Upcoming Japanese cinema, 2012

Well, by the time you read these words, the silly season is well and truly over (two months is fair enough time to lay it to rest), and over here in Japan we started 2012 with a bang: on January 1st there was a fairly hefty earthquake that shook Tokyo, just to ring in the new year in an oh-so-special special way.

Fortunately – this time around – there were no fatalities, tsunami or major damage.

Anyway, without further ado, I decided to get off my buttocks and do a mini round-up of some of the recent Japanese movies winging over your way.

You can over-analyze (or ignore) the article @ Forces Of Geek.

Odd Bedfellows on a Plate – Part 2

As I mentioned in the first part of this article back in December, Japanese food isn’t just about the sushi.

Or the fugu.

There’s a whole lot more, starting with the biggest meal of all – that consumed by... the sumo.

Sumo is one of Japan’s more internationally famous sports, probably because the spectacle of two exceptionally plump men – in a nation of exceptionally skinny people – wrestling one another, clad only in loin-cloths is, well, fascinating.

Sumo wrestlers would be nothing without their diet, though we do dangle the word “diet” here in an ironic sense.

Chanko-nabe is the food of the sumo. It’s a huge, simmering hot-pot that is chock-full of meat, fish and vegetables, best mixed with soy sauce, but sometimes also blended with mirin, miso, sake, and dashi stock (shavings of dried skipjack tuna mixed with edible kelp).

Leftover broth is often then consumed with a hefty plate of noodles.

It’s as highly nutritious in protein as it is gut busting, and is the principle dish gorged by sumo wrestlers to extend their hefty waistlines and add to already-impressive girths.

Some wrestlers enjoy the concoction so much that they quit the ring and instead become the chanko-cho, or chief chanko chef, for their wrestling stables, and eventually open their own restaurants – often with sumo memorabilia from their workhorse days adorning the walls.



READ MORE @ FORCES OF GEEK, with commentary from Japanese DJ/producers DJ Wada, Jin Hiyama & Lili Hirakawa.

Japanese Americans!

It's official: I'm typecast as a walk-on WWII era American MP, at least according to Japanese cinema.

If anybody actually bothers to read this hack blog you may've stumbled across a story about a previous outing I had in the movie I Want To Be A Shellfish (私は貝になりたい Watashi wa Kai ni Naritai, 2008), starring Yukie Nakama (Shinobi, Trick) and Masahiro Nakai (SMAP), directed by Katsuo Fukuzawa.

I did another film role yesterday, for 16 hours at the stunning, historic Tamioka silk mill in Gunma - just over 2 hours from Tokyo - for an upcoming TBS TV series called Japanese Americans (橋田壽賀子ドラマ) also directed by former rugby player Fukuzawa.

This time the stars were Nakama alongside SMAP's Tsuyoshi Kusanagi, Death Note actor Kenichi Matsuyama, and veteran actress Pinko Izumi - who kindly offered donuts to me and Jon, the only other gaijin on the set.


Apparently this blog's ol' fave Kiichi Nakai is also starring in the show, but sadly he wasn't in the scenes they shot with the other actors (above) yesterday.

Yep, I'm an MP again - this time at the beginning of WWII, shepherding Japanese Americans into a detention camp. When will they figure out that my accent is all wrong for these rolls?

And, in the grand scheme of things, what's it all about anyway?

Well, this autumn TBS plans to broadcast the five-episode drama series, written by screenwriter Sugako Hashida, to coincide with their 60th anniversary. It apparently is set to focus on a Japanese family who emigrated to the United States around a century back and their tribulations with the advent of the Pacific War. You can read more about the plot HERE.

Crazy time as usual, particularly six MPs (none of whom were really American; think instead one Aussie, one Brit, and four fill-in Japanese crew members) lining up in formation and marching around a compound for a couple of hours on end - in the late evening in what felt like sub-zero temperatures, but probably wasn't... quite.

Ahhh, the things we do for art - and a fistful of yen. Go figure.

End Of Year 2009/10 Top 10 Shenanigans

Well, I kind of had no choice, what with the plethora of Top 10 lists that currently bamboozle the senses, all focused on the decade known as the Noughties, the Naughties, the Aughts, the 00s, the 2000s or the Zeros, depending on your cultural upbringing or sense of humour; it seems everyone and his dusted-down and/or bedraggled dog is conjuring up one list or another, and I keep expecting to read one that highlights the ten best kinds of staple (I'm talking stationery apparatus, not food product) over the past 10 years.

