Review: The Wind Rises (2014)

The Wind Rises (2014) is the saddest movie I ever seen, it is not tearing out your eyes type sadness but it is a loaded silence looking at how dreams can be a monster when it tampered with reality. I was choking inside last night and I felt this is the most personal Miyazaki work ever. His sadness can be felt from flat line pacing which might pissed some viewers off as being too uninteresting. To me, it is thematic background acknowledgement of dead dream represented by the flatline...constantly goes on and on. His treatment of events are rather blase, Miyazaki is just not interested in dramatizing things at all. Which is remarkable.

The characters are insular and aloof, they never try to engage the viewer because the director wants to talk about the end of a dream more by using these characters as a proxy to that end. It is not about character development at all. Even Jiro, the male lead is voice acted by Evangelion director is placid in his expression. The only human connection is brief moments of lapse and the constant puffs of smoke. The main female lead feels tacked on despite efforts to make her relevant to the story.

Artwise is very dreamy, fitting because it talks about dream.

To fully grasp the meat of the movie, a viewer must have some background knowledge of Japanese history and aviation too since this is the only spot of passion that Miyazaki keep in the movie. World War 1, the Great Kanto Earthquake, the economic crash, the war on China and World War 2 are the pivotal points for storytelling.

This movie can be polarizing since it is so personal, it is solid 8 out of 10 from me but other people might hate this movie because it appears to be so uninteresting. In a way, it is Miyazaki's personal essay on why militarism is bad for Japan and his criticism (some say preaching) to Shinzo Abe that this is not right at all.

I suspect I might see something else if I going to watch this movie again in future.

Princess Kaguya (2013) Long Trailer

Okay this is a 6 min trailer on 2nd Studio Ghibli movie of the year, The Story of Princess Kaguya. Directed by same dude who did Graveyard of Fireflies (Isao Takahata), I suspect it will be another tearjerker or thematically sad at the minimum.

Needless to say, I am eager to watch this. Bring it on. Coming soon to Japan on 23rd November 2013, no announcement for international screenings yet.

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Hidan no Aria / 緋弾のアリア is meh for me.

Came across this series, intrigued that this is the most "anticipated anime of the new season" as voted in a recent poll. So I decided to read the light novel and boy, am I not impressed. The story is basically students at one school in Tokyo are authorized to be part time law enforcement personnel due to increasing crime in Japan.

Some dude called Kinji who has this split personality or bipolar wanted a normal life, refusing to join the SWAT version of the school "Butei" called Assault team despite having an excellent aptitude for it. One fateful day he met this twin tailed, red hair, hot-headed chick called Aria and mayhem ensues due to the meeting. His enhanced self will only manifest when he sees females in trouble. After she saw what Kinji can do, she wants him badly despite vehement protests from him. To pass his time in the school before he will be transferred out, he join the detective division and score as lowly as possible in order not to stand out.

The setting is completely unconvincing and Aria is suppose to be descended from famous English master, Sherlock Holmes who looking for someone to complete her so she can brought up her inner talents to the brim. Facing them is some French criminal mastermind descendant, Lupin who still hold a grudge against the Holmes lineage. Her goal is to free her wrongly accused mother from some crime in Japanese jail while Lupin is trying to take down scores on Aria.

This story is purely for people who wanted the next Zero no Tsukaima tsundere female lead, only this time the male lead for this series is slightly less dense than usual. Her character is utterly predictable with usual tropes attached. No suspense, no surprises. Action is too ridiculous, it pushes suspension of disbelief to the limit.

The plot gets very thin quickly as she keep abusing the male lead, it is annoying. Unlike Toradora's Taiga who actually develop during the narrative, Aria shown very little of development at snail's pace. Ironically, the leads of Toradora are back especially the tsundere queen, Rie Kugiyama. I can foresee this series will be big, just a question of how big it will be.

I will give it a pass, not really my kinda stuff.

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Who will be Koizumi next nemesis?

The anime shorts Legend of Koizumi is hilarious series based on this manga. I noticed that the OP sequence have hints as to who will be next opponent of the intrepid hero from land of Rising Sun. Now let's see....




