Tell me some of the worst movies you’ve ever watched.
As for me … here are some movies that I’ve had the misfortune of enduring:
Lost In Translation
2001
The Shining
Forrest Gump
サンシャイン 2057 (Sunshine 2057)
Have you seen any of those?
What did you think of them?
What are some movies you hated?
Every December (for the past seventeen years or so), a 漢字 (Japanese (Chinese) written character) is chosen which has a meaning that best summarizes the passing year.
Last year the character 「絆」 (bonding) was chosen because of the way the world came together to help Japan after the March 11th earthquake.
Well, this year, for the first time since this tradition began, the 「今年の漢字」 (“Kanji of the Year“) will be a repeat.
In the year 2000, the 「今年の漢字」 (“Kanji of the Year“) was 「金」 (“gold”) because Japan won gold medals at that year’s Olympics and also because “Kin-san” of the famous elderly Japanese twins “Kin-san and Gin-san died that year—and her name meant “gold”.
This year too, 「金」 (“gold”) was chosen again to be the 「今年の漢字」 (“Kanji of the Year“).
And once again the reason for this choice was because of the gold medals that Japan won at the Olympics. Other reasons cited were the opening of the Tokyo Sky Tree, the Nobel Prize won by a Japanese professor, and the solar eclipse last spring.
The character 「金」 for “gold”.
Writing the Kanji of the Year for 2012 in the official ceremony.
I have written a number of posts about interesting people. Most of whose stories are related to Japan in some way.
Maybe you haven’t seen many of them…so I decided to put links to all of them on a new page that I titled “Who’s Who?“.
Please check them out and leave comments to let me know what you think.
The new page is here.
Do you know Roald Dahl?
He was a great author of classic children’s books such as “Matilda“, “James And The Giant Peach“, and “Charlie And The Chocolate Factory“, many of which have been into excellent movies.
When I was a kid I read his book “Charlie And The Chocolate Factory” and I saw the 1970’s film adaptation starring Gene Wilder that was titled “Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory“.
「夢のチョコレート工場」 ("Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory")
The better movie version of this story was the one made by director Tim Burton and starred Johnny Depp.
This version was titled the same as the book and more closely followed the storyline.
「チャーリーとチョコレート工場」 ("Charlie And The Chocolate Factory")
In the story, Charlie finds one of the limited number of “Wonka Chocolate Bars” with a “Gold Ticket”.
Similarly, I learned that most of the “Wonka Chocolate Bars” sold in Japan have the same English-language labels as the ones sold in other countries…but there are harder-to-find “Wonka Chocolate Bars” with labels with the name written in Japanese カタカナ (Katakana) characters.
Well, I saw some in a store yesterday and, even though I don’t eat chocolate often, I bought one.
It says 「ウォンか」 which means "Wonka".
I haven’t opened it yet. I’m going to give it to my kids but I’ll probably try a piece of it.
Have you ever tried a “Wonka Bar”? Is it good?
The 「東京スカイツリー」 (“Tokyo Sky Tree”) tower will stand an incredible 634 meters tall once it’s completed next year and every evening it will be illuminated blue and purple on alternating nights (blue one night, purple the next, and so on).
What the Tokyo Sky Tree will look like illuminated in blue, once it's completely built.
What the Tokyo Sky Tree will look like illuminated in purple, once it's completely built.
Well, as I wrote in this comment I made last Saturday, the Tokyo Sky Tree was illuminated in both blue and purple from 6:30PM until 9:30PM tonight in a test run of the LED lights that will be used to light up the tower every evening once it’s done being built.
As expected, many people turned up with their cameras to see the Tokyo Sky Tree light up the night sky for the first time (and only time until next year).
The Tokyo Sky Tree lit up in purple tonight.
I like to listen to heavy metal music. I enjoy most all “genres” of heavy metal (as “heavy metal” itself is a “genre” of rock music, you may be surprised that there are different “types” of heavy metal music).
Some of my favorite bands are KISS, Judas Priest, Black Sabbath, Megadeth and “pre-1991” Metallica.
