JAPANESE FILMS

Three Aviation Propaganda Films

Hayao Miyazaki, whose THE WIND RISES (2013) gathered various praises and criticisms over last few months, made a particularly harsh remark about the coming Zero fighter movie, EI-EN NO ZERO (2013) due open this winter. Based on the bestseller novel of the same title by Naoki Hyakuta, the story is about the brother and sister who investigate their grandfather’s past as a Zero fighter Kamikaze pilot. Miyazaki criticized it is “packed with inaccuracies” and “filled with the same old sentiment”. To me, this morbid obsession with this particular type of warplane, – Zero fighter -, by both of these men …

'BOBTAIL' REVIEW / DOCUMENTARY FILMS / JAPANESE FILMS

Campaign (2007)

In THE DISTINGUISHED GENTLEMAN (1992), a con-man-turned-candidate-for-the-Congress (Eddie Murphy) runs the shameless election campaign on a low budget. He drives a car fitted with loudspeakers around the town, just to sell his ‘name’. “Jeff Johnson, the name you know”. He figures that most voters wouldn’t care and vote for him simply because the name sounds familiar (Jeff Johnson is the name of a dead Congressman). He cruises around the town in a van, advertising his name through the speakers in different accents to appeal to different ethnic groups. Well, THE DISTINGUISHED GENTLEMAN was a comedy. It was supposed to be …

JAPANESE FILMS

More photographs : Ozu, Eisenstein, and others

All right, another sets of photographs. Actually I don’t know if these are rarely seen or not, but just I haven’t seen them before. Top: Ozu contemplates in the set of WHAT DID THE LADY FORGET? (SHUKUJO WA NANI WO WASURETAKA, 淑女は何を忘れたか, 1937). The film opened in March 1937, while Ozu was drafted to the Army in September of the same year and sent to China for two years. (Feb. 1, 1937, Kinema Junpo) This is a very rare ad of THERE WAS A FATHER (1942), which I found in the magazine SHIN-EIGA (Feb. 1942). Because of poor quality of …