Happy weekend!
I hope everyone is well.
This post has been delayed because I’ve been busier than normal this week doing courses on top of my regular job and it’s been fun doing something outside of work with new people. I released some reviews I wrote earlier in the year, If Cats Disappeared From the World and When I Get Home, My Wife Always Pretends to be Dead. I’ll be gearing up for next year’s festival season so December is going to be busy as well.
What is released this weekend?
When I Get Home, My Wife Always Pretends to Be Dead. 
家に帰ると妻が必ず死んだふりをしています。 「Ie ni Kaeru to Tsuma ga Kanarazu Shinda Furi wo Shite Imasu」
Release Date: June 08th, 2018
Duration: 115 mins.
Director: Toshio Lee
Writer: Fumi Tsubota (Screenplay), K. Kajunsky Ichida (Original Story)
Starring: Ken Yasuda, Nana Eikura, Ryohei Otani, Sumika Nono,
Ken Yasuda and Nana Eikura make an odd couple in this rom-com that comes with shades of sentimentality and darkness to give a lesson on how some people express a need for love and support.
Based on a series of Yahoo! Answers messages that were novelised, this is the tale of an average salaryman named Jun (Ken Yasuda) who gets a shock whenever he returns home from work: his wife Chie (Nana Eikura) is dead every time. She isn’t really dead. It’s nothing supernatural or nefarious, she just likes to set up a scene complete with elaborate props and costumes for her husband to walk in on. Whether she is as a victim of a wild animal attack, shot through the head with an arrow or worse, Chie likes to surprise her husband. Only he doesn’t like what he sees as strange behaviour and seeks advice from work colleagues as he hopes to curb her performances. There is a deeper motivation to what Chie does and Jun will have to start looking past the theatre and at take his wife’s emotional needs seriously to understand her. Could her cryptic use of the phrase, “The moon is so blue tonight” be the key to making him realise?
If Cats Disappeared From the World
世界から猫が消えたなら 「Sekai kara Neko ga Kieta nara」
Release Date: May 14th, 2016
Duration: 118 mins.
Director: Akira Nagai
Writer: Ryoichi Okada (Screenplay), Genki Kawamura (Original Novel)
Starring: Takeru Satoh, Aoi Miyazaki, Mieko Harada, Eiji Okuda, Anna Ishii, Gaku Hamada, Eita Okuno
“If I were to disappear from this world, who would miss me?” Characters in movies usually think this while contemplating death. Of course, every person matters and our lives are connected with each other and the environment so something or someone disappearing has a big impact, but that is not always clear to people as we get swept up in dramatic circumstances and tumultuous emotions. There are tried and tested cinematic journeys used to lead a character to that epiphany of interconnection, either a path defined by hijinks or a contemplative trip down memory lane to show how important we all are, the latter of which happens in this gently powerful and moving film where the main character finds out he will die within days.
Continue reading “If Cats Disappeared From the World 世界から猫が消えたなら Dir: Akira Nagai (2016)”
Happy weekend, everyone.
I hope you are all well.
It’s raining in my neck of the woods and I think I am coming down with a cold, this just before I take a teaching course to refresh my English language teaching skills. I’ll power through, regardless.
This week I managed to watch a bunch more 80’s horror movies as I tick of titles from a list of films I haven’t seen. I published a preview of the Japanese films for this year’s edition of the London International Animation Festival and a review for the Kyoto Animation film A Silent Voice.
What is released this weekend?
A Silent Voice
声の形 「Koe no Katachi」Release Date: September 17th, 2016 (Japan)
Duration: 129 mins.
Director: Naoko Yamada
Writer: Reiko Yoshida (Screenplay), Yoshitoki Ooima (Original Manga)
Starring: Saori Hayami (Shouko Nishimiya), Miyu Irino/Mayu Matsuoka (Shouya Ishida), Aoi Yuuki (Yuzuru Nishimiya),
Animation Production: Kyoto Animation
If love brings out our best qualities, hatred deform us. A lack of empathy and ignorance lead to hatred and victimisation. This is perfectly illustrated in A Silent Voice. Based on Yoshitoki Ooima’s award-winning seven-volume manga, Kyoto Animation (KyoAni), with their trademark eye for revealing the humanity in their characters through their focus on exquisite character designs and animation, create a quiet and searing tale of teens experiencing the poisonous effect of bullying, the fragmenting of relationships and their self-perception in a story that takes the rather unconventional step of showing it from the perspective of the bully.
