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Giovanni Fazio

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Giovanni Fazio

Giovanni Fazio has been The Japan Times' resident film crank since 1993. When not at the movies, he is busy recording and playing live with his band Makyo and running the independent electronica label Dakini Records.

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film / SHORT TAKES

Jan 11, 2008

"The Notorious Bettie Page"

Director: Mary Harron

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Jan 4, 2008

Mira Nair's last film, "Monsoon Wedding," was not only a lot of fun, it was also a perceptive look at cross-cultural confusion, tracking the travails of an Americanized Indian guy back in Dehli for an arranged marriage. Her latest film, "The Namesake," flips the equation, following a young Calcutta girl...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Dec 21, 2007

Inspired by repression

I am a very private person," says Marjane Satrapi, author of "Persepolis" and co-director of the new film based on her graphic novels. It's a curious statement coming from someone who's poured her own life into an autobiographical novel, but as she repeatedly pointed out to The Japan Times, it's not...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Dec 21, 2007

When Art Spiegelman's "Maus" came out in 1986 (a later edition would win a Pulitzer Prize in 1992), many mused that the graphic novel had come of age. Finally, it seemed, it was possible to meld words and pictures with the richness, depth, and insight of a novel. All sorts of topics could be tabled now,...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Dec 14, 2007

'The Simpsons Movie'

Over the past two decades, I've maintained a simple standard for judging the comedies I review: did it make me laugh as much as an episode of "The Simpsons?"

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Dec 7, 2007

'The U.S. vs. John Lennon'/'Chapter 27'

This Saturday, Dec. 8, marks 27 years since ex-Beatle John Lennon was gunned down outside his New York City home. Fans of the singer — and he still has many — often mark this sad anniversary by playing his music, raising a glass to his memory, or lighting a candle in Strawberry Fields.

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Nov 30, 2007

'Beowulf" is the epic poem dating from the 8th or 9th century that every high-school English Literature student has learned to dread. With good reason too — try getting your head 'round lines like "I ween with good he will well requite offspring of ours, when all he minds that for him we did in...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Nov 23, 2007

'The Number 23'

Any student of music, and especially anyone who's studied their John Cage, knows that if you listen hard enough, you can always discover patterns. Producer Brian Eno once described recording a walk in the park, and taking a 3 min.-30 second segment of it and listening repeatedly: patterns emerged, the...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Nov 16, 2007

'A Mighty Heart'

When "The Road To Guantanamo" came out a year ago, a lot of people were ready to jump all over director Michael Winterbottom. His film, which portrayed three British men of Pakistani origin who were picked up and incarcerated at the U.S. military base in Guantanamo, Cuba, was seen by some as one-sided...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Nov 9, 2007

Some film reviewers seem to have the idea that their job involves simply telling you the film's story. They'll walk you through the first act, the second act and often well into the third act, stopping just short of ruining the ending for you. But really, haven't they already spoiled the beginning and...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Nov 2, 2007

There's a great scene in "The Big Lebowski" where Sam Elliott leans over a bar counter next to Jeff Bridges and asks: "Just one thing, Dude. Do you have to use s'many cuss words?" To which The Dude replies, "What the f**k are you talkin' about, man?" That was but one of 281 times the F-word was used...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Oct 26, 2007

"Shaun Of The Dead" was one of the better cult comedies of recent years, but like so many cult comedies — "Napoleon Dynamite" and "Dazed and Confused" spring to mind — it went straight-to- video in Japan. So it's all the more surprising that "Fido," released as "Zombino" in Japan, a new movie...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Oct 19, 2007

"People who know" say that fantasy is the next big thing in Hollywood. "People who know" obviously haven't seen "Stardust" yet.

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Oct 12, 2007

It seems impossible to make a movie about 9/11 or the "war on terror" without getting sucked into the political dogfight surrounding the mess America now finds itself in. Whether it's "The Road To Guantanamo," "United 97," or even the latest season of "24," it's hard to portray current events —...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Oct 5, 2007

'Air Guitar Nation'

What is it that makes a man, in the heat of the moment of an Yngwie Malmsteen or Iron Maiden guitar solo, grimace, thrust their crotch, and place hands on an imaginary guitar? "Air Guitar Nation" — is a documentary that seeks to answer that burning question.

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Oct 4, 2007

The camera and the truth

With his fake documentary purporting to show serving President George W. Bush's assassination, director Gabriel Range has made this year's most controversial movie

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Sep 28, 2007

'Pan's Labyrinth'

Acute little girl wandering in an imaginary realm filled with fantastic creatures: This is the scenario for "Pan's Labyrinth," and while it may sound much like "Alice in Wonderland," director Guillermo del Toro's world is an altogether darker place.

Japan Times

CULTURE / Music

Sep 21, 2007

Still rising like a phoenix

S teve Hillage and Miquette Giraudy, former old-school hippies turned cybertechno pioneers with their band System 7, have a career that puts most of their contemporaries to shame. And, unlike Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, after three decades of making music, they still love each other, still challenge...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Sep 21, 2007

'The Good German'

Director Steven Soderbergh has a habit of confounding expectations. After his win at Cannes and subsequent commercial success with "Sex, Lies, and Videotape" in 1989, Soderbergh released a series of increasingly opaque films, culminating in 1996's crackpot "Schizopolis." This nearly ended his career,...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Film

Sep 14, 2007

'Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten'

Punk rock has survived over the past three decades, but at the expense of devolving into fixed form and fashion — the very rock 'n' roll cliche the original movement so loudly denounced. But for those of us who were there at the time, it was clear that punk was a mind-set, an unspoken philosophy...

You can often see generations of families enjoying performances together at Fuji Rock Festival.

Japan’s summer music festivals are feeling the heat in more ways than one

Akiko Trush says her experience with the neurological disorder dystonia left her feeling like she wanted to chop her own hand off.

The neurological disorder that 'kills culture'

By Tomoko Otake

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Exploring Japanese culturevia Tohoku’s festivals

Exploring Japanese culturevia Tohoku’s festivals

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