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CinemaCafe has an interview [jp] with Yu Aoi about Otouto — recently released on DVD and Blu-Ray. If someone could give a proper translation of it, that would rock. In the meantime… some of what I think are interesting bits.

Title of the piece is Kotoba ni Dekinai “Kankaku” ga Kanojyo o Tsukiugokasu, which seems to be something like “It isn’t the words, it’s the emotions that motivates her”.

First sub-title, Ii Deai no Renki ni Megumaremashita, which is something like “Blessed with good encounters,” referring to the people she worked with in Otouto [Yoji Yamada, Sayuri Yoshinaga, Tsurube Shofukutei, Ryo Kase], plus I see mentions of Kyoko Koizumi [from Gakuya].

GAH! I really can’t translate more, but the following paragraphs seem interesting. Like the last one about balancing work and free time. My head hurts.

Here’s some more Yu photos =D Like the intro said something about her gentle smile.

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Just had the chance to catch Kick-Ass, and let me tell you. Forget about Kick-Ass, we need more Big Daddy and Hit Girl~~~ Better yet, we need more girly potty-mouthed super heroes.

In a movie too centered on the insipid Kick-Ass — mind you, the film is title with his name — Hit Girl rocked my world.

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Finally watched Polanski’s The Ghost Writer. In short, very well done. Loads of thrills, melodrama, some humor… loads of politics. Having said that, Olivia Williams needs more attention. She was pretty great last season with An Education — and was completely snubbed –, and she’s always been interesting on screen.

Every time I bring up her name, people say “who?”

And you must know her for sure! I mean, she was on Dollhouse~~~ and she had a cameo on X-Men The Last Stand, She was Mrs. Darling on Peter Pan. She was also on The Body with Antonio Banderas, she started out as Bruce Willis’ wife on The Sixth Sense, and was on Wes Anderson’s Rushmore. WTF, she’s been a working actress for almost 20 years~

On The Ghost Writer? She pretty much blew me away. The question is, should she be going for Best Actress, or just go for Best Supporting? Supporting acting always gives good results.

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I have a feeling I’m gonna love this show. Though, Linney’s character needs a hotter husband. I’m sorry, I’m shallow… I enjoy Oliver Platt’s acting as much as the next fella, but come on. It’s getting surreal to the point where 99% of female leads have average or below average good-looking male co-stars.

[iframe width=”560″ height=”349″ src=”https://www.youtube.com/embed/ey-mE3ji4mU?rel=0″]

I just had a fandom crossover spazz.

And it’s always good to post Kate Moennig photos.

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Unubore Deka aired its 2nd episode on Friday. ;P

The show tells the story of a detective whose ex-girlfriend is now married to his newest co-worker. Now, for reasons unknown, he always ends up obsessed-in-love with women who turn out to have committed crimes. In the end, he always ends up asking them to choose between marriage to him, or being arrested… without much success for him in his love life.

Well, that’s the best thing I can do without subs.

But no worries!

Unubore Deka is getting subbed by TOMAlicious Fansubs in hardsubs English, Suu no Command in hardsubs Spanish, Haniko’s Fansubs in Hungarian, and Asia Powa Fansubs in French~

In this week’s episode, Yu plays Konuma Setsuko, who appears to be your everyday masseuse. One day Unubore ends up in the massage parlor she works in, and falls in love just by her touch.

A lot of kinky stuff going on.

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I’m not sure on how many episodes she’s supposed to show up — considering only ONE EPISODE seems like such a waste — so my money is on a 3 or 4-episode character arc… Hopefully longer. If you missed the photos of how Yu’s character looks like — well, don’t miss them here.

Ryomaden on NHK World Premium
Sunday, July 18th @ 8pm (JST) – or 6am (-5 GMT)
Repeat on Monday, July 19th @ 3am (JST)
Repeat on Saturday, July 24th @ 1.05pm (JST)

Check your local time here.

Woah, long time no see, eh?

Let’s see if I remember how to do this. First, because the Yu Aoi posts always get the most hits, I pimp the RSS subscriptions. There’s no better way to keep updated than by subscribing. So~ here you go, Google and Yahoo.

Also, don’t forget the poll on the side (if there’s one), and support the site by buying stuff – not necesarilly what I suggest… but you can click those Amazon, YesAsia and/or HMV HK banners, and buy whatever you want. Also, I’m not allowed to say this but… ad my clicks, if you know what I mean. ;P

Here we are, 2 years after the broadcast of Yu Aoi’s WOWOW drama Camouflage — also known as Yu Aoi x 4 Lies. If you are interested to know, Viikii allowed Saltine to post softsubs for it. Though the last episode (ep12) is the only one missing… it’s a HUGE improvement. So thank you Saltine.

