Category: Films

  • This is the Japanese Kubo We Deserved~

    I don’t know what is it about Laika, but Kubo was the second Laika film that I enjoyed the Spanish Latino dubbing more than the original English track. Not that the original Boxtrolls dialog lacked anything, but the Spanish Latino is funnier to me. When re-watching on Bluray, I would choose the dubs over the original audios in both. In Kubo, it had a lot more to do with the fact that Charlize Theron’s voice as the mother and Monkey spoiled the bit of the story, which I suppose was a huge reveal.

    With dubbed voices, the identity of the voice is a lot foggier, so it comes as a greater surprise (unless the dubbing had chosen a recognizable voice to sell the project).

    I was eagerly waiting for Kubo to open in Japan (just like I watched Los Fantasmas de Goya in Castillian Spanish xDDDD), and since it was taking so long, I was wondering if it was ever going to be released there since Laika hasn’t been making much money there and Boxtrolls didn’t even open.

    I was super disappointed when the first trailer for KUBO クボ 二本の弦の秘密 dropped, but it was subtitled. LOL It’s about three weeks to opening date on Nov.18, and this first clip of the dubbing came out. It features Pierre Taki in McConaughey’s place (the Bettle), alongside Rina Kawaei in Mara’s role of the Sisters, Akiko Yajima (whom I think is doing the voice of Kubo xD), Atsuko Tanaka (as, I suppose, Monkey), and Michio Hazama (as, I suppose, the Moon King).

    Laika could totally release a collector’s edition with this audio track included.

  • So Many Aoi Yu Updates~

    I just didn’t want to spam you, even though I have been spamming y’all with Mamamoo continuous posts x’D

    First, Tokyo Ghouls came out, I don’t think it made such a big splash as Rurouni Kenshin did [at the Box Office] and Yu-chan’s role is tiny [the Variety review spoils the role and movie, but does mention Yu hasn’t aged since 2006 xD].

    The trailer for Birds Without Names [aka. and shortened to “kanotori”], it comes out on Oct.28., which is a week after the release of Mix., which also released its trailer and Yu-chan is hilarious.

    Over the Fence and Japanese Girls Never Die came out on DVD/BR sometime in Mar and June. Subtitles may be scarce xD I’m not aware of HK editions with subtitles. I may be trying to catch Over the Fence without subs for all time’s sake. LOL

    Yu-chan has also been on TV lately. She was in the recent special for We’re Millennials Got a Problem SP (ゆとりですがなにか 純米吟醸純情編), which will be coming out on DVD/BR in November (late) alongside What a Wonderful Family 2. I’m still debating whether I should watch the show~ She’s also currently on TBS’ drama Hello, Detective Hedgehog (ハロー張りネズミ) with Eita :)

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  • The 30th Tokyo Film Fest presents The Muses of Japanese Cinema

    And I’m like TT (lol)

    We’ll be blessed this year at the Tokyo International Film Festival with screenings for Sakura Ando, Hikari Mitsushima, Aoi Miyazaki… and, and, Yu Aoi, yo~~~ I’m so jealous and so blessed, all at the same time.

    via TIFF-jp.net

  • Classic Hollywood Feud Feelings Were Had

    Fox Series Latino finally aired the final episode of Ryan Murphy’s Feud with Joan Crawford and Bette Davis, and feelings were had~

    I’ve been a huge Crawford admirer for many years now, and I’m so glad that there are people who have begun seeing her as something more than Wire Hangers Campy Crawford. Murphy, himself, enjoys Crawford’s campy self [1], and I do too, but I’m so happy we’re seeing her as something more. Jessica Lange’s isn’t exactly Joan Crawford, but her Lucille Le Sueur was pitch perfect.

  • Dave Tynan’s Heartbreak featuring Emmet Kirwan

    Sometimes I forget to share some of the short films I find online that I love. I was working on some of the MUBI film submissions and this came, which has just won the Irish Film & Television Academy Award for Best Short Film, which shows Emmet Kirwan doing some slam poetry to tell the story of a teenager who gets pregnant and raises her child, struggling to be an unwed Irish mother from a poor household in modern day Ireland.

    I came to know about slam poetry via Shane Koyczan and his sequence at the 2010 Winter Olympics [1]. xD

  • Woah, Shweta Menon~

    Look at that face, yo!

    I also love saying ‘Shweta‘ xD I’ve had Salt N’ Pepper on my queue for a while, but I think I’m also gonna go hunting for her movies. This picture seems to be a still from Thaaram, which I cannot find much info on xD At the moment, I might begin looking for Akkaldhamayile Pennu and Rathinirvedam, which are some of her most recent… and should be the easier to find. LOL

    And her husband, yo!

