Although his last feature “Zegen” was not quite the success production company Toei had hoped for, they, nevertheless, wanted to continue their collaboration with renowned director Shohei Imamura and gave him the opportunity to tell a story he had been thinking about for quite some time. Based on Masuji Ibuse’s novel of the same name, the project “Black Rain” was set in Japan in the aftermath of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It is a work which cinephiles, critics and film scholars alike often regard as an exception to Imamura’s work in the 1980s, as it bears more similarities to the features he directed in the 1960s given its radical imagery, tone and themes. At the same time, “Black Rain” follows Imamura’s concept of the period piece as a tale set in the past but which has a striking significance for the present, and even for the future,...
- 12/26/2020
- by Rouven Linnarz
- AsianMoviePulse
Sweet Bean (An) Kino Lorber Reviewed by: Harvey Karten for Shockya, d-based on Rotten Tomatoes Grade: B Director: Naomi Kawase Written by: Naomi Kawase based on Durian Sukegawa’s novel Cast: Kirin Kiki, Masatoshi Nagase, Kyara Uchida, Miyoko Asada, Etsuko Ichihara Screened at: Review 2, NYC, 2/17/16 Opens: March 18, 2016 Eating is a social occasion to such an extent that we may feel sorry for those, like business executives, who must often dine alone. People bond over food. State dinners are de rigeuer in much of the world, sharing of food helping along agreements between countries. And people bond as well over cooking. Though cooking at home is often a [ Read More ]
The post Sweet Bean Paste Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
The post Sweet Bean Paste Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
- 4/3/2016
- by Harvey Karten
- ShockYa
Despite her prolific output, with films often times making their way to the Cannes Film Festival, Naomi Kawase seems to go under-appreciated here in the United States due to the lack of distribution. Thankfully her latest drama, Sweet Bean (previously titled An and Sweet Red Bean Paste), was picked up by Kino Lorber and will be arriving next month. Following the story of a small bakery, it was one of our favorite dramas of Cannes last year and today brings the U.S. trailer.
We said in our review, “Contributing immeasurably to this empathetic tone is Kiki’s soulful, splendidly unaffected performance. Playing someone with a sad secret to guard and a militantly cheerful exterior as defense, this portrayal could have gone off the sappy or the farcical end so easily. Instead, she succeeds in first tricking you into seeing this harmlessly wacky old lady who talks to red beans and greets birds,...
We said in our review, “Contributing immeasurably to this empathetic tone is Kiki’s soulful, splendidly unaffected performance. Playing someone with a sad secret to guard and a militantly cheerful exterior as defense, this portrayal could have gone off the sappy or the farcical end so easily. Instead, she succeeds in first tricking you into seeing this harmlessly wacky old lady who talks to red beans and greets birds,...
- 2/23/2016
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
'The Beginning or the End' 1947 with Robert Walker and Tom Drake. Hiroshima bombing 70th anniversary: Six movies dealing with the A-bomb terror Seventy years ago, on Aug. 6, 1945, the U.S. dropped the first atomic bomb over the city of Hiroshima. Ultimately, anywhere between 70,000 and 140,000 people died – in addition to dogs, cats, horses, chickens, and most other living beings in that part of the world. Three days later, America dropped a second atomic bomb, this time over Nagasaki. Human deaths in this other city totaled anywhere between 40,000-80,000. For obvious reasons, the evisceration of Hiroshima and Nagasaki has been a quasi-taboo in American films. After all, in the last 75 years Hollywood's World War II movies, from John Farrow's Wake Island (1942) and Mervyn LeRoy's Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo (1944) to Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan (1998) and Michael Bay's Pearl Harbor (2001), almost invariably have presented a clear-cut vision...
- 8/7/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
In just a couple weeks, the organizers at the Cannes Film Festival will unveil their official selections, and widely expected to pop up is Naomi Kawase's "An: Sweet Red Bean Paste." She's a favorite on the Croisette, with three films playing In Competition over the years, winning the Grand Jury Prize and Golden Coach award for "The Mourning Forest" in 2007. Her latest looks like a lovely piece of low-key drama, judging by the first international trailer, which admittedly, I didn't understand a word of. Read More: Naomi Kawase's 'Still The Water' Is A Spectacle For The Senses Starring Kirin Kiki, Masatoshi Nagase, and Etsuko Ichihara, and based on the novel by Tetsuya Akikawa, the story follows the bond that forms between an ex-con-turned-manager-of-a-bakery and an older customer, who develop a friendship over their communal love the titular pastry. But a secret could change everything if revealed. "An: Sweet Red Bean Paste" opens in.
