The Sound of Grass 草の響き Dir: Hisashi Saito (2021)

The Sound of Grass

草の響き「Kusa no Hibiki」

Release Date: October 08th, 2021

Duration: 116 mins.

Director: Hisashi Saito

Writer: Hitomi Kase (Script), Yasushi Sato (Original Novel),

Starring: Masahiro Higashide, Nao, Shunsuke Daito, Kaya, Yuki Mine, Shigeru Muroi, Yuta Hayashi,

Website  IMDB

The loneliness of a long-distance runner forms the basis of The Sound of Grass, a gentle film about a man striving to find peace for his mental health troubles via physical exercise while those around him fall by the wayside. It is the latest film commissioned by the Hakodate-based mini theater CINEMA IRIS in a marathon of cinematic adaptations of the works of late author Yasushi Sato, a Hakodate native, as a resurgence in interest in his output continues apace after a period of under-appreciation.

Creepy クリーピー 偽りの隣人 Dir: Kiyoshi Kurosawa (2016)

Creepy       

Creepy Film Poster

クリーピー 偽りの隣人 「Kuri-pi- Itsuwari no Rinjin」　

Running Time: 130 mins.

Release Date: June 13th, 2016

Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa

Writer: Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Chihiro Ikeda (Screenplay), Yutaka Maekawa (Original Novel)

Starring:  Hidetoshi Nishijima, Teruyuki Kagawa, Yuko Takeuchi, Masahiro Higashide, Haruna Kawaguchi, Ryoko Fujino, Toru Baba, Misaki Saisho,

Website IMDB

I have been sitting on this film review for nearly two years. Due to the tragic death of Yuko Takeuchi, I have released it in her honour. This film is available to view for free on Amazon Prime in Japan and the UK, so please take the time to watch it and see Yuko Takeuchi in action.

Kiyoshi Kurosawa has crafted some chilling antagonists in his horror films, all based on original scripts. The amoral magnetism of the mesmerist Mamiya from Cure and the ghosts of Pulse are some of the most memorable, but they were just the symptom and not the cause of the main character’s true conflicts. Alienation caused by society was at fault for channelling these monsters into everyday settings. This sense of disconnection is something Kurosawa masterfully utilised in the family drama Tokyo Sonata where a patriarch and his clan lose their cohesion after he loses his job and the family each reformulate their sense of place in the world. With family time made unbearable by the barely suppressed anger and disappointment each character feels, it strikes a very realistic chord whilst being scary like much of Kurosawa’s horror output. Creepy is based on a book by Yutaka Maekawa and while Kurosawa may not have scripted the antagonist, he is one of his most odious bad guys yet.

“He gave me the creeps.”

Ex-detective Koichi Takakura (Hidetoshi Nishijima) quits the Tokyo police force after a psychopath almost kills him. He ups roots and moves with his wife Yasuko (Yuko Takeuchi) to the suburbs and takes up work as a university lecturer in criminal psychology. Their new life seems stable enough. He thinks his job is fun, she is busy as a housewife and their new house seems pleasant but things turn sour when they introduce themselves to their next door neighbours. One set, the Tanakas’, aren’t interested in getting to know them and then there is Mr. Nishino (Teruyuki Kagawa) who seems to hide his wife and daughter Mio (Ryoko Fujino) from the outside world.

Japanese Films at the Cannes Film Festival 2018 Review Round-Up: Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s “Asako I & II”

Making his Cannes debut is Ryosuke Hamaguchi who came to the world’s attenton with his five hour film Happy Hour (2015) which took a top prize at the Locarno Film Festival. Here, he adapts

Asako I & II

The Kirishima Thing 桐島、部活やめるってよ (2012)

The Kirishima Thing                                                   

Romaji: Kirishima, Bukatsu Yamerutteyo

Japanese Title: 桐島、　部活　やめるってよ

Release Date: August 11^th, 2012 (Japan)

Running Time: 103 mins.

Director: Daihachi Yoshida

Writer: Ryo Asai (Original Novel), Kohei Kiyasu, Daihachi Yoshida (Screenplay)

Starring: Ai Hashimoto, Ryunosuke Kamiki, Suzuka Ohgo, Mayu Matsuoka, Motoki Ochiai, Masahiro Higashide, Kurui Shimizu, Mizuki Yamamoto, 

High school is a universal experience for a lot of people and a very popular setting for film and anime. Japan is especially good at creating high school, especially when one considers the dominance of clubs in high school life¹. Many stories look deep into the nature of relationships and the way people socialise and deconstruct various aspects to capture high school life and all of the ephemeral emotions adolescents have as this treasure of a film demonstrates.

