Naked Youth

Hosozao (aka Kojirō Shishido, b. 1983) has posted an HD version of Naked Youth on Youtube. Really innovative work. Check it out below & read my post on his work he...

Tricky Women: Japanese Animation Today

The Tricky Women animation festival is the first and only festival dedicated to animation by women. It began in 2001 as a biannual event in Vienna, but since 2007 it has been held annually. The best films from the event make appearances at other venues around the world and DVDs of the best films of 2007 and 2008 are available from their online shop.Over the years, several Japanese animators have...

Kato Kunio wins Oscar!

Congratulations to Kunio Kato and all his colleagues at ROBOT on winning the Oscar for Best Animated Short for La Maison en Petits Cubes at last night's Oscars. It must have really been nerve-wracking for Kunio to give a speech in English in front of so many Hollywood celebrities, but he was smart and kept it short, sweet & very funny!It was a big night for Japan as Okuribito, the film KineJun...

Otto Yamaoka

This blog gives a rather lopsided depiction of my interests, because I am by no means merely a Japanophile. Among other things, I have also long been a fan of early Hollywood movies. On a whim yesterday, I picked up a cheap DVD of Libeled Lady (1936), one of Jean Harlow’s last films starring her then-lover William Powell, his frequent co-star Myrna Loy, and Spencer Tracy.I was intrigued by the opening...

Book of the Dead (死者の書, 2005)

My first screening of Kihachiro Kawamoto’s masterpiece, The Book of the Dead (死者の書, 2005) was a real disappointment. The US release of the film on DVD falsely advertises itself as having a Japanese soundtrack with English subtitles. In actual fact, the soundtrack has replaced Kyoko Kishida’s narration with an English narrator who I had never heard of before. While Alice Hackett’s narration is...

Furukawa's Minna no Uta animation

It is well known that many of Japan’s great independent animators, like Yuri Koji, Taku Furukawa, Sadao Tsukioka, Shinji Fukushima, and Fumio Ooi, have designed animations for the NHK’s Minna no Uta series. Unfortunately, it is not so easy to get a hold of these little treasures due to regular crackdowns on people who upload them onto filesharing sites. Occasionally one can luck out and find a few...

Animation at the Japan Media Arts Festival

The Japan Media Arts Festival is underway from today until the 15th of February at The National Art Center in Tokyo. Every year this influential festival presents a selection of the year’s best films, animation, games, manga, and other media art to eager audiences. This year, the festival had 2,146 entries from more than 44 countries. For more information on exhibitions, screenings, symposia, workshops,...