Japanese Movie Reviews »
Kyoto Nocturnes: Elegant Slaughter (2004) Movie Review
“Elegant Slaughter” is part one of a five-part anthology set in the Japanese underworld, aka the Yakuza. Part one concerns a Yakuza boss (Keishu Tsumagata) who flees to a late-night restaurant along with his...
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Evil Dead Trap 2 (1991) Movie Review
Shy and sullen Aki Otami (Shoko Nakajima) is a projectionist at a fleabag theatre in a rundown and seedy section of town, where she’s haunted by fleeting visions of a small boy whom she...
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Perfect Blue (2002) Movie Review
Ahhhh, the vagaries of stardom. Plenty of money, private jets, fast cars, an entourage of “Yes” men doing your bidding, and millions of screaming fans. However, fans sometimes become a star’s worst enemy. We’ve...
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Tomie: Forbidden Fruit (2002) Movie Review
“Tomie: Forbidden Fruit” is the fourth in the franchise based on the Japanese manga by popular horror artist Ito Junji, whose unique talent also produced the inspirations for the films “Uzumaki” and “Kakashi”. “Forbidden...
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Ichi the Killer (2002) Movie Review
“Ichi the Killer” is easily one of the most controversial films of the last decade, and its undeniably extreme content has become synonymous with the name of its director, the notorious Takashi Miike. For...
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Nausicaa of the Valley of the Winds (1984) Movie Review
“Nausicaa” (also known by the longer title, “Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind”) is based on the manga series of the same name, written and drawn by the film’s writer/director Hayao Miyazaki. The...
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Nobody Knows (2004) Movie Review
Japanese director Hirokazu Koreeda has built somewhat of a cult reputation for off centre, documentary-like dramas, such as his Heaven-set “After Life” and the Dogme style “Distance”, which starred Tadanobu Asano. Although his films...
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Gun Crazy: Vol. 1 – A Woman From Nowhere (2002) Movie Review
(Movie Review by Edward Lee) The world loves a good western. As a matter of fact, Europeans loved them so much that, when distribution problems of the early 1960s made these movies increasingly difficult...
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Azumi (2003) Movie Review
Ryuhei Kitamura’s “Azumi” is surprisingly very ordinary, especially considering its 140-minute running length and the movie coming from the director of the hyper zombie epic “Versus”. It can be said that “Azumi” shows the...
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Sayonara Jupiter (aka Bye-Bye Jupiter, 1983) Movie Review
When it was announced in the early 1980s that American audiences were returning to Jupiter via “2010″, the Peter Hyams sequel to Stanley Kubrick’s groundbreaking “2001″, Toho decided to give Japanese audiences a trip...
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My Lover is a Sniper (2004) Movie Review
“My Lover is a Sniper” is the third part in a series that started with two TV movies that proved popular enough to warrant a feature on the big screen. The movie stars Miki...
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Destroy All Monsters (1968) Movie Review
Godzilla’s popularity was on the wane in the late 60s, both in Japan and abroad. As a result, Toho management decreed that “Destroy All Monsters” would be Godzilla’s swan song, and ordered a film...
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Giant Monster Gamera (1965) Movie Revie
Toho’s Godzilla series was so successful that Daiei Studios decided they wanted a monster of their own. Probably realizing they couldn’t compete at the adult level with the Big G, Toho aimed somewhat lower,...
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Cutie Honey (2004) Movie Review
I suppose it goes without saying that you can’t take a movie called “Cutie Honey” too seriously. And even if you were to mistakenly believe this was a serious superhero movie, one glimpse of...
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Zatoichi: The Life and Opinion of Masseur Ichi (1962) Movie Review
The itinerant blind swordsman/masseur/compulsive gambler Zatoichi is something of a cinematic institution in Japan. The meek, blind masseuse defending the helpless from evil (using a samurai sword hidden in his walking stick with preternatural...
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Three: Extremes (2004) Movie Review
The release of the Asian horror anthology “Three…Extremes” on DVD comes as a bit of a dilemma to international moviegoers who had already seen one of the three stories, Fruit Chan’s “Dumplings”, when it...
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Casshern (2004) Movie Review
Like “Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow”, and before that, Mamoru Oshii’s “Avalon”, the Japanese sci-fi film “Casshern” seems to have been built on a foundation of, “It’d be really cool if we...
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Godzilla Raids Again (1955) Movie Review
Toho wasn’t going to let a little thing like the title character dying get in their way of making money. Five months after the original “Godzilla” first hit screens, a sequel was quickly made...
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Zebraman (2004) Movie Review
You probably won’t find a wackier film than Takashi Miike’s “Zebraman”, a Japanese movie about a loser who discovers that, by making a homemade superhero costume, he can literally transform into his TV idol...
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Cross Fire (2000) Movie Review
“Cross Fire” was produced by the Japanese Toho studios, best known for the classic, enduring “Godzilla” series. This attempt at trying something a little different with the horror genre, as opposed to simply churning...
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