    Not only is my husband the most encouraging partner, he is more demanding than me when it comes to films, wanting me to do better roles. If I come across a character which is against the so-called ‘samskaram’ he would be the one pushing me to take it up. ‘You are an artiste and your job demands it’, he would say.

    source: Times of India

    LOVE!!! More actresses’ husbands like that!

    And I LOVE Food Films, so this quote on what her feelings on shooting Salt N’ Pepper makes me giddy. I’m gonna push that movie forward in my queue.

    ‘it’s going to be fantabulous’, I told them. So when I was eating the cake in the movie I was actually savouring every bit of it.

    She’s gonna have tough Food Film competition~~~

  • Mayday 3DNA: I Never Forget my Promise~

    I recently bought myself a bluray copy of the Mayday 3DNA film/concert, which I didn’t love at first. But Mayday was my dad’s last favorite band, and I found that he had been carrying Mayday’s music on his phone and on a USB drive, alongside a copy of the movie; so now it just brings memories of him to me.

    I remember I re-watched the movie on his first commemorative month, and I cried a bit with the whole Lam Suet is a dad LOL but I just truly lost it with the storyline of the brother and sister. On last night’s rewatch, however, it was all tears when listening Ashin singing during the concert. Even during Liang Ai-I-N-G (戀愛ING) [MV] LOL I need the subtitles, though.

    so I’m all like~ Huh… this movie is not that bad. I still think the ending feels very forced with the stealing (WHY couldn’t they all go to the concert, yo!). But feelings nonetheless~ I miss my dad, but specially yesterday. And it wasn’t even any special day… just one of those blue ones.

  • Yu Aoi as Yo for Mix

    A couple of days ago it was announced that Yu Aoi had joined the cast of Mix (ミックス。), the table tennis movie starring Gakki and Eita. They have an Instagram account and just updated with a picture of Yu-chan with panda hair tie alongside Hiroyuki Morisaki, I suppose, playing her husband.

    I love that because of the white restaurant getup, the panda hair ties, people are asking if they’re playing Chinese. Yu-chan’s character name is Yo, though. BUt Morisaki’s is Cho, so~ of course.

  • Yu Aoi for Adaptation of Mahokaru Numata’s Kanojo ga Sono Na o Shiranai Tori-tachi

    I check the Yu Aoi search word on Twitter from time to time (not as often as I used to), and I ran into the posts announcing that Yu Aoi shot a movie adaptation of Mahokaru Numata’s (沼田まほかる) Kanojo ga Sono Na o Shiranai Tori-tachi (彼女がその名を知らない鳥たち, which translates to ‘The Birds She Doesn’t Know the Names Of‘ but there isn’t an official translation of the novel… yet.), alongside Sadao Abe.

    I’ve still yet to watch Over Fence and Haruko Azumi, but with the Giuseppe Tornatore movie and the adaptation of Tokyo Ghoul, and this… 2017 is proving to be an active Yu-Aoi-fan year!

    I’m a happy fan!

    I’m also a lazy fan, I’ve only google-translate the article so I don’t know much about the movie, other than Numata’s mystery novels are in the style of Kanae Minato, and the wiki includes this priceless quote~

    There has been an iyamisu (eww mystery) boom in Japan since around 2012. Iyamisu (eww mystery) is a sub-genre of mystery fiction which deals with grisly episodes and the dark side of human nature. Readers blurt out “eww” when they are reading iyamisu (eww mystery) novels.

    Iyamisu, I love it. LOL Eww mystery. Adaptations of Kanae Minato’s novels are also pretty good.

    source: Cinra.net

  • My 2016 Letterboxd Year in Review

    I was secretly looking forward to my Letterboxd Year in Review newsletter :P Compared to last year, my hours watched dropped in a staggering 32% yo! And it’s not even because I’ve been watching shorter movies LOL The total number of movies watched also dropped around 32% (31.89%). I still haven’t decided whether that’s because I got obsessed over Mamamoo or because I got caught up with work.

    This year I made it a point to brush up on my Chinese cinema, but it doesn’t make sense that Johnnie To is my most-watched director because I can only recall watching 2 movies of his last year — Office in early January and Mad Detective was my last watch — LOL Oh, nevermind, I also watched Three xD which matched the three other movies I saw in 2015. And yeah, Anna May Wong was definitely my Most Watched Actor with 7 titles— The Thief of Bagdad, Impact, The Toll of the Sea, A Study in Scarlet, Daughter of the Dragon, Bombs Over Burma, and Lady from Chungking.

    The movie-watching also got very influenced with the #52FilmsByWomen project [1][2][3].

    My 2017 didn’t start off with a bang, so I’m just hoping to match my 2016 record~