Tag: Japanese-American

Tokyo Pop

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 1 May 2025
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Director – Fran Rubel Kuzui – 1988 – US, Japan – Cert. 18 – 99m

****

A girl singer, fed up with being sidelined by the music business in New York, relocates to Tokyo and falls in with local rock band hopefuls there – select UK cinema screenings from Friday, April 25th prior to its Blu-ray release on Monday, May 5th

“Hey, Mike, when do I get to use my song?” asks the band’s disgruntled, leather-clad back-up singer, feeling redundant as she stands on stage holding a tambourine. Her music career in New York stalling fast, Wendy (Carrie Hamilton from Cool World, Ralph Bakshi, 1995; Shag, Zelda Barron, 1989) receives a “Wish you were here” postcard from her friend Jane in Japan and shoots back a reply: “Hope you meant it – ‘cos I’m coming.”

In Japan, a band does an English language cover of Blue Suede Shoes. When Wendy arrives in Tokyo, her girlfriend has moved on to Thailand. Barely speaking any Japanese, Wendy winds up in a cheap hotel in Itabashi the space of a small Japanese apartment where footwear is removed on entering and, as an Aussie resident tells her, everything operates on credit card and a shower is Y100 for ten minutes.… Read the rest

Tags ambush, angel, bath, bets, Blue Suede Shoes, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Carrie Hamilton, catchphrases, censorship, chasu ramen, cheap hotel, composition, corporate toilet, credit card, demo tape, Diamond Yukai, exposure, fame, food bar, footwear is removed, Fran Rubel Kuzui, front office, gaijin, gorilla suit, grandpa, harbour, Hasumi Harukawa, heavy metal, Home on the Range, hostess bar, hotel, Itabashi, James Bond, Japan, Japanese, Japanese rock band, Japanese-American, karaoke, lavatory TV ad, leather, Makoto Fukuda, music business, music career, music producer, music venue, musician, New York, park, photographed, pick up girls, pick up lines, postcard, Red Warriors, religious shrine, romance, sexualised images, shower, singer, singing in English, singing telegram, support act, Taiji Tonoyama, taxi, Tetsuro Tanba, Thailand, Tokyo, TV porno, US, vocalist, Wish You Were Here, wrestling gig, You Make Me Feel (Like a Natural Woman)

Features Live Action Movies Music

A Complete Unknown

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 16 January 2025
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Director – James Mangold – 2024 – US – Cert. 15 – 141m

*****

A feature narrative recreation of Bob Dylan’s career in New York up to the 1965 Newport Folk Festival gig where he switched acoustic guitar for electric – out in UK cinemas on Friday, January 17th

1961. Carrying his acoustic guitar, complete unknown Bobby Dylan (Timothée Chalamet) arrives in New York trying to find the hospital where legendary folk singer Woody Guthrie is being treated for terminal illness. After some false starts, Bobby finds the place, with Pete Seeger (Edward Norton) sitting by Woody (Scoot McNairy) at his bedside. Pete welcomes him, and Woody, who can barely speak, indicates he would like to have the young man play one of his own compositions. Bobby obliges. Both men are impressed. Sensing the youth has nowhere to stay, Pete invites him to stay at his house with his Japanese-American wife Toshi (Eriko Hatsune) and their two daughters.

Pete, who recognises in Bob a powerful talent and a new, artistic voice, is deeply committed to both political activism and folk music as a vehicle for social change. One of the organisers of the annual Newport Folk Festival, he takes the young Dylan under his wing and helps him get gigs.… Read the rest

Tags “I woke up famous”, 1961, 1965, A Complete Unknown, acoustic and electric, acoustic guitar, afternoon political discussion groups, Al Kooper, album cover photographs, annual, artistic voice, backing band, bar to watch a gig, bedside, Blowin' in the Wind, Bob Dylan, Boyd Holbrook, boyfriend, catalyst, Columbia Records, composition, conservative, contract, cultural history, Edward Norton, Einstein, electric guitar, Elle Fanning, folk music, folk singer, gig, guitar, Highway 61 Revisited, hospital, immersive experience, immortality, James Mangold, Japanese-American, Joan Baez, Johnny Cash, Like a Rolling Stone, Monica Barbaro, New York, New York apartment, newer material, Newport Folk Festival, Newport Folk Festival 1965, nowhere to stay, old tunes, organiser, overnight celebrity, painte, Pete Seeger, political activism, popular music, pull the plug, quiet corner, reaching a wider market, recognised by fans, recording studio, recordings, rock and roll, romance, Scoot McNairy, set list, social change, standards, Sylvie Russo, talent, terminal illness, The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, The Kinks, Timothée Chalamet, tipping point, Todd Haynes, unknown and celebrity, Woody Guthrie, You Really Got Me, youth, youth audience

Features Live Action Movies

Minamata

Director – Andrew Levitas – 2020 – US – Cert. 15 – 114m

****

A dramatisation of celebrated photographer W. Eugene Smith’s investigation of Japan’s Minamata environmental atrocity in 1971 – out in cinemas and on digital from Friday, August 13th

This feels like a Hollywood actor-led project with laudable aims which comes unstuck somewhere in the execution. That said, there’s still much to admire.

Minamata is the name of a Japanese coastal town which became synonymous with Mercury poisoning caused by the Chisso chemicals factory in the 1950s and ‘60s.

Following a celebrated career as a war photographer in WW2, W. Eugene Smith photographed the series Country Doctor for Life magazine, now recognised as a landmark in the medium of the photo-essay. In the early 1970s, he and his Japanese-American wife Aileen were introduced to the town of Minamata and its dark secret, and collaborated on a photographic book about it. When we meet him in 1971, played by Johnny Depp (from such films as Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, 2005; Sleepy Hollow, 1999; Edward Scissorhands, 1990, all Tim Burton) he has his own darkroom in a New York loft and has clearly seen better days as he is constantly on the whisky and amphetamines.… Read the rest