Slash And Burn

Yes! Yes! Yes!

Riki Takeuchi is now RIKI, complete with jumpsuit and decotruck. We've heard him sing before, but never like this:

And here he is shamelessly plugging this new record, "Kurenai no backfire," on Japanese TV:

Found on Patrick Macias' site.

Viz Theater Update

I've been pretty excited about the Japanese movie theater and J-pop center Viz is building in San Francisco's Japan Town, and have covered it in the past.

Last I heard from the company's site, the theater and center were slated to open in winter 2008. Now the site is saying 2009.

I was staying in San Francisco's Japan Town recently and had the opportunity to snap the picture that accompanies this post. Yes, it's a big hole in the ground, but that's something compared to what this space has been for seemingly ever: the old Hokubei Mainichi Shinbun building.

When completed, this will be the only Japanese theater in America. Can't wait!

Riki Takeuchi Sings!

You've joined his fan club, now own his single.

Patrick Macias was kind enough to post MP3s of Riki's 1995 single, "Yokubou no Machi," or "Town of Desire." Lots of wailing guitar, thick synth strings, and one gravely voiced bad ass. There's even a karaoke version so you can do your own Riki.

Get it here.

Update on Viz San Francisco Theater

I spotted this in Kaiju Shakedown's interview with the folks from Viz:

We're even in the process of building a new art-house theatre in San Francisco, VIZ's hometown. In addition to the theater, this building will house a J-Pop bookstore, café, and some girls’ fashion retailers from Tokyo. It's scheduled to open in the winter of 2008.

I heard some time ago about the theater but the other stuff sounds good too. But how will they fill programming? Viz doesn't have that many acquisitions in film format...

Oh, also, Viz is bringing Nice no Mori: First Contact aka Funky Forest to DVD. That's the kind of news I like to hear.

Learning Kanji From Movies

One of my favorite things about studying kanji (the written characters that come from Chinese) is learning a character that I've seen in movie titles. So much of the kanji I learn is without context. Until I'm living in Japan, it's just characters that I forget after taking the test. But to see it in the context of a film title, or in credits, well, then it sticks.

So here are some characters you may see watching Japanese films, starting with the basics.

映画
Pronounced "eiga," this means movie.

作品
You see this one in credits a lot. It's pronounced "sakuhin" and means, essentially, a work of art, or more simply, a production. As in a Toho production.

七人の侍
"Shichi nin no samurai," means, in English, Seven Samurai. The last character is the one for "samurai." "Shichi" is the first, meaning seven, and "nin" (sometimes read "hito") is the second, signifying that it's seven people.

生きる
Another Kurosawa title, this one is "Ikiru," which means, "to live." You may have noticed (if you're at all familiar with how Japanese is written) that not all of the characters are kanji. The second two (as well as the third one in "Shichi nin no samurai") are hiragana, phonetic characters unique to Japanese. In the case of 生きる, the hiragana changes as the verb conjugates. The の (pronounced "no") in the above title denotes a possessive, essentially (seven people that are samurai).

風林火山
The Japanese title for Samurai Banners, "Fuu rin ka zan," actually means, "wind, woods, fire, mountain."

やくざの墓場
The title for Kinji Fukasaku's Yakuza Graveyard is written in kanji and hiragana. The first three characters are "yakuza," then the "no," and then "hakaba," which means graveyard. It's made up of the characters for "grave" 墓 and "place" 場.

下妻物語
This is "Shimotsuma monogatari," better known as Kamikaze Girls. The English title has nothing to do with the Japanese title, which means "Shimotsuma Story." Shimotsuma is a city in a rural area a few hours north of Tokyo. But what is useful to know is the word "monogatari." You've seen it tons of times in Japanese movie titles. "Zatoichi monogatari," "Tokyo monogatari," "Hachiko monogatari."

武士の一分
This is another with an alternate English title. In English it's Love and Honor, Yoji Yamada's latest samurai film, but in Japanese it's "Bushi no ichibun," or "one part of bushi." "Bushi" is, of course, the warrior spirit, or "bushidou" 武士道.

妖怪大戦争
Any guesses? "Youkai dai sensou," which means Great Yokai War. The first two make up "yokai," which is like a spook or goblin. Next up is "dai," or "great," then "sensou," which means "war." I saw a poster for the Takashi Miike film when I was last in Japan, before the movie had come out here on DVD, but I couldn't read the characters yet. After learning "sensou" in kanji class, I looked up "yokai" to make it complete.

And my personal favorite:

怪獣
"Kaiju," as in rubber monster movie kaiju! The characters mean "strange beast." Hey, I just noticed that the first character, "kai" 怪 (strange) is the same as in "yokai" 妖怪. Wow, I just learned a new character.

I love Japanese.

I Big Up Myself Part 2

Daily J has posted part two of its interview with me. So there.

Thanks to everyone at Nipponster for choosing me to be your launch interview. I hope I don't ruin your business.

(But seriously. It's quite flattering. ありがとうよ。)

An Interview With Me

The nice folks at Daily J have done an interview with yours truly about this little site of mine.

Read what I have to say here.

Daily J is a part of Nipponster, a search engine that filters for Japan-related content.

Come On, Amoeba

I don't want to hate too much, because I really do like Amoeba. I've been going to their stores since they opened in Berkeley in 1990 (seems older than that, but that's what the website says). When I lived in LA I shopped at the Hollywood store, and of course I often frequent the Haight Street store. So what's up with the recent shoddy DVD ordering?

The Haight store has a great DVD section. It's huge and I've come to rely on it for fun shopping. I always find used stuff at good prices, and usually new stuff too. But the last few times I've been in there to pick up a Japanese film it hasn't even been ordered.

Last time it was for Welcome To The Grindhouse: Dragon Princess/Karate Warriors and Rica. They had neither. Today I was in there and they still didn't have Rica, nor did they have Horrors of Malformed Men or Snake Woman's Curse! I asked about it and they said they must have snuck under their radar.

OK. Rica I can kinda understand. But Horrors? It's one of the most expected titles recently. Never been available on DVD before. Ever. Not even in Japan. So what gives? I hate to say it but I'm going to have to start buying all my DVDs online.

ExPats Need Online DVD Rentals Too

I just learned about ExPat Video, an online DVD rental site geared towards expats living in Japan. The film selection is pretty good, focusing on Japanese and other foreign films with English subtitles as well as arthouse fare and cult titles. Like Netflix and Greencine, the DVDs come to your house in the mail, and the site offers a number of different plans.

I know when I finally get my ass back to Japan, I'll be taking advantage of this site.

Eigauta

I've been dragging my feet on the latest reviews so in a pathetic attempt to stall, here are three clips from Mystery Science Theater 3000, each with a song about a Sandy Frank-related picture. (See, there's a tenuous Japanese film connection!)

Sandy Frank Song:

Gamera Song:

Fugitive Alien Song:

Yeah.