- 4/3/2015
- by Kevin Jagernauth
- The Playlist
Director Yoji Yamada originally planned to begin principal photography of Tokyo Kazoku, an homage to Yasujiro Ozu’s Tokyo Story, on the first of this month. However, the devastating Tohoku earthquake and tsunami which occurred on March 11 caused Shochiku to halt the production and has forced Yamada to seriously consider altering the script to reflect post-3/11 Japan.
After planning the project for over a year and assembling a cast which includes Bunta Sugawara, Etsuko Ichihara, Masahiko Nishimura, Shigeru Muroi, Satoshi Tsumabuki, Yui Natsukawa, Shozo Hayashiya, and Yu Aoi, Yamada made the admittedly agonizing choice to push production back further after consulting with Shochiku.
The director suggested going ahead with the current script might be “feigning ignorance”, considering the possibility that the hearts and minds of the Japanese people may be changed by the events of 3/11. For that reason, the current plan is to monitor the state of the nation through the end of this year,...
After planning the project for over a year and assembling a cast which includes Bunta Sugawara, Etsuko Ichihara, Masahiko Nishimura, Shigeru Muroi, Satoshi Tsumabuki, Yui Natsukawa, Shozo Hayashiya, and Yu Aoi, Yamada made the admittedly agonizing choice to push production back further after consulting with Shochiku.
The director suggested going ahead with the current script might be “feigning ignorance”, considering the possibility that the hearts and minds of the Japanese people may be changed by the events of 3/11. For that reason, the current plan is to monitor the state of the nation through the end of this year,...
- 4/15/2011
- Nippon Cinema
Back in December, it was announced that director Yoji Yamada was working on a contemporary take on Yasujiro Ozu’s 1953 film “Tokyo Story” called Tokyo Kazoku. Earlier today, the cast was revealed by Shochiku.
Bunta Sugawara (77) will star as Shukichi Hirayama and Etsuko Ichihara (75) will play his wife Tomiko. Sugawara has not appeared in a film since “Battery” in 2007 and his last starring role was in 2003’s “Watashi no Grandpa”.
Masahiko Nishimura (50) will play their eldest son Koichi, who works as the administrator of a hospital. Yui Natsukawa (42) will play his wife Fumiko.
Shigeru Muroi (52) will play their eldest daughter Shigeko, who manages a beauty parlor, and Shozo Hayashiya (48) will play her husband Kurazo.
Finally, Satoshi Tsumabuki (30) will play the younger son, with Yu Aoi (25) playing his girlfriend.
Filming wil take place from April 1 to late June, with a theatrical release planned for winter 2011.
Sources: Tokyograph, Eiga.com...
Bunta Sugawara (77) will star as Shukichi Hirayama and Etsuko Ichihara (75) will play his wife Tomiko. Sugawara has not appeared in a film since “Battery” in 2007 and his last starring role was in 2003’s “Watashi no Grandpa”.
Masahiko Nishimura (50) will play their eldest son Koichi, who works as the administrator of a hospital. Yui Natsukawa (42) will play his wife Fumiko.
Shigeru Muroi (52) will play their eldest daughter Shigeko, who manages a beauty parlor, and Shozo Hayashiya (48) will play her husband Kurazo.
Finally, Satoshi Tsumabuki (30) will play the younger son, with Yu Aoi (25) playing his girlfriend.
Filming wil take place from April 1 to late June, with a theatrical release planned for winter 2011.
Sources: Tokyograph, Eiga.com...
- 2/23/2011
- Nippon Cinema
Kuroi ame / Black Rain (1989) Direction: Shohei Imamura Screenplay: Shohei Imamura and Toshirô Ishidô; from Masuji Ibuse’s novel Cast: Yoshiko Tanaka, Kazuo Kitamura, Etsuko Ichihara, Shoichi Ozawa Animego’s DVD release of Shohei Imamura’s Black Rain includes as a bonus feature a selection of World War II-era anti-Japanese propaganda films. Sponsored by various U.S. government bureaucracies, most of these shorts traffic in the usual sort of wartime racism and paranoia which, depending on your sensibility, you will find either disturbing or amusing. The most egregious of these is something called My Japan, which features an actor in yellow-face hectoring the American audience into buying more war bonds by boasting that Japan won’t be defeated [...]...
- 4/8/2010
- by Dan Erdman
- Alt Film Guide
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