The story starts on a Friday when news that the popular high school volleyball star player Kirishima has quit the team is broken to various people.

Shockwaves are sent through the school’s social world with Kirishima’s handsome and equally popular best friend Hiroki Kikuchi (Higashide) left bewildered by the few facts that emerge, Kirishima’s socially popular girlfriend Risa (Yamamoto) angry, and the volleyball team in a panic ahead of a big game with the less capable Koizumi Fuusuke (Taiga) taking Kirishima’s pivotal libero position and getting scared by the pressure to live up to Kirishima’s performance leel.

Also affected, but indirectly, are the rest of the students who see the results of the revelation of Kirishima’s disappearance like badminton players Kasumi Higashihara (Hashimoto) and Mika Miyabe (Kurumi Shimizu), the less popular kids in the culture clubs like Aya Sawashima (Ohgo) a brass band musician with an impossibly earnest crush on Hiroki, and the president of the film club Ryoya Maeda (Kamiki) and his assistant director Takefumi (Maeno).

The story ends on a Tuesday when some of the students find themselves having crossed social boundaries and redefined themselves while others remain steadfastly in their mind-set. 

The Kirishima Thing was the big winner at the 36^th Japan Academy Prize Awards taking Picture of the Year, Most Popular Film and Director of the Year awards.  It is based on a similarly named high school novel written by Ryo Asai who worked on adapting the book’s omnibus story framework into a film which has resulted in a non-linear narrative that covers all sorts of people who witness different things from different perspectives.

xxxHOLiC First Impression

xxxHOLiC

Japanese Title: ホリック xxxHOLiC

Romaji: Horikku xxxHOLiC

Duration: 8 Episodes

Director: Keisuke Toyoshima

Writer: Jun Tsugita (Screenplay), CLAMP (Original Manga)

Starring: Anne Watanabe, Shota Sometani, Karen Miyazaki, Masahiro Higashide, Naoto Takenaka, Yumi Adachi,

xxxHOLiC is the TV adaptation of a popular manga by CLAMP, a quartet of artists who have a huge back-catalogue of supernatural tales all with their distinctive designs which features impossibly long-limbed and waifish characters.

They are so influential they are called in by various production studios to provide character designs and stories – witness Blood-C, the latest entry in the Blood franchise.

Despite their fame and prowess the only CLAMP franchise I have watched is Cardcaptor Sakura back when I was back in high school. Even that I dropped after the first series because, let’s face it, it’s aimed at girls. xxxHOLiC is a title I know of but have missed. I have not read the manga or watched the anime so I am going into this eight part TV adaptation as a complete novice which is pretty exciting because it is virgin territory and I can form an unbiased opinion. After three episodes I can safely say that I like it. Part of the reason I like it is because it feels familiar thanks to the staff and the atmosphere and the other part I like it is the great acting.

The story begins with Kimihiro Watanuki (Sometani) who is a high school boy who can see Ayakashi (spirits). These spirits take on all manner of forms like shades and disembodied body parts and they pop up at the most unexpected points which, when you think about it, is pretty irritating since ghosts seem to haunt everywhere. Even school, is haunted by these supernatural presences. Furthermore, some seem to be aggressive.

His ability to see the supernatural also opens up possibilities. On his way to school he finds himself witnessing a woman pass by with a dark mist emanating from her ‘pinkie finger’. It turns out he will meet said woman later but let us continue with the setup for now… he continues walking down an alley into what looks like a gorgeous magical grove. Seriously, this is ‘take-a-picture and admire the light emanating from the sun’ gorgeous. Watanuki’s about to see more gorgeous things when he steps in a puddle. The scene cuts to a mysterious woman who seems to summon him by taking control of his body and dragging him to her house. Watanuki is stunned at the sudden change of location which is gorgeous but not as gorgeous as what comes next…

Watanuki is seized by a supernatural force and taken to a house where he is met by two cute girls named Maru and Moro who drag him into what can only be described as a mystical chamber where he finds himself in the presence of a (seriously) gorgeous woman named Yūko Ichihara (Watanabe).

Who is she to have these mystical powers? What is her plan in hooking Watanuki? Will the camera lovingly hug her body at every moment?