Japanese Movies/Discussion/Recommendations

[smap_gal]

hey everyone!! does anyone know where can I download the movie "Umizaru"?? can ps tell me!! I have searched some of the site but no more seeders.. Thank you..

[bmwracer]

smap_gal wrote:

hey everyone!! does anyone know where can I download the movie "Umizaru"?? can ps tell me!! I have searched some of the site but no more seeders.. Thank you..

You might want to make your request here in this BT thread: http://jdorama.com/viewtopic.1680.htm

[Shurayuki-hime]

I suddenly became a fan of chambara films. Lone Wolf & Cub series is awesome (I still have the last two films to go). Lady Snowblood kicks ass (just orderd the sequel). And I finally started going trough Zatoichi films (Zatoichi 1 & 22 on order). Do you guys have any other recommendations? I'm looking something action packed, preferrably violent and cool (like Lone Wolf). I'll probably check out Hanzo The Razor films next.

[bmwracer]

Shurayuki-hime wrote:

I suddenly became a fan of chambara films. Lone Wolf & Cub series is awesome (I still have the last two films to go). Lady Snowblood kicks ass (just orderd the sequel). And I finally started going trough Zatoichi films (Zatoichi 1 & 22 on order). Do you guys have any other recommendations? I'm looking something action packed, preferrably violent and cool (like Lone Wolf). I'll probably check out Hanzo The Razor films next.

FYI, did you see some of the discussion of Hanzo the Razor several pages back?

[Shurayuki-hime]

bmwracer wrote:

FYI, did you see some of the discussion of Hanzo the Razor several pages back?

yeah, I did. It sounds like.. well, it could be great. Or not. I'll have check it out myself. Many people seem to like the first two movies, but not the third.

[loris]

Shurayuki-hime wrote:

I finally started going trough Zatoichi films (Zatoichi 1 & 22 on order). Do you guys have any other recommendations?

Zatoichi is my favorite chambara series. Lone Wolf and Cub is all right, but the stories lack some of the human condition element of Zatoichi. I find Hanzo the Razor is a curiosity due to it being in the (s)exploitation genre, but really, the stories of Hanzo are by themselves mediocre (IMHO).

There is another decent series, Nemuri Kyoshiro (a/k/a Sleepy Eyes of death). The protagonist is a Ronin, and a bit of rogue, unlike the usual hero he is not morally upstanding. And yet, he still has a strong sense of justice, and if he decides you have violated it, watch out, his "Full-Moon-Cut" style will get you. That bit is kind of silly, I suppose, but he does play a cool character, and the stories I find interesting. The swordplay is not as good as Katsu Shintaro or Wakayama Tomisaburo, however. You can tell it is just an actor swinging a sword, whereas Tomisaburo actually was a good martial artist, and Katsu was real, real good at faking it.

I like all the Kurosawa "samurai" flicks: Seven Samurai, Hidden Fortress, Yojimbo, Sanjuro ... Those are all great.

There were a few movies made about the "47 ronin/Chuushingura Incident" that are worth checking out. It seems to me that it is so widely known in Japan as an example of Samurai loyalty that it's one of those things you should know about if you like the genre.

Also the movie: Seppuku is really really good. The way it unfolds to tell 2 sides of a story is brilliant. Not a happy movie though.

[Shurayuki-hime]

Thanks, I'll probably get Seppuku/Harakiri when the Criterion dvd is released. And Nemuri Kyoshiro series could be good, too. I'll check it out sometime.

[bmwracer]

DVD Verdict review of Kagemusha: http://www.dvdverdict.com/reviews/kagemusha.php

[jholic]

i just got the lone wolf series myself, and was planning to watch it after the 'yakuza papers' series.

[Geezer]

I love Horror movies.

And like most horror fans, I love cheesy, crummy, awful horror movies almost as much as I love great horror movies.

I just saw "Infection". It ain't great. And it ain't cheesy.

It's just lousy. As in, not even bad enough to be funny. As in, boring.

They had a couple of familiar faces from Doramas. (Koichi Sato) And a couple of cute girls in nurse's outfits (Yoko Maki). And an old, run down building.

No script. No director. No reason to put this thing on film other than somebody had given them some money... and at the end of the day was expecting... something.

If you're in need of a nap... rent this thing. I defy anyone to stay awake while it's playing.



[/b]
_________________

Manga is to Literature
what Graffiti is to Art

[bmwracer]

Geezer wrote:

If you're in need of a nap... rent this thing. I defy anyone to stay awake while it's playing.

