Archives For Stills

A few items on Yu Aoi’s upcoming film, which we are calling The Lonely Girl Has Gone, but it should be noted that IMDb has it listed twice— one as Japanese Girls Never Die, and the other as Haruko Azumi Is Missing. Therefore, there is no official English title for the movie, despite the book being listed with the name in YesAsia [1].

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According to Eiga.com, the film is set to close this year’s edition of the Shinjuku Cinema Qualite Film Festival (新宿シネマカリテの映画祭) in Tokyo, as part of the Qualite Fantastic! Cinema Collection 2016 (カリテ・ファンタスティック!シネマコレクション2016) presenting 71 films from 16 countries… including Taiwan’s Our Times [Trailer], which I totally recommend for a fresh rom-com.

The collection will be presented from July 16th to August 19th. In addition, there will also be presentations at Cine Libre Umeda (シネ・リーブル梅田) in Osaka between August 6th to the 26th, and Nakagawa Corona Cinema World (中川コロナシネマワールド) in Nagoya, Aichi, between August 6th to September 2nd.

I also ran…

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Last October I reported about Yu-chan returning to the leading-lady gig with Daigo Matsui’s AZUMI HARUKO wa Yukuefumei (アズミ・ハルコは行方不明). Twitter has just shown me a first still. There’s also a music video by Ishizaki Huwie (石崎ひゅーい) titled Flower Vase (花瓶の花, Kabin no Hana) attached to the press release on natalie.mu, but it’s geo-blocked :*(

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Did I tell you? I’m going to Japan next week! It’ll be less than 2 weeks, but I’m going! I’m mad excited and totally nervous. I feel there’s so much to do and so little time, all I’m hoping is that I don’t get lost. xD Anyway~

This just popped up in my searches~ Yu Aoi is doing another rendition of John Ford’s 1600s incest tragedy ‘Tis Pity She’s a Whore, under the Japanese name Aware Kanojo ha Shofu (あわれ彼女は娼婦), which had already been presented back in 2006 with Eri Fukatsu, Shosuke Tanihara and Mikami Hiroshi [1][2]. The brother half of this story will be played by stage/voice actor Kenji Urai (浦井健治).

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The play was translated by Odajima Yushi (小田島雄志), and is being directed by Kuriyama Tamiya (栗山民也).

The play will begin on June 8th 2016 until the 26th.

You can check the varying schedules available at the New National Theatre Tokyo website.Prices ranges from 8,640円; 5,400円; 3,240円 and 1,620円.

You can check two interviews with both of them over at Spice [1][2].

I ran into this video on YouTube from the Off the Great Wall channel, and they got a bit of flack over the fact that a vast majority of their picks (3 picks for each of the four speakers) were East Asians xD — only one South Asian pick, because Aishwarya has to be everywhere xD, and then there were the Asian-American (Lucy Liu, I don’t think she’s mixed… is she? And she makes it twice~), the Euro-Asian (but basically) Asian-Americans (Maggie Q + Olivia Munn), and (off the official list) the Euro-Asian (Thai-Swede Praya Lundberg).

The thing is beauty is such a subjective element- whatever floats your boat depends on who you are, cultural background, upbringing, etc. But I do agree with Dan (though he doesn’t apply his own rule when it comes to Munn) — especially when making lists — Staying Power is important.

So I do agree 100% that Gong Li deserves that spot. She’s fabulous and continues to be even more fabulous… In Bollywood talk, Gong Li basically started her career doing de-glam roles in banned Zhang Yimou movies. She was a villager so often, wife of gangsters; and in her 40s, she became an Empress. That’s the complete opposite of the typical Bollywood heroine. She hasn’t been acting much, but a couple of years ago she romanced Andy Lau in a sick powersuit, and just a year or two ago broke everyone’s heart as the wife of a writer during the Cultural Revolution. This year? She’s the baddie in one of the blockbusters on this season- The Monkey King 2. And yeah~ she still looks as fabulous as ever at 50 years old.

Besides staying power? Talent, especially when it comes to celebrities, you know? Someone that can do their job like no other? Interview (variety show appearace) perception is a big plus, but CV is important.

