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CULTURE / Film
Apr 18, 2001

Europe goes Hollywood

Enemy at the Gates Rating: * * * 1/2 Director: Jean-Jacques Annaud Running time: 132 minutes Language: EnglishNow showing You could probably count on one hand the number of European directors with the budgets and grand vision to compete directly with Hollywood films. Somewhere between Luc Besson and...
CULTURE / Film
Apr 18, 2001

Hollywood goes indie . . .

The Mexican Rating: * * Director: Gore Verbinski Running time: 123 minutes Language: EnglishNow showing "Brad, meet Julia." And with that, the makers of "The Mexican" probably sat back smugly and started dreaming of box-office dominance. With casting like that, you could make a film called "Steaming...
JAPAN
Apr 14, 2001

New rules to trim public organizations

The Cabinet on Friday approved a set of guidelines to reform public organizations financially aided by the government or conducting charity, academic or other work on behalf of the state.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Apr 14, 2001

Sylvie Gramegna

"Small and beautiful" is the description people use when they speak of Luxembourg. This little country, tucked between Belgium, Germany and France, has for centuries been a meeting place of Germanic and Latin cultures. It is known for being open to the movement of people and the different influences...
COMMUNITY / THE PARENT TRIP
Apr 13, 2001

English as a father tongue

You are living in Japan in a bicultural, bilingual relationship (meaning that you can deal with the dry-cleaning guy in Japanese). Little Tomu or Tommy, your first, has gone from goos and gurgles to words and even sentences. How cute! Kawaii! You, who have struggled so hard to master Nihongo (or at least...
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Apr 12, 2001

From ridiculous to sublime: the arguments of a fossil fool

Last month, the White House announced that U.S. President George W. Bush would not support the Kyoto Protocol because it "is not in the United States' economic best interests." The protocol is aimed at reducing human emissions of greenhouse gases, particularly carbon dioxide, that contribute to global...
CULTURE / Film
Apr 11, 2001

Comical Sturm und Drang , all in the family

Rendan Rating: * * * * Director: Naoto Takenaka Running time: 104 minutes Language: JapaneseNow playing "What does woman want?" Freud famously asked -- a question that is just as famously unanswerable. At the dawn of the modern feminist era, however, many women seemed to want what Anais Nin, in a 1974...
CULTURE / Art
Apr 11, 2001

How Italy taught the world to see

In many ways, Renaissance artists taught us how to see.
CULTURE / Film
Apr 4, 2001

Anyone for more gore?

Flashback to 1960.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 1, 2001

A time of hopeful change in the Philippines

MANILA -- Political life is always exciting in this fascinating country of over 7,000 islands, be it in periods of great upheavals, as with the two famous "EDSA" popular movements or during subsequent periods of transition in search of calm and stability, as at the present moment.
CULTURE / Music / MUSIC NOMAD
Mar 27, 2001

Tradition and innovation in modern Celtic music

Julie Murphy and Sharon Shannon are two of the most talented, forward-looking and musically challenging women in Celtic music. Both have captured the spirit of the times, setting a benchmark for a new generation of musicians in their respective traditions. They will soon be performing in Japan with fine...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Mar 25, 2001

Few tasks are tougher than being thoughtless

Meditation increases concentration and mindfulness. That's what this book on Zen meditation says. It instructs me to concentrate for 20 minutes on nothing. Absolutely nothing. One strategy to prevent stray thoughts from entering the mind, the book says, is to concentrate on my breathing.
LIFE / Food & Drink / WINE WAYS
Mar 22, 2001

Raimat's verdant vineyards produce rich variety of wine

I recently enjoyed a trip to the Raimat wineries in Catalonia in Spain's northeast.
JAPAN
Mar 19, 2001

Poll shows public concerned about safety, education

A rising number of Japanese are concerned that public safety and education have worsened over the past few years, according to a government poll.
CULTURE / Film
Mar 18, 2001

Donald Richie: being inside and outside Japanese cinema

In his five decades as a writer, Donald Richie has investigated everything from the glories of noh to the mysteries of the Japanese tattoo, while attempting everything from the travel narrative ("The Inland Sea") to the historical novel (the meticulously researched, wittily engaging "Kumagai"). He is...
CULTURE / Music
Mar 16, 2001

Post-rockers toil in obscurity and they like it like that

Anonymity is the nemesis of pop. History is filled with earnest, well-meaning bands who did whatever they could to keep the music up front and the personalities in the background, often to the point where they wouldn't even reveal their names (like early Pavement). But unless you intend to toil in obscurity...
LIFE / Style & Design / BEAUTY EAST AND WEST
Mar 15, 2001

