“We send a reporter to the scene, he asks the transit police if he can go into the tunnel, they say no, he says okay, I go on the air every eight minutes and say, ‘Still no news on that disabled train.'”

broderic on September 17, 2013

Pulled from the Shelves: From Up on Poppy Hill

The great animation director Hayao Miyazaki announced his retirement this past week. He’ll be sorely missed, but if Ghibli continues to make animated films as lovely as From Up on Poppy Hill, the studio is in good hands.

From Up on Poppy Hill is directed by Miyazaki’s son, Goro Miyazaki. The father wrote the screenplay based on a shojo manga from the early 80s. Ghibli films are known for their leading ladies. Choosing a shojo manga heroine is natural. Although, this is the first time one can say that Ghibli is doing a moe film.

Moe? Yes. It’s got plenty of tropes from anime of the last few years: twin tails, seifuku, school clubs, school setting. For a second, From Up on Poppy Hill feels almost like any anime lately. That doesn’t really detract from it. I’m only noticing because of the amount of anime I’ve been watching.

The plot revolves around young love. The heroine falls for the charismatic editor of the school newspaper. She helps him in saving the old club house building from being demolished. They are meant to be together but certain family ties stand in their way.

It’s a simple film. Girl meets boy. Girl falls for boy. Boy falls for girl. They both are in love. Plain and simple.

I bought the Blu-Ray/DVD combo and I have both discs in both TVs ready to be watched. The English dub is completely different than the original Japanese. Goro Miyazaki trusts his viewers to understand what’s showing on the screen. The English dub doesn’t; it opens with a voice over from the heroine setting the scene fro the rest of movie. The Japanese version opens with just the soundtrack playing following the heroine as she wakes up, prepares breakfast, and gets ready for the day. We are meant to infer what’s happening, let the story unfold, and figure out the setting. That’s trust by showing and not telling.

Animation is not a genre. It’s a technic. This film could easily have been live action. I’m glad that Ghibli did it animated. Animation isn’t just for kids. Plenty of stories can be animated. I wish more directors chose it. Thank you Hayao Miyazaki.

4 of 5 stars.

Seven Swans A-swimming

broderic on December 31, 2011

New Year’s Eve. It’s a new movie opening this weekend. I don’t think I want to subject you, my readers, to something that painful so I’m gonna fall back to one of my favorite Coen movies, The Hudsucker Proxy.

Norville Barnes, a hick from Muncie, Indiana, peers perilously over the ledge as the clock strikes twelve on New Year’s Eve. He wants to take his life because he was a failure at being the CEO of the Hudsucker Corporation, but he was just a stooge put in place by the board to drive the stock down. At the disastrously lowered price, the board members wanted purchase the stock on the cheap. Needless to say, Norville’s idiocy guides the Hudsucker Corporation to new heights especially with the introduction of the hula-hoop, Norville’s invention.

Amy Archer is a Pulitzer winning journalist who spies something funny about Norville Barnes as CEO, and she decides to investigate him. She poses as a fellow Muncian and becomes Norville’s secretary. She finds out how much of an idiot he is, but also that there is some genius to his idiocy. She falls in love, yet, she exposes his idiocy and causes his downfall. “How could you a fellow Muncian?” Queue the climb to the ledge.

The Christmas theme today is the circular notion of “what comes around goes around.” Christmas comes just once a year. It’s gone, but it will be back again next year. Live for that and it will come around again. Give and you shall receive. Or as they said in the movie karma.

The big O! “You know, for kids!”

So as you celebrate New Year’s Eve remember, you do get a second chance. It’ll come around again in a year’s time.

Short Shrift

broderic on March 4, 2011

God of Love put a smile on my face. It’s this year’s Oscar winner for Live Action Short, and the director and star, Luke Methany, had IMO the best acceptance speech. It was also produced by a Filipina, so it’s got a lot of good karma going for it.