But sometimes, so it happens, I also break my own rules~ lol

Also~ my Pakistan, South East Asian, Middle East and Russian games are not strong. Neither is my Asian-Latino game. So forgive the lack of names there, and I do take suggestions (especially if they come with great movie recommendations~~~).

All below listed by seniority~

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My Life in Movies

February 5, 2016 — Leave a comment

Will also keep this updated.

*Updated every February 5th.

Customary MUBI list.

… you are supposed to be ready, man~ Get your sh!t together!

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But the Pfeffermans are such awful messed up bunch of people xD I’m so glad (kinda) that she’s out of that whirlwind. Here’s a spoilery interview with Kathryn Hahn about her character in Season 2, and she’s wonderful. I’ve been having a major girl crush there for a while.

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And all of a sudden~ Elena Khazanova’s The Puppet Syndrome (Синдром Петрушки) was released. A couple of months ago when the trailer was released, I didn’t even have a solid release date, but alas~

They’ve also just released the trailer for Aleksandr Proshkin’s Garden of Eden (Райские Кущи), but while they’re promoting The Puppet Syndrome, Khamatova gave an interview for Gazeta.ru about the film, women on Russian film, as well as being a film actress… and talked briefly about playing a teenage boy in Aleksei German Jr.’s Under Electric Clouds.

Apparently, they really did build a Chulpan Khamatova real-life-sized doll, full-body plaster cast, straws in her nostrils and the whole thing.

I can’t wait to watch that~~~

On Pixar’s Inside Out Russian movie pitch~ “Let’s make this big beautiful expensive animated film… about emotions in the mind of a little girl!- This is ridiculous.” Even in the European/Hollywood environment, it seems like a crazy idea.

Interesting bits about that line alone~ the Russian title of Inside Out, Головоломки (Holovolomky) — means “game puzzle.” and an animated film is called a мультфильм (mul’tfil’m).

And if she had been given the chance to play Furiosa (or Milla Jovovich’s role in Resident Evil), she bluntly said no. LOL

You can read the whole interview on the Gazeta.ru website.

7 years — SEVEN FREAKING YEARS! — after starring on Yuki Tanada’s One Million Yen Girl, Yu Aoi is finally going to star in a new movie as a lead. The lucky production? An live-action adaptation of Yamauchi Mariko’s (山内 マリコ) book AZUMI HARUKO wa Yukuefumei (アズミ・ハルコは行方不明), which translates to Azumi Haruko Is Missing, which will be directed (and most likely adapted) by Daigo Matsui (松居大悟).

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My Japanese is going to the gutter. lol

BUT! The internet (meaning me) is all excited about it! Actually, I see a lot of tweets on it, but I’m too lazy to read or google-translate them, so I will just pretend we’re all excited about this.

YesAsia has an “English title,” and lists it as Lonely Girl Has Gone.

I don’t know what the book is about, if you do- tell me. Other essential info? Apparently it started shooting in mid-September, and it’s set for a 2016 release.

Sources: Natalie, Yahoo JP. Big version of this photo on Eiga.

Cry tears of regret with me.

Evgeny Mironov and Chulpan Khamatova live, right in front of your faces.

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This whole week, starting today until Sunday. Check the Lincoln Center site for more info.

I haven’t caught up with Dr. Rintaro since the first episode, but Yu-chan’s name has been going around on Twitter. Apparently — according to Twitter/Google/Bing translation — Yu is one of the actresses/actors who smoke. You know Japanese magazine rags, though, all text no images xD If anyone is shocked/surprised/following this, please do let me know. Otherwise, disregard. If Yu is, in fact, smoking… for years, hats off. Gurl, how do you keep yourself so young? Genes, I tell you, GENES!

In other news… The Case of Hana & Alice is (finally) coming out on DVD/BR disc in August.

There’s also news that Yu-chan will be voicing a character (I suppose the female robot) in an upcoming Disney Channel Lilo & Stitch SP. Complete with Yu & Stitch photo [picture][link].

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… and finally~

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