Keiichi Hara’s Top Animation Picks (2003)

The list that Keiichi Hara (原 恵一, 1959) submitted for the Laputa Top 150 World and Japanese Animation (2003) is fascinating as it reveals not only the animation that influenced him during his formative years, but it also his dissatisfaction with the state of animation in Japan in the early 2000s. At the time of the poll, Hara’s talent as an animator had recently been recognized with the Mainichi...

YOU WILL MEET A TALL DARK STRANGER

It has become fashionable for critics to patronise Woody Allen, a director who, apart from the odd freak hit such as VICKY, CHRISTINA, BARCELONA, hasn't produced a run of sustained hits since the late 1980s. He has been accused of cannibalising his back catalogue; producing dramas of diminishing quality; and for focusing his attention on an idea of the upper middle-class intellectual elite that is...

ANUVAHOOD

ANUVAHOOD is a beautifully observed, wickedly funny satire on British "yoot" culture, as depicted in flicks like KIDULTHOOD. Writer-director and lead actor Adam Deacon takes us into the council estates of contemporary London, and gives us the unforgettable character of Kenneth - a nice boy from a nice family who thinks its cool to pretend to be a gangster-rapper from Baltimore. All talk and no action,...

LIMITLESS

LIMITLESS is a nicely executed sci-fi thriller but falls down on the screenwriters inability to fully explore the ramifications and consequences of its initial conceit. For all that, a perfectly decent DVD-night film.  THE HANGOVER's Bradley Cooper stars as Eddie Mora, a hapless novelist with a loyal but alienated girlfriend (Abbie Cornish).  At wit's end, he takes a dodgy pill called...

Random DVD Round-Up 4 - BURIED

Ryan Reynolds plays Paul Conroy - a man buried in a coffin - running out air, and running out of cellphone battery life. He frantically tries to call his employers, his wife, the emergency services - he is frustrated, put on hold, given the run around.  It's the perfect horror movie set-up. Claustrophobia - a truly hard deadline - and the frustration that comes of dealing with an invisible enemy...

Masahiro Katayama’s Animation Top 20 (2003)

Norio Hikone's amusing animated commercials for "Curls"The late Masahiro Katayama was one of more than a hundred animation professionals who took part in the 2003 Laputa poll that resulted in the Laputa Top 150 Japanese and World Animation. When I heard the news about Katayama’s passing, I looked up his picks. He chose his top 20 in random order and had so much trouble narrowing his list down to...

Random DVD Round-Up 3 - DUE DATE

Todd Philips, writer-director of OLD SCHOOL, SCHOOL FOR SCOUNDRELS and the break-out hit THE HANGOVER, returns to our screens with what can only be described as a piss-poor; woefully under-written; shameless cash-in. The structure of the movie aims to rip off what was best in PLANES, TRAINS AND AUTOMOBILES. Robert Downey Junior plays an up-tight architect on his way home to see his wife deliver their...

Random DVD Round-Up 2 - MAMMOTH

In New York a young professional couple outsource childcare to a Philippino nanny.  Sure, the surgeon-mother might get angsty that her daughter has more of an emotional relationship with the nanny than with her, but there's no real solution. Meanwhile, dad is off doing business in Thailand. We believe he really loves mum. Truly. And he's a good guy. But even he can't resist casual sex....

In Memory of Masahiro Katayama (片山 雅博, 1955-2011)

Last month the Japanese animation community was shocked by the passing of Professor Masahiro Katayama at the age of 56. Katayama was an animator, manga-ka, illustrator, administrator, mentor, and professor at Tama Art University.  As a child, Katayama’s love for animation was formed by the work of Walt Disney and other popular American animation that he saw on television. When he later encountered...

Random DVD Round-Up 1 - THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT

By the time I got round to watching THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT on iTunes, it had been well-reviewed by Ebert and The Guardian, and garnered a stack of award-season acclaim. And the film certainly had pedigree. Annette Bening and Julianne Moore are capable of both opening a movie AND portraying characters of emotional depth and nuance (see BEING JULIA and SAFE). Mark Ruffalo has impressed me ever...

Tokyo Anima 2011

Renewal by Shiho HirayamaTokyo Anima 2011’s site went live this week with some great previews of the work to be featured this year. On March 26th and 27th there will be three programs running featuring new short animated works from 30 artists. On March 26th in the evening there will be a symposium with Atsushi Wada, Osamu Sakai, Hoji Tsuchiya, and Mirai Mizue. If you are a filmmaker, check out TOCHKA's...

Keiichi Hara in Frankfurt

This week’s screenings of the award-winning animation Summer Days With Coo (2007) at Mal Seh’n cinema in Frankfurt on Tuesday and at the Japan Foundation in Cologne were cancelled in order to observe a period of mourning for the victims of the earthquake and tsunami that have devastated the Tohoku region. I have been in a state of shock and sorrow at the events unfolding in Japan and I would recommend...