Looking at the OP montage, the silhouette matches a famous portrait of Shi Huang Ti. I did not speculate, I am pretty confident it was him. It is hard to miss Great Wall of China at the background too.






The OP also shows Adolf Hitler as the next nemesis. His arm raised in Nazi salute in front of the Nazi Eagle is pretty clear.




Napoleon Bonaparte with his most famous portrait, this drawing is based on him during spectacular Italian campaign.




Augustus Caesar, 1st Emperor of Imperial Rome. The pose looks the same with background of the famous Colosseum.



Now this one is a big question mark for me. The sequence of the OP montage suggests that he will be next opponent of Koizumi after Shih Huang Ti, the First Emperor of China,. The background is Chinese and my speculation is this enemy will be wisest man of China after Koizumi won against the best warrior king of China. My pick will be 3: Sun Tzu, Zhuge Liang or Kung Fu Tze or Confucius.

Let's see if I was right. LOL!

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Senkou no Night Raid / 閃光のナイトレイド

"The story is set in Shanghai in 1931, when the Imperial Japanese Army has been dispatched to mainland China due to the relatively recent First Sino-Japanese War, Russo-Japanese War, and World War I. In this cosmopolitan city of intrigue, there is a special military spy organization called "Sakurai Kikan" that has since been buried in history."

Basically it is an espionage drama during interwar years (1919-1939) situated in what then cosmopolitan city of Shanghai. During that period, spies from various Great Powers came and doing intrigue (cloak and dagger stuff) against each other since China was a failed state with bountiful resources. Usually a favourite epoch/genre for many Chinese dramas from Hong Kong, it is rather unusual for anime to do a story from this era of this genre.

Now though question is how Imperial Japan will portrayed in the series. They are not nice bunch of people during those years in reality so I assume the anime will somewhat tone it down and make them the good guys who scheming against voracious Western Powers especially Russia. Or even the treatment of Chinese in the story going to matter or not.

Jun Matsumoto (Persona -trinity soul-) is the director with A-1 Pictures funding on this series. Shinsuke Onishi (The Third: The Girl with the Blue Eye, New Getter Robo, 009-1) is supervising the scripts.Staff wise it looks pretty ok but what I wondering if it will be historically fair or not. But again, if Hollywood can make historically biased movies, I am not counting too much on Japanese anime to give it an even tone. Soon to be aired in 2010 spring.

Source

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Otoyomegatari / 乙嫁語り/ The Bride's Story art showcase

Look at the sheer beauty of this scene. No run-of-the-mill mangaka can pull this kinda stuff. It requires patience, passion and love for the craft to produce this kind of detailing (the fabric weaves and patterns are behold to look at). Kaoru Mori, famous for her work in Shirley and Emma (both set in Victorian era England) is penning this story about Central Asia newly wed couple in slice of life story. I suspect it is situated in Kazakhstan based on costumes the manga shown so far (all the hints: is the story is based on Silk Road life in 19th or early 20th century and an off hand comment that "people of the north" are encroaching on their life which sounds like Russians asserting their power over the steppe nomads). The story pacing is slow so far (as expected from her work) but the historical detailing is pretty high standard if anyone reads Emma can remember.













The videos showing stage by stage work of the art. Lots of slow, painstaking stuff here. This Japanese website have more details on this. Amazon Japan is selling the 1st volume. This is kinda stuff that gives me reason why I love art and drawing in 1st place.

Cheers.

Production I.G Musashi / 宮本武蔵 ―双剣に馳せる夢― Trailer

Slated for summer of this year, Production I.G's work 宮本武蔵 ―双剣に馳せる夢― / Musashi: The Dream of the Last Samurai envisioned and written by Mamoru Oshii (GITS, Sky Crawlers) should be interesting. Oshii's vision and intellectual approach of story is either sublime or obtuse for fans. Now we shall see how he handle one of Japan's most renowned samurai legend. Kill Bill anime sequence director Mizuho Nishikubo will be the one sitting on director's chair.

Russo- Japanese Anime collobration, First Squad / Первый отряд / ファースト・スクワッド part 2

Remember this fantastical World War 2 themed anime series by joint Russian and Japanese effort?

Finally there is more details and full trailer.


