All posts tagged: trailer

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Sapphire

Published by Ben Dimagmaliw

Action and genre movies are the bread and butter of low-budget/indie filmmaking. So, it’s absence from many indie movies in Japan is rather pecuiliar. Horror movies certainly are represented, but action movies, from martial arts to swordplay movies, are quite few and far between. Even more rare are gun-action movies and the ones that do exist are usually not very convincing. This is due to the unavailability of guns which act like their real counterparts; stunt guns. Even studio movies suffer from weaponry with little to no recoil, no casing ejection, and only the barest of muzzle flash in addition to the lack of squibs which accurately portray the mayhem of a gunfight. However, a veteran Japanese prop master has devised a way to upgrade model guns to act like real guns for a fraction of the cost it takes to downgrade real guns to perform as stunt guns perhaps signalling a possible renaissance in Japanese gunplay movies, especially in independent movie circles. Yonishi Toshinari’s Sapphire is a girls-with-guns movie taken to the next level. …

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Synchronizer

Published by Ben Dimagmaliw

“[…]Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn’t stop to think if they should.” Jeff Goldblum’s Dr. Ian Malcolm asserted a need for science to question the ethics of its pursuits; for a sense of responsibility to govern the drive to do what never has been done. Manda Kunotoshi’s latest movie, Synchronizer seems to examine this very dilemma. A researcher conducts unauthorized experiments into synchronizing the brainwaves of humans with animals. His female co-worker, realizing his research could lead to applications in remedying brain dysfunctions, assists in advancing the experiments. Then, the researcher attempts to explore the possibility of curing his mother of Alzheimer’s disease through synchronization between two human brains. Though the woman ascertains what will result from the experiment, will she be able to stop it? The high concept scenario bears a superficial likeness to Igarashi Akiko’s Visualized Hearts which premiered at the 2017 Osaka Asian Film Festival and Manda taking a dip into apparent lo-fi sci-fi is quite intriguing in and of itself. However, unlike Igarahi’s …

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Tayutau

Published by Ben Dimagmaliw

Though Japan is not a Judeo-Christian or even particularly “religious” country per se, LGBT issues are, if not morally reprehensible, still socially unaccepted–at least publically–in a patriarchal society where the role of men and women are still maintained. Over the years some transgender men have been able to gain notoriety as well as acceptance as television talent, but one sometimes feels they do so by becoming everyone’s stereotypical friendly “jovial gay;” the “life of the party” everyone laughs with (and at) in TV programs and movies. This leaves the exploration of LGBT issues to smaller, indepedent productions like Tayutau, the feature-length debut by twenty-something director, Yamamoto Aya, who based her screenplay on a conversation she had with a friend who doubted their gender identity. Kataoka Junko (Jun), whose emotional identity have been at odds with her biological identity, shares a room with her friend since high school, Kinoshita Akari, who doesn’t know the father of the fetus growing in her stomach. After being dumped by an older companion, Jun now worries she will live her …

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Illuminations

Published by Ben Dimagmaliw

Hasegawa Yokna, director of the engagingly artistic take on the dystopian future, Dual City, shot Illuminations in 2014 which, according to the filmmaker’s official site, is the first chapter of the “Japanese Year Zero Trilogy”–Dual City being the second. Though Dual City captured the lion’s share of international attention and overshadowing its series predecessor, interest is training toward Illuminations as its quite intriguing story perhaps was at the vanguard of a steadily growing number of narratives and filmmakers concerned with Japan’s place in the world as a “peaceful nation.” In 2020 Japan is divided into North and South. Northern Japan became the area of conflict. Although in Southern Japan they still preserve peace, it is slowly changing into a threatening situation day by day. 18-year-old Southerner Yousuke, who lost his childhood friend Kurata as a deserter to the Northern War, spends his days in emptiness. One day he meets Kikuchi in a game center and gets to know the drug ‘Illuminations’, which has the effect of time travel and is popular among kids.Kikuchi invites him …

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The Albino’s Trees

Published by Ben Dimagmaliw

“Which is the harmful being?” The question posed in the trailer for Kaneko Masakazu’s The Albino’s Trees is the perfectly loaded question for encapsulating both the inner struggle of the protagonist and the larger conflict between mankind and our surroundings. Rationalizations, as varied as the motivations fueling them, are what drive the story of Yuku, “a hunter who works for animal damage control programmes in the mountains of central Japan. In order to afford the medical bills for the treatment of his mother’s illness, he accepts a lucrative contract to kill a rare, white deer that lives in the forest by a remote village, and whose presence is thought to undermine tourism in the region by the neighbouring town’s bureaucrats….” However, Kaneko begs whether there should be an acknowledgement of something greater, no matter the rationale. Summing up the central theme of his movie, Kaneko states: Being human inevitably implies the killing of other living things. Yet we often lack the real sense of what killing means, and our awareness of it is usually limited …

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Typhoon Noruda

Published by Ben Dimagmaliw

One of 2016’s buzzwords was Your Name, the animated feature by likely the most recognized independent animation director, Shinkai Makoto. However, a year prior, there was animated feature made by another small animation house called, Colorido. Typhoon Noruda employs techniques similar to Shinkai Makoto, but there is a more youthful and innocent (for lack of a better term) air to the palette and character design. While it can be argued Shinkai’s works are driven by esoteric, adult themes, the works by Colorido are high-concept, yet more straightforward adventures in childhood and/or adolescence. Set on an unspecific outlying island, *Typhoon Noruda*, tells the tale of Azuma and Saijo, two friends since youth bound by their love of baseball. Their relationship is strained when Azuma decides to quit playing. Then Azuma comes upon a strange girl, Noruda, who appears out of nowhere. “When the whirlwind on the ground, the maelstrom in the sky and I are linked as one, this world will be reborn…” At this time, the largest typhoon in recorded history is bearing down on …