Directed by Naoko Yamada, she and her team of animators at KyoAni create one of the most honest portrayals of guilt and perseverance in the name of redemption through every character, each of whom carries some form of guilt and each of whom has been lovingly drawn and animated to give them a life that emanates from the screen so we can relate to them. Lingering shots on facial expressions or mid-shots that focus body-language and sign language show the subtly shifting emotions of hate and love so we feel for all of the characters.
This year’s London International Animation Festival (LIAF 19) will be at the Barbican from Friday, November 29th to Sunday, December 08th. The organisers have combed through 2,600 entries and whittled them down to 85 films that best represent the international indie animation universe.
I’m interested in everything Japanese so here’s what’s on offer:
Continue reading “Japanese Animation at the London International Animation Festival 2019”
Happy Weekend, everyone!
Time to relax unless you have a weekend job.
Only one film watched and that was the Italian zombie movie Burial Grounds which was not that great. Plenty of Japanese practise and I did a bit more overtime this week and during that period where I was just escorting a contactor around, I managed to read a book by Ernest Hemingway. I published reviews for Eureka Seven: Hi-Evolution and Penguin Highway.
What is released this weekend? A lot…
Penguin Highway 
ペンギン・ハイウェイ 「Pengin Haiuei」
Release Date: August 17th, 2018
Running Time: 119 mins.
Director: Hiroyasu Ishida
Writer: Makoto Ueda (Screenplay), Tomihiko Morimi (Original Script)
Starring: Kana Kita (Aoyama), Yuu Aoi (Mysterious Lady), Hidetoshi Nishijima (Aoyama’s Father), Megumi Han (Hamamoto), Naoto Takenaka (Hamamoto’s Father),
Animation Production: Studio Colorido
Ten years since his three-minute student short film Fumiko’s Confession brought him to worldwide attention, Hiroyasu Ishida has taken the helm of his first feature, Penguin Highway, for Studio Colorido. A little more calm and controlled than his manic and comedic debut, what remains the same is his knack for telling a tale from a kid’s perspective and with a lot of heart.
Based on a same-named book by Tomihiko Morimi, the story takes a child’s-eye view of the world by following the adventures of Aoyama and his coterie of friends who live in a quiet suburban town. These bright and bubbly kids are charmers as they all display cute foibles while getting lost in their everyday squabbles and learning more about their world in a laid-back summertime atmosphere. Things take a turn for the fantastical as penguins start popping up everywhere without warning.
Eureka Seven Hi-Evolution 
交響詩篇エウレカセブン ハイエボリューション 「Kokyo shihen Eureka sebun Hai eboryu-shon 1」
Release Date: September 16th, 2017
Duration: 109 mins.
Chief Director: Tomoki Kyoda
Director: Hisatoshi Shimizu
Writer: Dai Sato (Screenplay),
Starring: Kaori Nazuka (Eureka), Yuko Sanpei (Renton Beams/Renton Thurston), Aya Hisakawa (Ray Beams), Juurouta Kosugi (Charles Beams), Tohru Furuya (Adrock Thurston), Michiko Neya (Talho Yuuki),
Animation Production: BONES
When did anime compilation films become a thing and which greedy capitalist initiated it? Most months of the year feature a spin-off or a sequel to a TV anime, all of which are fine, but the compilation seems like the most cynical cash-grab since it is often only the most salient parts of a TV show blown up on the big screen, something that could only satisfy a pre-existing audience who have watched the entire story and will have a high level of familiarity with the characters and what is going on in the narrative and bring all of that linking material to a truncated story. This film is a great example of everything wrong with compilation films and then some.
Eureka Seven Hi-Evolution is the first of three movies that serve as a reboot for the Eureka Seven mecha anime which ran for 50 episodes on TV from 2005 to 2006. It takes footage from the first 10 episodes and adds a brand new beginning and end while the remixing footage from the TV anime for the middle section – you’ll notice which parts were made for the cinema and for TV with the change in aspect ratio.
Happy weekend, people!
I hope you are all well!
I watched a bunch of more horror films this week and worked harder on my kanji. Slightly less overtime at work. I’m about to spin up for a few outside projects at the end of November to refresh my teaching skills.
This post was easier to write because a few of these films were recently shown at the Tokyo International Film Festival. I posted the awards handed out at the fest and also a review for the fun anime adventure Birthday Wonderland.
What is released this weekend?
