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April 01, 2025
 

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James Hadfield
Japan Times
CULTURE / TV & Streaming
Jul 1, 2021
‘The Naked Director Season 2’: Netflix’s porn industry saga is skin deep
The second season of the streaming giant's fictionalized biopic of Japan's notorious adult-video director and entrepreneur offers another round of cheap thrills.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jun 24, 2021
‘The Door into Summer’: Some doors are best left closed
An orphaned genius travels to the future and back in Takahiro Miki's treacly sci-fi, “The Door Into Summer,” based on the 1957 novel of the same name by Robert A. Heinlein.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jun 17, 2021
‘Mari and Mari’: A perfect couple comes undone
Tatsuya Yamanishi's intriguing debut feature takes a cynical view of relationships, with a premise that's like something out of an early Haruki Murakami story.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jun 3, 2021
‘Brothers in Brothel’: Come for the sex, stay for the family drama
Sex is a dirty family business in actor-turned-director Jiro Sato's vivid drama.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
May 26, 2021
'Tomorrow's Dinner Table': Three women are served an overwhelming helping of struggle
Mitsuki Takahata is a standout in Takahisa Zeze's uneven multinarrative drama about the struggles of modern mothers.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
May 20, 2021
'A Madder Red': Yuya Ishii's pandemic drama is scattershot but soulful
Social realism rubs up against melodrama in the film 'A Madder Red,' which focuses on a single mother dealing with economic challenges during the pandemic.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
May 15, 2021
Pioneering composer Terry Riley finds himself comfortably marooned in Japan
Performer-composer Terry Riley's 1964 piece 'In C' has been compared to Igor Stravinsky's 'The Rite of Spring.'
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
May 13, 2021
‘Headless Girl’: A lighter approach to the act of historical interpretation
A planned peace memorial triggers open conflict in Ken Kawai's “Headless Girl,” a scattershot satire about who gets to write history.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Apr 30, 2021
Flying Lotus gets into the samurai mindset for 'Yasuke' soundtrack
Electronic musician Flying Lotus draws inspiration from the likes of Vangelis, Isao Tomita and Jean-Michel Jarre in creating the music for the Netflix anime about Japan's only Black samurai.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Apr 14, 2021
‘Blue’: Not your typical underdog story
Kenichi Matsuyama plays a fighter on a losing streak in Keisuke Yoshida's “Blue,” a boxing drama that finds nobility in failure.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Apr 8, 2021
Sex, murder and a getaway car: ‘Ride or Die’ stars go on the trip of a lifetime
Kiko Mizuhara and Honami Sato discuss the challenges of bringing Ching Nakamura's harrowing, sexually explicit manga to the screen in a provocative new Netflix movie.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Apr 7, 2021
‘Homunculus’: You need to see this like you need a hole in the head
Takashi Shimizu's adaptation of a manga series about a man who gains psychic powers after having a hole drilled in his head manages to be tasteless and timid at once.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Apr 1, 2021
'Kiba: The Fangs of Fiction' shows the gory details of modern-day publishing
Director Daihachi Yoshida brings a sympathetic lens to an industry in trouble in his film “Kiba: The Fangs of Fiction.”
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Apr 1, 2021
‘Junk Head’: One man’s imaginatively twisted labor of love
Takahide Hori's stop-motion animation feature, which took seven years to complete, has finally arrived in Japanese theaters after receiving a warm reception overseas.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Mar 25, 2021
‘The Blue Danube’: Finding levity in the drudgery of war
Akira Ikeda's absurdist drama about two towns locked in an interminable war finds humor in tragedy and boredom.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Mar 18, 2021
Pushing against the grain of Japan’s film industry
Industry gatekeepers have been resistant to the idea that an India-born director can make a Japanese film. With “Kontora,” Anshul Chauhan isn't trying to endear himself to any of them.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Mar 11, 2021
‘The Sun Stands Still’: Race against time fails to pick up the pace
Eiichiro Hasumi's big-budget thriller about globe-trotting spies is not quite Japan's answer to the “Mission: Impossible” movies.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Feb 25, 2021
Director Kentaro brings an auteur’s touch to a soulful road movie
The 'Under the Turquoise Sky' director mixes realism, fantasy and comedy in his visually stirring feature debut about a Japanese man who goes on a journey of self-discovery in Mongolia.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Feb 25, 2021
‘Heisei no Oto’: A sonic trip to the golden age of CDs
Osaka record store owners Eiji Taniguchi and Norio Sato have unearthed some musical treasures from 1989-96 for this bright and buoyant compilation.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Feb 17, 2021
‘The Murders of Oiso’: A whodunnit in search of a crime
Takuya Misawa's stylish and enigmatic murder mystery centers on a quartet of friends thrown into disarray after a sudden death in their town.
Japan's biggest beef bowl chain Sukiya to shut nearly 2,000 stores after rat and bug contamination
Zensho Holdings, operator of fast-food chain Sukiya, said it will close all of its stores in Japan, except for a small number in shopping centers, between Monday and Friday following recent contamination incidents.
Alert raised for volcano in southwestern Japan
Shinmoedake, a volcano located between Miyazaki and Kagoshima prefectures, in November 2019
Japan considers all possible options as Trump threatens new auto tariffs
Subaru cars awaiting export at a port in Yokohama on Thursday.
Nankai Trough earthquake could kill 298,000 people, government says
Residents participate in an evacuation drill held with West Japan Railway in Shirahama, Wakayama Prefecture, in January 2024 to prepare for a Nankai Trough earthquake and a possible tsunami following the quake.
A Canadian made a weekend trip to Costco a Japanese pastime
Under the watchful eye of Ken Theriault, Costco representative director and Japan country manager, the American membership-model wholesaler has flourished in Japan.
A Canadian made a weekend trip to Costco a Japanese pastime
Under the watchful eye of Ken Theriault, Costco representative director and Japan country manager, the American membership-model wholesaler has flourished in Japan.
Tokyo tech failures lean into misfortune, mistakes and missteps
Tsuyoshi Domoto in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward on March 28. As an entrepreneur, Domoto experienced plenty of setbacks but maintains a positive attitude and continues to pursue his dreams.
Who among the opposition would join the ruling coalition?
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba enters his office in Tokyo on Friday.
Traveling the Three-Star Road, the tourist route made from thin air
Scenes like this snow-covered bridge leading to the village of Shirakawa-go are what make the Three-Star Road worth traveling — its name notwithstanding.
Recent spate of wildfires in Japan and South Korea linked to climate change
Smoke and flames rise from a wildfire in Andong, South Korea, on Tuesday.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

Professional cleaner Hirofumi Sakurai takes a moment to appreciate some photographs in a Gotanda apartment whose occupant died alone. 
The last cleanup: Life and death in a lonely Japan
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