Okay, the German Army occult unit (not too far off since Himmler is very interested in occultism in real life) invoked vengeful spirits from old Eastern Crusade which Germanic order of knights "Teutonic Knights" spearheaded against pagan or Othrodox East European in 15th century. Their efforts were broken in 1410 at Battle of Tannenberg which also symbolizes the emergence of nationalism of Polish since the Polish King lead the opposing side. The battle is depicted in painting above.

In 1942, German Army is on offensive again after stabilized the line from Zhukov counteroffensive in late 1941 near gates of Moscow. This time though the Russian Army is ready for them. In the movie, the Russian vengeful spirits killed in 1941 were back helping Nadya the 14 year old NKVD/STAVKA agent to fight the mythical German Army crusaders.

Sounds like good fun. Someone did remarked to me it looks like Blood+ but with blond swordsgirl killing Nazis this time. LOL.

The movie soon will be premiered in Cannes Du Marche Films at May 13th and Palais C at May 16th and 17th 2009. Made by Studio 4C with cooperation of Molot Production, directed by Yoshiharu Ashino.

Manga as tool of political propoganda

The rise of Japanese manga as political commentary medium advancing sets of political beliefs that bears some reminiscent to Yukio Mishima's attempt to indoctrinate post war Japan into old Imperial mold of rightist thinking again using his literature power (which he failed and commits a very public suicide in Japanese Self Defense Force HQ). This time though, mangas like Spirit of the Sun (the author here appealing to Japanese youth to have pride to be Japanese again in national crisis), Rideback (this manga talks about fears of globalization destroying local political culture specifically Japan) and even seemingly every seinen manga published by Kodansha which I can recall, don't have much socialist or left wing slanted titles.

Most famous political manga in Japan is Silent Service which even got debated in Japanese Diet (parliament). This remarkable manga which still in top 10 of best seinen manga in Japan readership (2006) talks about a rogue Japanese submarine XO who hijack the submarine and declared his ship as independent neutral entity "Yamato" despite it is built as joint US-Japanese SSBN (nuclear submarine). 2.2 million copies were sold by 1992 and still enjoys massive popularity even today in Japan. In the end, he sailed to UN HQ in New York to appeal to the world that everyone should dismantle their nuclear arsenal or to be destroyed. Predictably, the US Navy is the baddies here, they tried to stop the Yamato from accomplishing the objective. To many readers it seems very naive politically but as ideologue on pacifism, it is remarkable poster boy in backhand manner.

However a discussion of politcal manga cannot be complete without talking about controversial Yoshinori Kobayashi. Famous for his Gomanism Shingen / ゴーマニズム宣言 and his more infamous statements were like for example, total veneration of Kamikaze Corps, denial of Nanking Massacre and comfort women issue is a fabrication of anti Japanese propaganda. He is the darling of Japanese media and often appear in morning shows to give opinions on current events. His rise to international fame is when 2 major liberal newspapers known in Western world; NY Times and Le Monde wrote a scathing article on him for his neo fascist stand. To the end, he still defiant and his latest manga "On Taiwan" is published outside of Japan despite angry retorts from Chinese.

Stay tuned for more later, as I will discuss what I think of Eagle, a manga of Japanese-American become US President advocating pacifism.

Why Oda Nobunaga (戦国BASARA / Sengoku BASARA) often depicted as villian in most chambara / samurai medias?

He is portrayed so because many Japanese samurai commentators regarded him as upstart usurper that destroyed harmony of Japanese idealized samurai hierarchy. In their view, he is the motorcycle gang leader complete with punk hair and bad attitude. He is ruthless, brilliant, unorthodox and uncharacteristically non conformist hence his constant portrayal as dark lord from another dimension.



Confucian influenced samurai commentators did not like upstarts hence they often written Nobunaga in rather bad light, only concede grudging respect when it warrants so such as his conduct in Battle of Nagashino 1575 CE (the battle that signified the end of famous Takeda clan) and his putting down of Ikko-Ikki monk rebellion. Not to mention his ruthless campaign against Iga ninja clan (as shown in GONZO anime series Basilisk) which some historian compare it to Mongolian genocide against feared Assassin clan during the Crusades. This is the man who hired an African as his personal bodyguard, he purchased him from visiting Portuguese missionary which brought him as slave. He is also the one promoted sandal bearer to general which later inherit his legacy and finish uniting Japan in his wake. The sandal bearer's name is Toyotomi Hideyoshi whom Nobunaga nicknamed him "Saru" which means monkey. This is why Hideyoshi was carrying a pet monkey in Sengoku Basara series.



