Hoga News

"Argentine Hag" disappointing start

One of the hopefuls that opened last weekend, "Argentine Hag" starring Kyoka Suzuki, Koji Yakusho and Maki Horikita, made 22 million yen over last weekend, 55% of Suzuki's "Cheerful Gang Turns the Earth" (final gross 200 million yen) and 15% of Horikita's "One Missed Call - Final" (610 million yen), and approximately the same as "Kofuku na Shokutaku" (literally "Happy Dining Table") opened in January, according to Mr. Texas.

He points out that Toho is more successful in similar screen number releases, such as "Check It Out Yo!" (1.08 bil. yen) "Memories of Matsuko" (1.31 bil. yen) and "Unfair the Movie" (currently shown), while "Argentine Hag"'s Shochiku has not been too successful, such as "Angel's Egg", "Seven Days of Manager Tsubakiyama" and "Happy Dining Table".

Source:  Movie Consultant Blog

"Bugmaster" top 10 start, Joe Odagiri gets proposed!?

Katsuhiro Otomo's live-action fantasy "Bugmaster" was released last weekend, with Otomo, Joe Odagiri, Yu Aoi, Nao Omori and the child actor Reia Moriyama appearing on stage on the first day.

Reia's character grows horns in her forehead and Odagiri's Ginko cures it.  12-year old Reia said of Odagiri, "thanks to Ginko, I have grown this big.  He was really nice at filming.  Please marry me when I grow up."  Odagiri replies, "so you are 12 years old, right?  Yes, I'd be glad to.  I have spoken to your mom, so I believe there is no problem."

"Bugmaster" made it to No. 8 in the weekend box office.  Other spring break kids movies remain in the top 10, while "Genghis Khan" already disappeared at Week 4.

See Kogyo Tsushin for the full top 10 list.

Source:  Cinema Topic Online, Kogyo Tsushin

Takeshi Kitano's new film info on Ryuganji

Takeshi Kitano has just come up with his 13th feature film "Kantoku - Banzai", supposedly a satrical comedy.  Ryuganji has a nice translation of SANSPO article here.

The article reminded me of the words of a friend of mine, whom I fotgot which one it was.  (Was it you, William??)  S/he was saying that Takeshi is such a shy guy, and he is uncomfortable to be praised as a great art-film director.  So he always says "I am just a comedian" and wants to do some crazy stuff to crash this "art-film director" image, to get back to his comedian identity.  Maybe this film is his latest effort on this line.

"Unfair The Movie" 3-billion pace start

With school kids in the midst of spring break, Japanese weekend box office continues to be kids shift.  Kids' animes "Doraemon", "Happy Feet", "Keroro Gunso" and "One Piece" and youth story "Battery" dominated the top 10 ranking last weekend.

In terms of revenue, not the adimssion number, however, "Unfair The Movie" was supposed to be No. 2 instead of "Doraemon", according to Mr. Texas.  "Unfair" is the feature-film version of FujiTV's detective drama, starring the same actress Ryoko Shinohara, whose character is a female detective, divorced with children and hard-drinker.  Yosuke Eguchi, Susumu Terajima and other stars also appear in the movie version.

Eiga.com reports that the weekend BO was 371 million yen with 272,000 admissions, which is well in the range of estimated final gross of 3 billion yen, a medium size hit for a J-movie.  Mr. Texas points out that its TV drama version was not particularly a big hit, 15.4% average ratings in Kanto area, and considering that TV version of last year's biggest live-action hit "Umizaru" was only 13.1% and "Kisarazu Cats' Eye" 10.1%, it may be that original TV drama rating does not have much correlation with the movie version popularity.

So, he wonders, what will happen to coming-soon theater-version "HERO", starring the king of J-drama Takuya Kimura, which had a legendary 34.2% rating with the TV version.  Interesting...

Please see Ryuganji or  Kogyo Tsushin for the complete top10 list.

Source:  Eiga.com, Movie Consultant Blog, Kogyo Tsushin

Hayao Miyazaki's new project announced

Toho announces that Hayao Miyazaki's new feture animation film will be "Gake no Ue no Ponyo" (literally "Ponyo on the cliff"), to be released summer 2008.

The story is supposed to be about a gold fish princess Ponyo, who wishes to become a human, and a 5-year old boy.  It is reported that Director Miyazaki got inspiration from Setouchi inland sea area where he lived in 2005.  Producer Toshio Suzuki of Ghibli says that it is also based on the time when Goro Miyazaki, Hayao's son who directed Ghibli's last year hit "Tales from Earthsea", was actually 5 years old.

The animation will be 100% manual, with no computer intervention.  Well, considering that Disney gave it up last year, and it is an interesting move.

Source:  Yomiuri Online

<Addition 3/20>

Ryuganji has put up more detailed report.  See Ryuganji.

Non-samurai period drama "Akane-zora" premiere event in a museum

Human period dramas, not focusing on sword-swinging side of samurai, are staple in Japanese classic literature, lead by great novelists such as Shuhei Fujisawa ("Twilight Samurai") and Shugoro Yamamoto, and this newer novelist Ichirki Yamamoto is sometimes called the successor of their tradition.