But I’d say my favorite heavy metal genre is “Shock Rock“.
Bands that have a shocking* or “over-the-top” image and stage-show to go with their excellent music.
Bands in this genre includes acts such as KISS, Alice Cooper, Lordi, GWAR, Black Sabbath, Ozzy Osbourne, Marilyn Manson, W.A.S.P., etc.
The concerts by these bands include frightening costumes and/or make-up, fire, blood, guillotines, snakes , and bats (one even had it’s head bit off 😉 ) all while playing the type of music I enjoy.
It’s a much more entertaining concert than is common by musicians of other types of music.
And of course since I’ve been living in Japan for the past twenty years I listen to a number of Japanese bands as well.
I wrote a post about the Japanese hard rock band X-Japan. I think they’re okay.
Then there’s the Japanese band 「カブキロックス」 (Kabuki Rocks). Probably inspired by the American band KISS (who, ironically, were inspired by Japanese 歌舞伎 (Kabuki theater)), Kabuki Rocks dress as Japanese kabuki actors while they’re on stage performing.
Here’s a video of them performing their most famous song 「お江戸」 (“O-Edo“):
But probably the best Japanese band in this genre is 「聖飢魔 II」 (“Seikima-Two“).
「聖飢魔II」 ("Seikima-II")
Their name is kind of a Japanese play-on-words. It’s spelled to say “The Holy Starving Demons (II)” but is pronounced “Seikimatsu”, which means “The end of the century”.
The reason for their name is because their gimmick is that they are a band of demons who came to Earth from Hell to punish humans for destroying the environment.
The band was formed in the 1980s and they intended from the beginning to take over the world and disband on New Years Eve 1999 at 11:59:59PM (the “end of the century”), and that’s what they did.
(Well, they didn’t take over the “world” but they were popular in Japan in the 1990s).
I remember at the height of their popularity in the ’90s, the lead vocalist “Demon Kogure” was doing funny TV commercials for Fuji Film.
"Demon Kogure", lead vocalist
In these commercials, the “demon” with his spiky hair and make-up was the “father” of a kindergarten-age girl.
Instead of his usual outfits that he wore, in these commercials he dressed in regular “human clothes” and he’d have some humorous adventure and his “daughter” would snap a photo of his facial expression with a “Fuji Film” disposable camera.
I liked these commercials a lot.
Here’s one where his “daughter” is on her school bus and he’s trying to give her her lunch that he forgot to give before she got on the bus:
And another one where he’s trying (and failing) to fly a kite with his “daughter” at New Years time (which is a tradition in Japan):
These commercials were so popular in Japan in the ’90s that Fuji Film began to offer “Demon Kogure” alarm clocks and pajamas (with “spiky hair” night-cap).
I remember that I wanted the alarm clock…but I didn’t buy film often enough to acquire the necessary “points” to get one. Oh well.
Here’s the commercial for the clock and pajamas:
Anyways, as I mentioned above, 「聖飢魔 II」 (“Seikima-II“) disbanded on New Years Eve 1999 at one second before midnight…but this year they had a reunion concert (including a show in America and one in France) and a new album.
I intend to get their new album.
Here’s a promotion video for a song by them that I like. It’s called 「蝋人形の館」 (“House of Wax”):
Today is ７月４日 (July 4). 「アメリカ独立記念日」 (American Independence Day).
I don’t usually do anything special on this day. Although there are many 花火大会 (fireworks shows) in Japan during the summer, they don’t usually start until late July or early August.
Watching fireworks is a “Fourth Of July” tradition in America, but I don’t live in America.
(It’s possible that the U.S. military bases in Japan will have a fireworks show this evening. I’m not sure. I don’t live near any U.S. military base anyways).
But anyways, in honor of the 234th anniversary of America’s independence from England, I am writing a list of some of American inventions that have changed the world (in most cases, for the better).
So, according to the U.S. Patent Office, this is a list of some of the numerous things that have been invented in America:
U.S. "Stop" sign
Japanese 「止まれ」 ("Stop") sign
「アメリカンドッグ」 (Corn Dog)
KISS "Alive II" on 8-track tape
The Japanese baseball player Hideki Matsui used to play for the New York Yankees major league team until he began playing for the Los Angeles Angels last December.
