Japan Cuts 2012 Review: LONELY SWALLOWS
I always gravitate toward documentaries that feature young people regardless of how they are made (in this case, poorly from a technical standpoint). With Gu Su-yeon's Hard Romanticker, this year's Japan Cuts highlights some of the trials and tribulations of... More »
  

Japan Cuts 2012 Review: ROADSIDE FUGITIVE SR
Yu Irie (8000 Miles, 8000 Miles 2 and Ringing in Their Ears) returns to this year's Japan Cuts with Roadside Fugitive SR, the third installment of his sleeper hit debut, 8000 Miles. The lovable losers from Saitama- Ikku (Ryusuke Komakine) and... More »
  

Japan Cuts 2012 Review: THE WOODSMAN AND THE RAIN
The major highlight of this year's Japan Cuts festival for Japanese film fans, as well as fans of great acting in general, is the New York appearance of Koji Yakusho, one of Japan's most acclaimed and accomplished actors, who continues... More »
  

NYAFF/Japan Cuts 2012 Review: HARD ROMANTICKER
There is an old saying about the Japan-Korea relationship my grandfather once told me that is very revealing. Apparently it's really easy for a Japanese to pick out Koreans among them because Koreans stink of garlic. For a Korean who... More »
  

NYAFF/Japan Cuts 2012 Review: POTECHI (CHIPS)
NYAFF and Japan Cuts favorite Yoshihiro Nakamura (Fish Story, Golden Slumber, A Boy and His Samurai) returns with his latest film Potechi (Chips), in which he once again adapts a novel by Fish Story and Golden Slumber author Kotaro Isaka.... More »
  

JAPAN CUTS 2011: INTO THE WHITE NIGHT Review
TCR 01:15:47:04Into The White Night is a good film. Too bad I had to watch a non-anamorphic screener with a time code running across the top and the wordSAMPLEstamped smack dab in the center of the frame. Call me a... More »
  

Japan Cuts 2011: VENGEANCE CAN WAIT Review

It's been a couple of days since I checked out the Masanori Tominaga-directed oddball comedy Vengeance Can Wait, and I'm still not sure how I feel about it. It features a quartet of characters, each of who with wildly varying... More »
  

JAPAN CUTS 2011: HARU'S JOURNEY Review
Tadao (screen legend Tatsuya Nakadai) is very upset. He's first seen storming out of the house by the sea in a small fishing village in Hokkaido, with his granddaughter Haru (Eri Tokunaga) trailing behind with his cane. She apologizes... More »
  

JAPAN CUTS 2011: SKETCHES OF KAITAN CITY Review
A young shipyard worker takes pride in his work. You can see it in his face when one of the gigantic ships he worked on is being launched to sea. There is almost a childlike glee in him. Then the... More »
  

JAPAN CUTS 2011: TORSO Review
One might wonder that whether we need yet another film about a blow up sex doll, especially one coming from the long time Hirokazu Kore-Eda's cinematographer Yutaka Yamasaki. Not that Kore-Eda's approach in Air Doll was in any way sensationalistic,... More »
  

JAPAN CUTS 2011 - A NIGHT IN NUDE: SALVATION Review
So... apparently A Night In Nude: Salvation is a sequel. I had no idea. It isn't being billed as one, at least not on the Japan Society website, yet somehow the rest of the internet seems to know what I... More »
  

Japan Cuts 2011: LOVE AND TREACHERY Review

Love and Treachery is an erotic drama that considers its characters at such a distance that we can't really get a feel for either of the modes the movie is going for. The performances are so stiff, so emotionally opaque,... More »
  

Japan Cuts 2011: THE SEASIDE MOTEL Review [Charles' Take]

I'll warn you advance: I have almost nothing positive to say about The Seaside Motel, the jumbled chronology anthology from director Kentaro Moriya, based on the manga by Yukio Okada. It's not an offensively bad movie in any real way--instead... More »
  

Japan Cuts 2011: TOILET Review

Naoko Ogigami's dysfunctional family dramedy Toilet is just slightly on the wrong side of twee and it's certain to turn a certain segment of the audience off, with its quirky collection of agoraphobics, socially awkward man-children, and snooty poets. This... More »
  

JAPAN CUTS 2011: BIRTHRIGHT (AKA UMBILICAL CORD) Review
Birthright, aka Umbilical Cord, is a deliberately paced psycho-drama about family, rejection and revenge. They say revenge is a dish best served cold, which, coincidentally, happens to be the best way to go into this film. Not because it's a... More »
  

JAPAN CUTS 2011: RINCO'S RESTAURANT Review
[With the Continental U.S. premiere of Rinco's Restaurant happening this, Wednesday, July 13th at Japan Society's Japan Cuts, we now revisit Niels Matthijs' earlier review -- Ben Umstead]Even though female directors are on the rise in Japan, they often limit... More »
  

Japan Cuts 2011: SWORD OF DESPERATION Review

If you're a fan of chanbara dramas--those sensitive, occasionally weepy samurai films that pop up every year or so--then you've probably already seen director Hideyuki Hirayama' Sword of Desperation. Well, if not the actual film, then some configuration of it... More »
  

NYAFF/JAPAN CUTS 2011: HEAVEN'S STORY Review
When one hears the word 'epic' one usually thinks of 'battles' and 'dragons', 'conspiracy and intrigue', 'larger-than-life filmmaking.' When one hears the words 'revenge story' images of Charles Bronson mowing down street punks or Choi Min-sik dishing out justice with... More »
  

Japan Cuts 2011: LOVE & LOATHING AND LULU & AYANO
It's interesting to note that that the director of the (anti-?) porn drama Love & Loathing & Lulu & Ayano, Hisayasu Satō, is himself a director of pink films. Since 1985, he's directed a couple dozen films in the exploitation... More »
  

NYAFF/JAPAN CUTS 2011: OSAMU TEZUKA'S BUDDHA: THE GREAT DEPARTURE Review
The first part in a projected trilogy based on Osamu Tezuka's 8 volume manga, Toei Animation's Buddha: The Great Departure chronicles the early life of Prince Siddhartha in bombastic fashion, constructing an epic on a scale intended to rival old-school... More »
  
 
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Twitchvision: Talking STAR TREK: INTO DARKNESS, MUD and THE ICEMAN

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Learning from the Masters of Cinema: Henri-Georges Clouzot's THE MURDERER LIVES AT 21

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Much has already been written, both on these pages and many others, about the landmark Hollywood-China co-production that is Marvel and DMG Entertainment's Iron Man 3. The film, directed by Shane Black, is the third solo outing for Robert Downey Jr's Tony Stark, and has proved a phenomenal success around... More »

FEAR & LOATHING AT CANNES, PART 2: I'M IN LOVE WITH EVERYBODY'S GIRL

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CINEMA HOLOCAUST ON THE FRENCH RIVIERA, PART 1: THOSE GOD DAMN FILM BLOGGERS

MIKE'S JOURNAL. MAY 13. MORNINGI wake up sometime around five AM. My flight to France doesn't leave until five PM. I should be there for security check in sometime around 3PM. There is no reason for me to be up this early but I'm feeling anxious. I have an itch... More »
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