However the one that upset so many samurai commentators is his liberal usage of gun on Japanese battlefield, they considered gun has changed the nobility of samurai warfare. The katana blade and bow is no longer elegant weapon of decision which celebrated in timeless samurai poetry, it is a simple peasant with arquebus can gun down even the mightiest warlord from safe distance riled samurai purists to no end. Hence it is no surprise that they look on Nobunaga with sullen disdain for this tradition breaking aspect.




In latest game inspired anime series Sengoku Basara / 戦国BASARA, it is an easy template for story writers to copy this popular casting of Nobunaga as badass baddie instead of more understanding examination of him. Just like how most Romance of 3 Kingdom media usage of Cao Cao as villain most of the time.

The series is fun to watch but don't take it too seriously. However the cast VA is like who's who in Japanese VA industry which is like Yang opposite of concurrent infamous Queen Blade which boasted very impressive female VA lineup Ying (the anime with lactating acid breast ahem). Nobunaga is voiced by famous Norio Wakamoto which considered by many fans as most macho male voice comparable to James Earl Jones Darth Vader.

It is basically a Gurren Lagaan with samurai setting with little homoerotic spiced relationships (Yukimura and Lord Takeda is perfect example).

Somewhat sufficient Wiki entry

John Woo as guest VA in Souten Koro / 蒼天航路

A different interpretation on Romance of 3 Kingdoms anime series, Souten Koro / 蒼天航路 will feature the famous director as one of the voice soon. The particular episode is scheduled around 28th April.

It coincides with screening of Red Cliff 2 in Japan, so it is a form of viral marketing for his movie.

Red Cliff 2 is rather conventional story on Cao Cao as baddie who tried to conquer whole China whereas Souten Koro depicted Cao Cao as benevolent leader who tried to put down disruptive rebellion by Liu Bei and the gang.

Rather interesting juxtaposition.

Personally, I think both views have their merits but Romance of 3 Kingdoms were so shrouded in many mythos that is difficult to divide which one is true and which one is not.

As for Red Cliff 2, the movie tries to too hard to be epic but it kinda overwhelms itself by focusing too much on few individuals in such vast canvas. John Woo can't make up his mind which movie should be, epic or human drama. It is a shame.

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Code Geass and Malaysian Politics? Marcos and Voltes 5?

It was indeed surprising and relieving to hear Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak announcing the release of 13 Hindraf detainees and lifting the temporary ban on opposition newspapers.
This move is somewhat parallel to ex-prime minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi’s promising speech for reforms when he entered office in 2003, only that PM Najib’s move was one of ‘action speaks louder than words’.



Najib’s action reminds me of Code Geass, a Japanese anime about the struggle of Japan against Britannia, a powerful nation that had colonised Japan and renamed that nation to ‘Area 11’.

In one scene the opposition, Order of the Black Knights, had gained substantial popularity in Area 11, especially amongst the Japanese because of their ability to win many battles against Britannia in their revolt. They are seen to be the messiahs for the Japanese and many threw their support behind the Order of the Black Knights.

This situation is synonymous to the opposition in Malaysia. The Order of the Black Knights has a reason to revolt – Britannia’s unjust treatment against the Japanese, which includes discrimination, deletion of their national identity, et cetera.



Pakatan Rakyat has a reason to strive – the ruling government’s unjust implementation of policies, corruption, discrimination, draconian laws, etc.

At the peak of the story, a new Britannia governor for Area 11 was sworn in and made her first speech – in which she reestablished Japan’s name and identity, Britannians and Japanese were now equal. This speech’s impact was far reaching.

The Britannians, who were comfortable with being of a higher status were not happy. The Order of the Black Knights, meanwhile, lost their cause to fight, because what they were fighting for had been fulfilled.



Therefore, it is no surprise that after PM Najib’s speech of releasing the Hindraf detainees and lifting the ban on opposition newspapers has somewhat diminished temporarily the purpose of PR.

