This week I thought I’d be a hero and try and get lots of reviews done as well as the Anime UK News Autumn Anime Preview Guide. I actually did achieve quite a bit of it by finishing the guide and most of the reviews. I finally finished up my Terracotta Far East Film Festival reviews with The Land of Hope and See You Tomorrow, Everyone. The Story of Yonosuke gets released tomorrow. I also posted about all of the Japanese films taking part in the Venice Film Festival this year. I’ll post about the autumn anime I’ll be watching next week and take the rest of the week off to get some more reviews finished before starting a mini Kiyoshi Kurosawa season and following that up with a Takashi Ishii season.
What’s released in Japan today? A lot of HK films including Vulgaria.
RETURN Hard Version 
Japanese Title: RETURN (リタ–ン ハードバージョン)
Romaji: RETURN (RITAN HA-DO BA-JON)
Release Date: August 10th, 2013
Running Time: 105 mins.
Director: Masato Harada
Writer: Masato Harada (Screenplay)
Starring: Kippei Shiina, Asami Mizukawa, Anna Tsuchiya, Yusuke Yamamoto, Midoriko Kimura, Kazuhiro Yamaji, Keisuke Horibe, Kenichi Yajima, Mariko Akama, Denden
Masato Harada… That name rings a bell… Bounce KO Gals and Kamikaze Taxi, two films from the 90’s I vaguely remember watching parts of. Action-packed dirty films in complete contrast to the high class drama Chronicle of My Mother which was Harada’s last film just released last year. He’s back with a film about a businessman named Kitahara (Kippei) who fled to Argentina after killing some crime bosses and returns ten years later facing all sorts of crazy people out for revenge including the Midonogawa sisters who want revenge for their brothers he originally killed. It looks like a nice bit of gangster action harking back to some of the 90’s stuff I’ve been watching recently plus it stars a bunch of great actors who are clearly having fun.
Genkinahito 