The story centers around the main guy, a singer, looking to fall in love with his drummer who has the hots for the guitarist who is also the lead’s best friend. The singer prays to the gods for guidance in love and he receives it in the form of cupid’s darts. Did I mention he’s also an accurate dart player? He’ll use these darts to bring love and happiness to his life and the lives of others.

I had purchased this short on iTunes along with a few others last week before the Oscar telecast. This was the best of the bunch. Let’s Pollute, an animated short, tried hard to satirize our wasteful ways by assuming the guise of a 50s ‘how-to’ cartoon. It was too heavy handed and quickly became a one note tune. The Crush was about a boy and his crush on his school teacher. I had picked this to win, but knew immediately when I started watching it that it was a terrible choice. It was predictable. I wondered how it could’ve gotten a nomination.

That’s my Oscar shorts. I think I want to catch the Illusionist.

God of Love 4 of 5 stars.
Let’s Pollute 3 of 5 stars.
The Crush 2 of 5 stars.

Link of the Day [8.13.09]

broderic on August 13, 2009

Speaking of shelves. Here’s a link to every Mac addicts favorite cataloguing software. I bought the first version and the upgraded to the second. I also bought the iPhone app before it was removed from the store for violating stupid Amazon.com’s TOS.

Use it to keep inventory of all your books, DVDs, manga, comics, anime, etc., etc.. I like that it has shelves to display your stuff. You can use your iSight to scan in the barcode to lookup on Amazon.com the item. It does com in handy.

That iPhone app is a great looking app. The desktop version is fun too.

http://www.delicious-monster.com/

Pulled From the Shelves: Shall We ダンス?

broderic on August 13, 2009

Pulled from the shelves is going to be some musings on a film from my vast library. Okay, it really isn’t vast, but it’s spilling out all over my house. Perhaps it’s time to invest in some DVD sleeves and recycle the boxes.

The first installment in this retrospect of my collection is a look at the Japanese Academy Award winner for Best Picture of 1997, Shall We Dansu? I don’t remember getting this one, but I found it sitting on my television still encased in plastic. It must’ve been when I bought some books from Amazon, as Marge at the FishTank, reminded me on Twitter.

If you hadn’t seen it, you may have seen the recent remake with J-Lo and Richard Gere. It has the same plot. A salaryman, slave to the grind seeks something outside of work and family to make him happy and relieve his ennui. He happens to see a beautiful, young woman looking forlornly out of the window of a dance studio. For a week, he catches sight of her every day from his the train home until one day he decides to find her. He at first approaches dance just to meet her. When he does finally have a chance to be alone with her, she rejects his advances and tells him that he is mistaken if he took up dance just for her. He accepts the rejection and puts his heart into dancing so much so that he begins to participate in amateur ballroom dance competitions.

All this time his wife suspects him to be having an affair. He’s no longer depressed and he smells of perfume when he comes home late. She hires a detective who informs her of his passion for dancing and who ends up finding passion in dance as well. She’s jealous.

He on the other hand is ashamed. Close dancing is unexpected in Japanese society. He doesn’t want anyone to find out about his dancing. A colleague at work also is a ballroom dancer, and he too hides it from everyone.

Our salaryman is also ashamed about finding happiness outside of his marriage. He doesn’t like to make his wife jealous. His obligation makes it too much to continue dance, but the rhythm calls. It calls for him, not just the pretty dance instructor.

Sorry about the spoilers.

The feeling I got from watching the dancing in this movie (maybe also, from the movie itself) is exhilaration. It looks like fun. I likened the feeling to riding my bike. It must be really fun! And especially, if you have a partner. Sometimes I feel like taking dance lessons. It looks like fun. It must be exhilarating to be in the embrace of a girl moving together to the music. And just like our salaryman, dancing may bring out the life in me.

So, I was glad to pull this film out of my library. I’ll gladly watch it again. In fact, I’m watching it again right now.

4 of 5 stars