If PM Najib were to go all the way and erase every single reason for Pakatan’s establishment, BN will definitely regain the confidence of the people. However, just like in the anime, it might come with a price in that perhaps the comfortable cronies would lose out.

In any case, PM Najib must not use this affirmative action for reforms as a veil over allegations of his alleged involvement in the murder of Altantuya.

He must indeed be cleared of any involvement through court proceedings. PM Najib, your good deeds will not even out or cover the serious allegations against you. The truth will.

Article in question



Amusing article from Malaysia Kini using anime as analogy to explain political situation. Last time it is the story of Philippine's Marcos and Voltes 5. In this historical case study, President Marcos known for his kleptocracy and corrupted regime, abetted by his greedy wife Imelda banned Voltes 5 anime series after rebels rally around this superobot series to chastise his administration indirectly.

When Voltes was rebroadcast again after the revolution (1986) that brought down Marcos regime, it was greeted with cheers by hard suffering Filipinos as symbolic victory just like how Voltes bring down the evil oppressive regime of Horned Humans in the anime series.

The History of Marcos and Voltes 5

Cheers.

Mamoru Oshii's Production I.G Musashi Teaser is out.

Oh! Beautiful! I am so looking forward to this. I wonder if they using the novel's template to tell the famous sword saint or not.

Production staff includes director Mizuho Nishikubo (also known by his alias Toshihiko Nishikubo) who has worked on numerous Oshii films including Ghost in the Shell (1995), Innocence (2004) and The Sky Crawlers (2008). He also directed the TV series Otogi Zoshi and Legend of Heavenly Sphere Shurato. Kazuto Nakazawa, director of the mind-blowing animation segment in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill Vol. 1 (2003) and creator of innovative characters as seen in Samurai Champloo (2004), will design the characters for Musashi. The animation is supervised by Kazuchika Kise, the chief animator in Ghost in the Shell, Innocence and Blood: The Last Vampire.

Previous entry

Otoyome-Gatari

The stage is a rural city next to Caspian Sea in 19th century, Amir Khargal, 20 year old nomad woman, married a 12 year old boy, Karluk Aphon. It's about a life of newly married couple, an aggressive nomad woman and a peaceful farmer boy.

Mori Kaoru said she fancies cavalry battles so she decided to write this story. She is well known for her works in Shirley and Victorian Romance Emma. What I admire is her meticulous detailing and research on culture, clothing of the era she is writing on. As the picture above shows, the costume of the plain nomads of Central Asia is intricate and very beautiful.

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Miyamoto Musashi/ 宮本武蔵

Mamoru Oishi from his praised but not commercially successful Sky Crawlers will be directing Studio IG movie on most famous Japanese duelist, Miyamoto Musashi. Musashi who wrote treatise on swordmanship known Book of Five Rings, said to have won 60 duels against famous martial artists in Japan. Studio IG has made excellent chambara series "Guardian of Water Spirit" or Seirei no Moribito should be able to rival another excellent chambara movie released last year, Sword of Stranger animated by Studio Bones.

Due for release in early summer 2009, the title would be 宮本武蔵―双剣に馳せる夢― / Miyamoto Musashi - Futaken ni Haseru Yume (Miyamoto Musashi – A Dream of Victory with Two Swords).

Perhaps this will talk about his exploits when he fought the Yoshioka school where he is forced to use dual sword in mortal combat against whole school. The ending might be where he went one on one against a renowned rival, Genryu Sasaki Kojiro.

Wikipedia entry
Anime movie site

Hetalia Axis Powers/ ヘタリア Axis Powers

New Studio DEEN's television anime version of Hidekazu Himaruya's Hetalia - Axis Powers web manga has been announced..

What is this all about?

It is about a "cynical gag" story mainly recounts the era between World War I and World War II, with the stereotypical description of each participant country or region (particularly northern Italy) anthropomorphized as pretty boys as opposed to female friendly Strike Witches. For example, Italia Veneziano is into pasta and women whereas Deutsch (Germany) loves potatoes and sausages. The manga's title comes the Japanese words for "useless" (hetare) and Italy (Italia).

Basically it is a geopolitical historical discourse in pretty boy analogy format.

Source