Okay, moving on!

Chapter 3 — aka. ep7 through ep9 — is titled AKABANE San Shimai or The 3 Akabane Sisters, directed by director Nobuhiro Yamashita (Linda Linda Linda). The concept of this chapter is to tell the story of 3 sisters — Older and reliable Matsuko aka. Macchan aka. Matsu-nei (Shoko Ikezu), Takeko aka. Take-nei (Yoshimi Nozaki) , and free-spirited Umeko (Yu Aoi), who don’t always get along that well, but always makeup by the end, in the style of old comedy shows that last for several years. The first episode is actually the first ficticious episode of the show titled “Sayonara Okada Sensei” which has the sisters returning from the funeral of their old 6th grade teacher… Continue Reading…

Ooh la la!

Mademoiselle Laurent featuring Bokeh xD
in black and white. I love.

Thank you other-Amy for the link =D

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*tada!*

Finally! You are probably saying that this is about time that I get to finish with this list of the 20 to Watch~ And accompanying Ryan Gosling who was #1 on the list of actors, there’s Emily Blunt on top of the list of actresses whom you should be keeping an eye out for~

Born in London, England on February 23rd 1983, this 27-year-old actress is best known for playing Emily Chalton opposite Meryl Streep and the 20 to Watch fellow Anne Hathaway on The Devil Wears Prada, for which she earned nominations for Best Supporting Actress at the BAFTAs and the Golden Globes.

Blunt’s first breakthrough as an actress was playing Tamsin on Pawel Pawlikowski’s My Summer of Love, opposite Natalie Press. The film received positive reviews, and earned nominations for Best British Film at the BAFTAs, as well as nods for Most Promising Newcomer for Blunt at the British Independent Film Awards, and British Newcomer of the Year by the London Film Critics.

A year later, Blunt played Natasha on Stephen Poliakoff’s BBC Made-for-TV movie Gideon’s Daughter starring Bill Nighy and Miranda Richardson, which earned Blunt her first Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Supporting Role. In 2006, she finally burst into pop culture knowledge as Hathaway’s Andy’s best-not-a-friend Emily, the desperate assistant to Streep’s Miranda Priestly. Despite only getting a supporting role in a film clearly led by La Streep, Blunt managed to garner enough attention not only from the public, and critics… but also casting agents.

Following Prada, Blunt participated in The Jane Austen Book Club (Maria Bello, Kathy Baker), Dan in Real Life starring Steve Carrel, Juliette Binoche, Dianne Wiest, and Amy Ryan, while closing 2007 with Charlie Wilson’s War directed by Mike Nichols, starring Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Amy Adams. It is perhaps then that she makes the decision to work with Adams on the film Sunshine Cleaning, where they play sisters.

Blunt also participated on The Great Buck Howard, a comedy with John Malkovich, and Tom Hanks — playing the father of his real-life son Colin. It seemed like Blunt’s roles were destined to be supporting forever… until The YoungVictoria. The film received considerable positive response, while earning Blunt nominations for Best Actress around critic circles, as well as Best Actress nod at the British Independent Film Awards, and at the Golden Globes.

This year, she returned to screens on The Wolfman starring Benicio del Toro and Sir Anthony Hopkins. While the film didn’t earn much critical or commercial response, you can’t deny that the film adds a certain variety to her CV. xD

All in all, Blunt tops the list because of a combination of factors, such as period of time until she’s 35, past projects, future projects… and perhaps, Hollywood-ness? It is perhaps the way she’s passed on roles on Iron Man 2 (that ended up on Johansson’s CV), or the upcoming Captain America with words such as:

I think that ‘Captain America’ is going to be really fun and I gather that the story is really interesting… It just wasn’t what I wanted to do next, to be honest.

There’s definitely a high commitment level and I’m not someone who likes to plan too much ahead… That would also be an issue for me as well.

via ScreenRant.

While everyone wants to jump on the Marvel franchise train, it is admirable to be a working actor and pass on roles to keep your acting schedule open. So we get to have 8 upcoming years of uncertainty~~~

What’s next up for Blunt? Well, there should be a wider release (or at least a DVD one) for Wild Target starring Bill Nighy, Rupert Everett… and fellow who didn’t make it Harry Potter alumni Rupert Grint. Then there’s The Adjustment Bureau with Matt Damon, written and directed by George Nolfi (who wrote The Bourne Ultimatum). Then there’s Gulliver’s Travels with Jack Black, Amanda Peet and Billy Connolly, as well as the animated film Gnomeo and Juliet with fellow the 20 to Watch James McAvoy, and finally Salmon Fishing in the Yemen by Lasse Hallström, with Ewan McGregor and Kristin Scott Thomas.

Yes, there’s a lot to watch from Blunt~