Lost In Translation

Oiwa Temple

This temple (Buddhist) is near Tamiya Inari Jinja (Shinto)  and is also associated with "The Yostuya Kaidan."

The Man Who Stole The Sun

I first became aware of Kazuhiko Hasegawa's film The Man Who Stole The Sun (1979), because I learned that director Paul Schrader's brother Leonard (who co-wrote The Yakuza with his brother in 1974) co-wrote the film with Hasegawa. This occurred when I was researching about Paul Schrader's film Mishima: A History in Four Chapters. It is a curious film in that its reputation is much greater in Japan than abroad-I haven't come across many references to it, and there are few reviews or literary articles devoted to it. This, despite the fact that in 2009 a film magazine, Kinejun, published a list of Japan's all-time greatest films to commemorate their 90th anniversary and The Man Who Stole the Sun tied with Rashomon and Sanzen Tange and the Pot Worth a Million Ryo with the number seven slot. I guess it can best be described as a sort of Dr. Strangelove nuclear bomb parody where a high school science teacher develops a nuclear bomb at home and threatens to use it, unless his two demands are met: 1) allow baseball games to be broadcast in their entirety instead of being cut short by the news and 2) allow the Rolling Stones to hold a concert in Japan despite their drug convictions. I believe the film was green-lighted because of the commitment of the the two main stars: Kenji Sawada (who was a major pop star at the time)as the science teacher and Bunta Sugawara (who was a major box office star of the Kinji Fukasatsu's Yakuza Papers series), as his rival the police detective in charge of the operation. There is some impressive cinematography as well as some Hollywood grade car chases and action film shenanigans. There are many location shots in Shinjuku and Shibuya that can still be identified today-especially the scenes shot in West Shinjuku near the main commercial hotel district. Ultimately, the film seems overlong, but subversive and ahead of its time.

Tamiya Inari Jinja Ato

Tamiya Inari Jinja Ato is the place for the remains of a real person, Oiwa (died in 1636), who was immortalized in a fictional ghost story "Tokaido Yotsuya Kaidan" written by Tsuyruya Nanboku.  The original shire was destroyed in a fire 1879 and relocated to Chuo-ward. This one was rebuilt in 1952.

Nebraska

Alexander Payne is one of my favorite contemporary film makers and Nebraska (2013) may be one of his finest achievements. His choice for black and white cinematography for the wide open spaces of Montana, the Dakotas, and Nebraska results in a gorgeous tapestry of images. There are some fine performances, Bruce Dern's taciturn performance as the laconic alcoholic patriarch who thinks he's won a million dollars in a sweepstakes, has been continually singled out. But I think the films success really relies on the performance of Will Forte as the son trying to connect with the emotionally distant father. There are some great supporting performances form Bod Odenkirk, Stacy Keach, and June Squib. It is bittersweet, there are some hilarious moments, but it is essentially a somber tale of decline and missed opportunities, but also emits hope of coming to terms with the disappointments of life. One of my favorite films of 2013.

Graham's Cafe Los Angeles

Graham's Cafe Los Angeles in Kyobashi has a burger that holds its own against the gourmet heavyweights in Tokyo. I prefer my burgers without special BBQ sauce,however, the one they use here is not overpowering. A bit pricey at ¥1600, but high quality beef and grease resistant buns are a plus.

The Great Beauty

Paolo Sorrentino's The Great Beauty (2013) almost slipped by my radar, until I heard a discussion of it on the Salte CUltural Gabfest. It was a visual feats that calls to mind classic Italian films like Fellini's La Dolce Vita and Bertolucci's The Conformist. It is the story of an aging bacchanalian minor author, Jem Garmbadella (with a robust performance from Toni Servillo), who realizes at his 65th birthday that time is against him. There are sumptuously choreographed party scenes and gorgeous throwaway transition scenes throughout the film. The whole may be the lesser of the parts, but the set pieces within the film entertain and appeal to the eye. A great film to see prior to any Italy visit.

Odd Obsession

Japanese director Kon Ichikawa and his wife Natto Wada have collaborated on several film adaptations of literary classics, and in Odd Obsession (1959), they take on Junichiro Tanizaki's novel The Key. The cast is boasts some of the bigger names of the 50s like Tatsuya Nakadai as the young doctor Kimura engaged to the daughter of patriarch Kenji Kenomochi (played by Ganjiro Nkamura who starred in Ichikawa's Conflagration with Nakadai in 1958). The matriarch is played by Machiko Kyo and the daughter is played by Junko Kano. It follows the novel in how the patriarch draws the young fiance into an erotic game with his wife, alienating the daughter. However, the conclusion is very conventional and moralistic and is a departure from the subversiveness of Tanizaki, which is what drew me to the writer initially. The film also benefits from the exceptional cinematography of frequent Kuroswa and Mizoguchi cameraman Kazuaya Minagawa.

The World

If nothing else Jia Zhanghke's films give the viewer a snapshot of China influx. In The Wolrd (2004) he shows the daily lives and loves of employees at a Beijing suburb's theme park that has reconstructed different tourist spots form all over the world: pyramids, Big Ben, the Eiffel Tower, etc., which provide excellent background for musings on life and love. He is well-known for the medium distance tracking shots that give a glimpse of the industrial wasteland that China has become in the 2000s. There are some curious interludes with animation that reveal text messages and there is a beguiling ending that is left open ended. It leaves the viewer wondering if it is a story of hope or despair?

Mamma Roma

As I continue to educate myself on the neo-realist films of Itlay, I watched my first Pier Paolo Passolini film, Mamma Roma (1962), another tragic post WWII story of despair in Rome. It is dominated by the livewire performance of Anna Magnanai as the powerful presence known as  "Momma Roma." She tried to quit "the business" to go legit as a vegetable seller and raise her teenage son Eittor, but he has developed some bad habits over the years and is a constant disappointment to his mother, who is only living for and through him at this point in her life. It has all the traditional hallmarks of that Italian movement like mostly real outdoor locations, several unprofessional actors. Passolini brings a sense of the iconoclast in staging religious symbols in this film that shocked the public at the that time.

Salvador

I first became an admirer of Joan Didion's nonfiction writing and I always find it top notch stylistically. Salvador (1983) in content is very much of a certain time and place and this document is a snapshot of that time when there was massive turmoil in central America due to interference of the US under the Regan administration and the Soviet backers of leftist rebels and or governments. I suspect assignments like this informed the writing of a novel like Democracy, which is set in an unnamed central American country. Didion always has done significant research and adds her eyewitness impressions and those of people she encounters to give a vivid sense of time and place.