What higher praise can one give to a movie....?

[loris]

bmwracer wrote:

Geezer wrote: If you're in need of a nap... rent this thing. I defy anyone to stay awake while it's playing. What higher praise can one give to a movie....?

Well, I did read recently that as many as 1/3 of all American adults suffer from insomnia at one point. Maybe doctors can start prescribing this movie ...

-----

I saw a couple "Otoko wa tsurai yo" movies recently ... These are the series with the famous character "Tora-san". They were interesting. Not great movies, but they definately had a kind of charm, I can see why they were such a popular series of movies.

[bmwracer]

loris wrote:

Well, I did read recently that as many as 1/3 of all American adults suffer from insomnia at one point. Maybe doctors can start prescribing this movie ...

There's an odd combo: the movie biz and medicine. Of course in this day and age of mergers, who knows??

"A fair doctor, but a great profile...!"

[jholic]

so i just watched the first movie in the 'yakuza papers' series. pretty interesting. since the movie was made in the 70s, the effects are a bit cheezy.

i thought the chinese were the masters of overacting when it comes to death scenes (from the kungfu movies i've seen), but it looks like the jp can easily hold their own.

still, the storyline was pretty good, though i had to rewind many times to keep up with who was who. does anyone know if this is based on true events?

[shin2]

jholic wrote:

so i just watched the first movie in the 'yakuza papers' series. pretty interesting. since the movie was made in the 70s, the effects are a bit cheezy. i thought the chinese were the masters of overacting when it comes to death scenes (from the kungfu movies i've seen), but it looks like the jp can easily hold their own. still, the storyline was pretty good, though i had to rewind many times to keep up with who was who. does anyone know if this is based on true events?

The first movie of the 5-movie Jingi Naki Tatakai series was based on a magazine series about a yakuza boss, Kozo Mino. Kinji Fukasaku, the director, also drew on his own eyewitness experiences as a young teenager in immediate post-war Japan in coming up with some of the series' storylines (Fukasaku was never a yakuza, but he did see a lot of them growing up). He and the scriptwriter for the entire series, Kazuo Kasahara, also managed to some of their ideas from interviewing yakuza as well. If you are interested in learning more about this particular genre of Japanese cinema, I highly recommend The Yakuza Movie Book, by Mark Schilling, a great reference and a highly enjoyable read.

[bmwracer]

jholic wrote:

i thought the chinese were the masters of overacting when it comes to death scenes (from the kungfu movies i've seen), but it looks like the jp can easily hold their own.

I guess the Japanese wanna be better than the Chinese at everything, even overacting.

[jholic]

shin2 wrote:

The first movie of the 5-movie Jingi Naki Tatakai series was based on a magazine series about a yakuza boss, Kozo Mino. Kinji Fukasaku, the director, also drew on his own eyewitness experiences as a young teenager in immediate post-war Japan in coming up with some of the series' storylines (Fukasaku was never a yakuza, but he did see a lot of them growing up). He and the scriptwriter for the entire series, Kazuo Kasahara, also managed to some of their ideas from interviewing yakuza as well. If you are interested in learning more about this particular genre of Japanese cinema, I highly recommend The Yakuza Movie Book, by Mark Schilling, a great reference and a highly enjoyable read.

shin2: thanks for the great information. i'm up to the last movie in the series, and pretty eager to find out what happens in the end. (no spoilers, please). the story's really well-written in that it makes you feel it's based on historical, real-life events.

i think one interesting thing is how american gangster movies often depict members as tough, no-mercy guys. the way i view the yakuza's in this series, some of them act tough, but a lot of them are actually afraid of violence.

i wonder if it was done on purpose, since jp entertainment usually depict violence as being senseless, whereas american ent often glorify it.

[bmwracer]

DVD Beaver review of The Yakuza Papers: http://www.compare.dvdbeaver.com/film/DVDReviews14/Kinji­_Fukasaku_Yakuza_papers_DVD_Review.htm

[Strawberry-cake]

I love Japanese horror movies.
I saw Juon and Ringu and loveeee them (The only 2 horror movies I've seen so far)
Anybody have any good horror movies to recommend??
And can anybody recommend me any good comedy/romance movies??
Thanks

[Terryb]

Watched Azumi 2 last week, Azumi 1 was great, 2 is just a very average flick where in nothing really happens..a shame.