneer Mark Bookman
Free screenings of THE new documentary on Japan-based disability rights advocate Mark Bookman will be held around Tokyo on Feb. 24, 25 and 27.
Straight-to-video films, locally called “V-Cinema,” were popular in the 1990s and into the 2000s, becoming a training ground and launchpad for Japanese directors and actors.
CULTURE / Film
Feb 8, 2024
Threatened with extinction, V-Cinema hopes for new saviors
Physical deterioration and copyright issues mar the influential film genre that once served as a launchpad for directors and actors in Japan.
Director Toshihiko Tanaka (left) is pictured in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, on Feb. 2, after his film, "Rei," won the top Tiger Award at the International Film Festival Rotterdam.
CULTURE / Film
Feb 5, 2024
Toshihiko Tanaka wins top prize for 'Rei' at Rotterdam film festival
The Japanese film "Rei" directed by Toshihiko Tanaka won the top Tiger Award at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, an annual event for up-and-coming filmmakers.
The title monster in “Godzilla Minus One” is a threat, of course, but the real story is about finding community in the wake of destruction.
CULTURE / Film
Feb 3, 2024
‘Godzilla Minus One’ stomps into ‘Oppenheimer’ territory
Those movies, along with “The Boy and the Heron,” are essentially in conversation about the moral weight of American and Japanese actions in World War II.
A man holds a poster for "The Boy and the Heron" at a movie theater in New Mexico in December.
CULTURE / Film
Jan 24, 2024
Miyazaki anime and Godzilla film among Oscar nominees from Japan
An anime directed by Hayao Miyazaki and the latest Godzilla movie were among the Japanese films nominated for U.S. Academy Awards.
Rising directorial star Sho Miyake's new relationship drama, "All the Long Nights," centers on two colleagues (Hokuto Matsumura, left, and Mone Kamishiraishi) who form a bond when they discover they both struggle with health issues.
CULTURE / Film
Jan 19, 2024
Familiar faces return to the big screen in 2024
Amid a roster of hits such as "Demon Slayer," “Doraemon” and “Detective Conan," Japanese cinema gets a little more inclusive in the year ahead.
A cinema employee checks a display showing a digital poster (right) for Hayao Miyazaki's most recent film, "The Boy and the Heron," in Tokyo on July 14.
CULTURE / Film
Jan 8, 2024
Anime giant Hayao Miyazaki's 'The Boy and the Heron' wins Golden Globe
Miyazaki, an Oscar-winning animator, announced his retirement in 2013 after producing "The Wind Rises" but began making the full-length film in 2017.
From movies, anime, manga and even to sports stars, 2023 was a year where global audiences demonstrated their increasing fondness for Japanese soft power.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Dec 27, 2023
From Godzilla to Shohei: Japan's soft power had a big year
Little by little, Japan is getting better at pitching its copious wares overseas, and 2023 proved that.
Filmmaker Tatsuhito Utagawa, who heads the nonprofit organization the Japanese Film Project, says there has been little improvement of the gender gap within Japan's film industry.
JAPAN / Society
Dec 24, 2023
Women representation in Japanese film production fell in 2022
The study also showed female representation among editors, scriptwriters and theater producers were also on a downward trend.
Holiday classic "Tokyo Godfathers" centers on three homeless people who have formed a makeshift family.
CULTURE / Film
Dec 23, 2023
Satoshi Kon’s unexpected anime classic for the holidays
The late director and animator's "Tokyo Godfathers" celebrates 20 years with new screenings.
The Royal Theater in the city of Gifu screens 35-millimeter films.
JAPAN / Society / Regional voices: Chubu
Dec 18, 2023
Mini-theater showing 35mm films is struggling to survive
Massive amounts of funds are needed to renovate the aged facility and people involved in the theater are seeking ways to keep the place alive.
While Hayao Miyazaki’s return to filmmaking, “The Boy and the Heron,” did not attain the ¥10 billion milestone that the beloved animator’s movies had once routinely surpassed, it debuted at the top of the North American box office and became the first original anime film to lead the box office in the United States and Canada.
CULTURE / Film / 2023 in Review
Dec 15, 2023
Japan’s auteurs and anime triumphed in 2023
From Hayao Miyazaki's “The Boy and the Heron” to Hirokazu Kore-eda’s “Monster,” the box-office hits kept coming.
A Godzilla head in Tokyo's Kabukicho district. The latest installment in the franchise, which opened last Friday, follows the giant reptilian monster rampaging through postwar Japan.
CULTURE / Film
Dec 7, 2023
Godzilla smashes U.S. record as top-earning Japanese live-action film
"Godzilla Minus One" made over $14.36 million as of Tuesday, surpassing the previous title held by "The Adventures of Milo and Otis."

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A statue of "Dragon Ball" character Goku stands outside the offices of Bandai Namco in Tokyo. The figure is now as recognizable as such characters as Mickey Mouse and Spider-Man.
Akira Toriyama's gift to the world