(Click here to read the post I wrote last December about him moving from the Yankees to the Angels.)
His nickname is “Godzilla“.
He is currently the spokesman in Japan for the Kirin “Fire” canned coffee and in 新宿 (Shinjuku, Tokyo) there is a huge balloon in his likeness wearing a baseball uniform similar to his L.A. Angels uniform that has “Fire” emblazoned on the front.
The balloon statue is leaning on a giant can of “Fire” coffee.
The campaign is called 「ビッグマツイ」 (“Big Matsui“).
My daughter had to go to Shinjuku today, so she took a couple photos of this giant display with her cell-phone camera when she passed by it.
Here are her photos of the giant Hideki Matsui balloon in Shinjuku (you can see how big it is in proportion to the people standing near it):
"Godzilla" has hit Tokyo again!
Speaking of Godzilla…this time the iconic Japanese monster called 「ゴジラ」 (“Gojira“) in Japan and “Godzilla” in other countries that continually destroys Tokyo in his countless movies from Japan’s Toho Studios.
I wrote a post last summer (click here to read it) about the numerous Hollywood remakes of Japanese movies…including a 1998 remake of Godzilla that was poorly received by both critics and fans.
Hollywood's "Godzilla", circa 1998
I also wrote a post last April (click here to read this one) about both America’s “King Kong” and Japan’s “Godzilla“…and the classic film in which they battled each other.
Well, America’s “Legendary Pictures” has just announced their intention to film another “Godzilla” movie.
The movie is scheduled to be released sometime in 2012.
A major complaint that many people had about the 1998 American remake of “Godzilla” was that both the storyline as well as the appearance of the monster were too different from the Japanese movies.
Legendary Studios has implied that their version of Godzilla will stay true to the Japanese original.
According to their press release:
“…Legendary intends to approach the (Godzilla) film and its characters in the most authentic manner possible….”
That would probably be a good strategy if they want their movie to be successful…especially here in Japan.
Because in Japan many of the characters from Japanese classic movies, such as Ultraman and Godzilla, are still very popular.
Their movies are still made nowadays.
2009 Dec "Ultraman" movie poster
"Godzilla: Final Wars" movie poster; circa 2004
I like movies.
I used to watch them alot more often when I was younger…but I still like to watch a movie that looks like it’ll be good.
If you like movies too, let’s play a kind of “Movie Trivia Challenge”.
I’ll write a trivial fact in this post about a few movies…if you recognize what movies I’m describing, then write the titles in this post’s comment section.
And also write a trivia question of your own about a movie or movies, and me or anyone else can try to guess the movie.
So, here are my questions:
1. What movie starred Clint Eastwood, Jim Carrey, and had a cameo appearance by members of the rock band “Guns ‘N Roses?
2. What movie starred Jack Nicholson, Danny DeVito and Christopher Lloyd?
3. What was the first movie that Johnny Depp appeared in?
Are these questions too easy?
I’ve mentioned before that I like the Japanese manga and anime titled 「ゲゲゲの鬼太郎」 (“Gegege-no-Kitarou“).
It’s about a group of 妖怪 (ghouls) who help humans.
I have a few of the manga, I watch the anime on TV sometimes, and my family and I went to see both of the live-action movies at the theater.
I also like the artist, 水木しげる (Shigeru Mizuki). His life story is fascinating.
I wrote a bit about him and the 「ゲゲゲの鬼太郎」 (“Gegege-no-Kitarou“) on another post.
Click here read it.
Anyways, 田の中勇 (Isamu Tanonaka), the 政友 (“Seiyuu“)…”voice actor”…who did the voice of one of this show’s main characters–「目玉おやじ」 (“Medama-oyaji“) died last Wednesday.
He was 77 years old.
田の中勇 (Isamu Tanonaka), R.I.P.
I wrote a post last September about the death of the artist of another popular Japanese manga…Click here to read it.
Tokyo Five 
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