His novel "Akane-zora" (literally "Crimson Sky") has been made into a film, with director Masaki Hamamoto, cast members Masaaki Uchino and Miki Nakatani.  Masahiro Shinoda, who declared to retire from film directing after "Spy Sorge", took up planning and wrote screenplay together with Hamamoto.

The story is about a tofu maker and his wife in Edo period, who try to start their small business in Edo with each other's help, and depicts the family ties in this simple period.

The premiere event was held in Tokyo Edo Museum that displays lots of materials from Edo period (mid 17th - mid 19th century).  Uchino is trained as live stage actor, but also is well known for his leading role in the year-round historical drama "Furinkazan", currently aired on NHK, and Nakatani is the winner of this year's Japan Academy Best Actress in her leading role in "Memories of Matsuko".  If not everything else, I am curious to see this movie, just because of this pair of hot actor/actress.

See video clip from the event HERE.

Source:  Cinema Topic Online, Dunk

"Bugmaster" press conference held

Katsuhiro Otomo 's live-action fantasy "Bugmaster" is slated to open on March 24 in Japan, and a press conference was held in Tokyo on March 12, attended by Director Otomo, leading actors Joe Odagiri, Yu Aoi and Nao Omori.

"Bugmaster" was shown at last year's Venice Film Festival, and is currently getting offers from 24 international film festivals and distributors in nearly 30 countries.  Otomo is known for his animation masterpieces such as "Akira", and he says the original story with a very mysterious atmosphere made him want to film it in live-action.  "The biggest difference between animation and live-action is actors.  When the cast members were lined up, I felt like I was already done with the film."  The reporter puts it, "if there is a gauge that the left extream is 100% live action and the other extream is 100% animation, 'Bugmaster' sits right in the middle."

Joe Odagiri says, "Ginko, the hero of the film, knows that he cannot control the nature, and so he tries not to kill the mushis (bugs), but just finds the way to live with it.  I had sympathy with such a natural attitude."

Yu Aoi says, "I was fascinated to the line, 'Tanyu (Aoi's character) has to stay in one place, Ginko can never stay in one place'.  I have never seen this world before, but I still feel nostalgic."

By the way, Odagiri appeared in a relatively tame hair-do and fashion FOR HIM this time, while Yu Aoi wore a goegeous kimono.  See photos here.

Source:  Cinema Topic Online

<Addition 3/12>

A lot more nice photos availble at CinemaLeaf, MSN Mainichi, and video clips Dunk, Yahoo

Yojiro Takita's "Battery" debuted at #2

It is almost the end of school year in Japan, so the spring break kids anime "Doraemon" opened at the top of the box office last weekend, for elementary school kids.

And for a bit older crowd, "Battery", a middle-school baseball story directed by Yojiro Takita, made it to the No. 2 position, with 185 million yen gross, which is approximately the same level as "Baby Fox Helen" (final gross 1.7 bil. yen) and "Touch" (1.2 bil. yen), according to Mr. Texas.

The two heroes who plays the battery (a pitcher and a catcher), Kento Hayashi and Kenta Yamada, were recruited among the real baseball kids, who got trained as actors.  Based on a best-seller novel by Atsuko Asano, it is a heart-warming story of a genious pitcher who finds ties with his family and friends in a new environment.  It sound very different from Director Takita's previous films, such as "When the Last Sword is Drawn" and "Onmyoji".

On the opening day stage, some big name supporting cast such as Bunta Sugawara, Goro Kishiya and Yuki Amami were present along with baseball kids.  See photos here.

Source:  Kogyo Tsuhin, Movie Consultant Blog, Cinema Cafe

"Ryu ga Gotoku" box office stats

Mr. Texas reports the opening box office result of Takashi Miike's "Ryu ga Gotoku", filmization of the popular PS2 game.  It recorded 32.5 million yen,　44% of Miike's 2004 film "Zebraman" and 98% of "Yo-yo Girl Cop".  As previously reported, it appeared in No. 10 in the weekend BO ranking.

Mr. Texas analyzes that its "pretty good result" is probably because Miike, the star Kazuki Kitamura and the original PS2 game each has cult following.

Source:  Movie Consultant Blog

"Argentine Hag" premiere event

On March 6, the premiere screening event was held for "Argentine Hag", directed by Naoki Nagao, and starring Koji Yakusho ("Babel"), Kyoka Suzuki and Maki Horikita, gathering 2000 people attending.

In the event, live performance of "Nostargico", music used in the film, by bandoneon player Ryota Komatsu was enjoyed before the movie.  Maki Horikita read out a part of the original novel by Banana Yoshimoto.

Through their comments, the film sounds like a rather heart-warming mild story, rather than sharp-edged comedy I originally imagined, from the title and Suzuki's heavy make-up.

The film is scheduled to open on March 24.

Source:  Cinema Topic Online