Genkina hito's Top Fourteen Films of 2020(!) featuring releases from @thirdwindow, @toyodatoshiaki, @shin_adachi_, @hirabber, @fukada80, @Gener80, @oaffpress, @tsukamoto_shiny, @anshul_san, @kamataprelude

Wow, I had no idea that 2020 would turn out like this when I wrote last year’s end post. We’re a few days away from the end of what has been a plague year. I almost got caught out at the start when I was in Japan and the borders were going to be closed, back at the end of March, but I escaped with the help of some friends. Since then, I have been in work on reduced duties or at home waiting to be…

book-paper-scissors つつんで、ひらいて Director: Nanako Hirose (2019) [Nippon Connection 2020] @NipponFilmfest

book-paper-scissors

つつんで、ひらいて 「Tsutsunde, Hiraite」

Release Date: 2019

Duration: 94 mins.

Director: Nanako Hirose

Writer: N/A

Starring: Nobuyoshi Kikuchi, Isao Mitobe, Yoshikichi Furui, Hiromi Jonbo,

Website     IMDB

The design and feel of a book is very important. Although it usually takes second place to the ideas in the text when we discuss what we read, elemental things involved in the…

Nippon Connection 2020: Documentaries @NipponFilmfest

This post is an offshoot from the earlier this week and it focuses on all of the documentaries that will be screened. Check out each description to see if each film is available for worldwide screening because quite a few of these are.

Nippon Docs

This section brings together a really diverse range of subjects and themes like art and culture, feminism, workplace rights, mental health, refugees…

Talking the Pictures, Yokai Watch Jam the Movie: Yokai Academy Y – Can a Cat be a Hero?, Dai kanran-sha, Woozoo be Alright?, book-paper-scissors, Seven Days War, Murder at Shijinso, Tunguska Butterfly, Necktie, Seventeen Motors, and other Japanese Film Trailers

Happy weekend, everyone.

We are closer to Christmas.

This week I reviewed two Sion Sono movies, Tag and Virgin Psychics, both from 2016 and while the former is more meaningful than the latter, both are worth watching.

Get past what we all know is inevitable and let’s make a start dealing with this stuff and making a change for the better in society.

What is released this weekend?

(more…)

When Marie Kondo told people to throw away their books, I was as outraged as any other lit nerd with an internet connection. You want me to only keep twenty or so books that “spark joy?” What about the paperback of Lunar Justice my mom’s friend gave me in high school, the one I’m definitely gonna read some day?

I need it!

But I wonder if she was only addressing Americans with that advice.…

Japanese Films at the Busan International Film Festival 2019 (03rd-12th October) @busanfilmfest

This year’s Busan International Film Festival is the 24th in the series and it runs from October 03rd to the 12th. This is the first time that I have covered Busan but it has been on the cards for a while because, much like Tokyo and Osaka, it’s a good place to scout out Asian films. There is a great slate of titles from some soon-to-be-released mainstream films to indie movies and there are…