An audacious urge for color

Shimmer and glimmer have been around long enough for their glint and sparkle to start to seem a bit boring, don't you think?
CULTURE / Film
Mar 13, 2001

Our dreams are made of this

Film critics often have a not-so-secret desire to get behind the camera themselves. Francois Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard and Peter Bogdanovich are among those who made the leap successfully, though Bogdanovich returned to writing after his directing career faltered in the mid-'70s. Even thumbs-up critic...
CULTURE / Art
Mar 11, 2001

Swords and chrysanthemums

Modern warfare is increasingly being depersonalized by long-range missiles, so-called smart bombs, and the virtual battlefield of electronic information. The current exhibition at the Nezu Museum takes us back to an era when our dirty work wasn't done for us by computers but was up-close and personal,...
CULTURE / Art
Mar 11, 2001

Bottling everyday beauty on film

With an oeuvre more than a quarter-century in the making, Mamoru Sugiyama is due for a retrospective exhibition. So that is exactly what Tokyo's respected Photo Gallery International has given the 49-year-old photographer, in a show featuring some 30 of Sugiyama's representative black-and-white still-life...
LIFE / Travel
Mar 7, 2001

Krabi: the next 'last paradise'

KRABI, Thailand -- The idea of an unspoiled, untroubled, untouched land has become necessary in our polluted times -- a space where nature as it was is still to be discovered and where we may once more become natural as well. It is a pleasing prospect, this visitable paradise.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Mar 5, 2001

Bush works on tax cuts while Clinton dodges more controversy

WASHINGTON -- "Beauty and the Beast" was on television Monday night -- the movie, not the continuing news saga of our current president and the most recent former one. That show seems to be a never-ending saga.
COMMUNITY
Feb 25, 2001

Top industrial designer to lecture on lunchboxes

The ninth-floor room in Tokyo's Mejiro where Kenji Ekuan receives guests is a perfect reflection of his personality. One wall is stacked with diplomas, photos and portraits, all neatly framed but in no particular order. Opposite, floor-to-ceiling glass shelving is crammed with memorabilia and knickknacks...
CULTURE / Art / CERAMIC SCENE
Feb 24, 2001

Names writ in letters of fire

The leading ceramics quarterly Honoho Geijutsu recently published a very interesting survey in its 65th issue, listing the names of the most important (juyo) and popular (ninki) ceramic artists of the 20th century.
CULTURE / Music
Feb 23, 2001

Mukai finds brassy brilliance in the balance

Aristotle said that to achieve beauty, proportion is everything. Shigeharu Mukai has contemporized that ideal into a well-practiced jazz unit that is just the right size: big enough for harmonic textures and soloing variety, but small enough for agility and drive. Mukai's latest release, "Super 4 Brass,"...
LIFE / Food & Drink / WINE WAYS
Feb 22, 2001

Take time to savor the days of wine and oysters

Once again fate finds me back in Japan, wondering what I can enjoy eating here that I can't enjoy back in lovable Leuven, Belgium, where one can have excellent cuisine of all kinds with a glass of well-made wine for a pittance (the norm is the Belgian franc equivalent of under 1,000 yen). It's hard to...
CULTURE / Art
Feb 21, 2001

CWAJ lecture series draws a line

"What characterizes Japanese art is its obsession with lines," says Sumie Jones.
CULTURE / Art
Feb 17, 2001

Ukiyo-e treasures make brief return

The Baur Collection of ukiyo-e woodcuts by several of Japan's top masters is this country's own version of the Elgin Marbles. Perhaps this is why the 200 works are only on display so briefly. If you want to see these excellent examples of print art in their homeland, you have only a short time.
LIFE / Style & Design / BEAUTY EAST AND WEST
Feb 16, 2001

Scrub a dub dub: DIY spa treatments

Though spring isn't far off, it's that time of year when even the last dregs of winter seem to be lingering too long. To cheer yourself up and conjure up a sense of renewal, give yourself a DIY spa treatment.

Longform

Eme-Ima Kitchen is one of over 10,000 kodomo shokudō in Japan. A term first used in 2012 to describe makeshift eateries offering free or cheap meals to disadvantaged kids, it now refers to a diverse range of individuals, groups and organizations working to provide not only food but a sense of belonging to both children and adults.
Japan’s ‘children’s cafeterias’ are booming — but is that a good thing?