In that case my vote goes with Zebra, the Japanese stationery manufacturer established in Japan in 1897, since theirs are the only ones I've actually been able to use over the past 8 years anyway. And I have a soft-spot for the name still, exactly a decade after I was editor of a little magazine of the same moniker back in Melbourne.

What a somewhat mad 10 years it's been over the intervening period.

For what it's worth - which is likely extremely little in these circumstances - here's my ¥2 worth of Top 10 inanity, even if these tens don't exactly restrain themselves to the past decade but count towards something in the atmosphere at least (maybe they've tainted the water supply?):


TOP 10 JAPANESE ARTISTS
Seiji Fujishiro
Yayoi Kusama
Yoko Umehara
Shirow Masamune
Maharo
Yoshitomo Nara
Yumiko Kayukawa
Takashi Murakami
Aya Takano
Ryoji Arai


TOP 10 JAPANESE FILM DIRECTORS
Seijun Suzuki
Akira Kurosawa
Yasujiro Ozu
Mamoru Oshii
Satoshi Kon
Ryuhei Kitamura
Takashi Miike
Hayao Miyazaki
Mamoru Hosoda
Shinichiro Watanabe


TOP 10 JAPANESE ELECTRONIC MUSICIANS
Hifana
Takashi Watanabe (DJ Warp)
Tatsuya Oe (Captain Funk)
Toshiyuki Yasuda (Robo*Brazileira)
Shin Nishimura
Shuji Wada (DJ Wada)
Kenji Kawai
Gadget Cassette
M-Koda
DJ Krush


TOP 10 JAPANESE MOVIES IN THE 2000s
Millennium Actress
Spirited Away
Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence
Battle Royale
Azumi
Casshern
Zatoichi
Tekkon Kinkreet
Tokyo Marble Chocolate
Mind Game


TOP 10 ANIME SERIES 2000s
Ghost Hound
Fullmetal Alchemist
Paranoia Agent
Gankutsuou
Samurai Champloo
Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
Samurai 7
Wolf's Rain
Le Chavalier D'Eon
Zenmai Zamurai


TOP 10 JAPANESE FOODS
Takoyaki: Octopus balls swamped in mayonnaise, special sauce and dried bonito flakes
Ikura don: Salmon rose with wasabi, chopped shiso and Kikkoman soy sauce on rice
Yakitori: Grilled chicken and the bird's assorted parts on sticks
Mori soba: Chilled buckwheat noodles served on a bamboo mat with a dipping sauce
Ramen: Noodle soup, especially tonkotsu (pork broth)
Fugu sashi: Blowfish served up super-thin and raw with a lip-smacking ponzu dip
Hachinoko: Bee larvae snack, great with beer. Really.
Basashi: Raw horse served sashimi style, often with ginger and daikon radish
Ikayaki: Grilled squid, often served with lemon and Kewpie maynonnaise
Tsukemono: Japanese pickled vegetables


TOP 10 TOKYO PLACES
Tokyo Parasite Museum
Tsukiji Fish Market
Nihon Minkaen Open-Air Folk House Museum
Jiyugaoka cake shops
National Film Centre
Nakagin Capsule Tower
Tin Toys Museum
Yakitori Alley, Yurakucho
Yamamoto-tei Tea House
Shibamata

TOP(PLING) 10 JAPANESECULTUREGONOW! SPOTLIGHTS
The quirky culture of Sake consumption
RX-78-2 Gundam statue terror
Tokyo's Postmodern (architecture) Purge
Shikinejima: Flying Fish Island
I was an MP in Post-WW2 Japan*
Tokyo Tower vs. Tokyo Sky Tree
Crow Castle
Toho Studios
Panda! Go, Panda! - the zaniest anime ever made?
Godzilla vs. Mothra

Japanese film posters

There's nothing quite like seeing a brand new flick advertised here in Tokyo with fliers in which the boring Roman alphabet is expunged (or at least expanded upon) in favour of kanji, hiragana and katakana characters.

It makes it all so... Blade Runner, or at least You Only Live Twice. Yum.