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Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 15, 2013

Monster-film maker tackles other big menace

Norman England is the world's leading non-Japanese expert on all things Godzilla, if hours logged on the set are any measure. From 1999 to 2004, he spent, by his own estimate, 150 days at Toho Studios watching the king of kaiju (monsters) come to life in film after film, culminating with Ryuhei Kitamura's...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 15, 2013

When young creators answer the big city's siren call

Veteran scriptwriter and director Toshiyuki Morioka had more than a professional interest in making his new film "Jokyo Monogatari." Based on an autobiographical manga by Rieko Saibara, its story of an aspiring artist coming to Tokyo to learn her trade and make her fortune was his as well.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Aug 14, 2013

Yuri Nonaka takes viewers on a trip through the imagination

All things weird and wonderful were loved by the Surrealists and there is plenty of the weird and wonderful in the world of their fellow traveler Yuri Nonaka. The Kamakura Annex of the Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura and Hayama, is currently holding an exhibition showcasing works that were donated to...
Reader Mail
Aug 14, 2013

Remembering the end of the war

We hear today that the majority of Japan's population doesn't know about the Pacific War firsthand. I belong to the minority that does know, as I heard the end of the war announced on the radio on Aug. 15 (1945) when I was a first grader in a small village of Nagano Prefecture. We had been evacuated...
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 13, 2013

How Russia's 'science of sex' threatens gays

Whatever is done to help sexual minorities in Russia, it must be done with an understanding that sex in Russia has a very different history than it does in the West.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / NOTEBOOK
Aug 13, 2013

See how a huge chandelier is cleaned; Yokohama to host more conferences

EVENTS
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Aug 12, 2013

Toyokazu Nagano: Dad's pictures of the kids that others do want to see

In 2008, Toyokazu Nagano, like proud parents do, started taking pictures of his daughters: eating breakfast, playing outdoors — slices of everyday life. However, for each candid image he took, he was vexed by missing another perfect moment.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Aug 10, 2013

Toba and Kashikojima: pearls of tranquillity beside Ise Bay

In places where land submerges itself beneath water, modes of transportation immediately change and, in some cases, endings become beginnings.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 8, 2013

'Homesick'

I once had a promising career as a teacher at a city day-care center in Hollywood (yes, that Hollywood). For one thing, I enjoyed interacting (translation: playing) with my charges, mostly African-American kids aged 9 to 12. For another, I liked making stuff with and for them, including a multi-story...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 8, 2013

'To the Wonder'

An intensely personal film by Terrence Malick ("The Tree of Life," "The Thin Red Line"), "To the Wonder" explores the lives and loves of four people, to the near complete exclusion of everyone else. The films revels in solitude and celebrates seclusion with what seems like voluptuous ardor.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Aug 7, 2013

Radioactive hot spots found in seabed as far away as Miyagi

A research team led by the University of Tokyo has found more than 30 concentrations of radioactive cesium in the first full-fledged study of the isotope's accumulation on the seabed near the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, scientists said Wednesday.
Japan Times
WORLD
Aug 4, 2013

Woman with Down syndrome wins rights case

In a victory for the rights of adults with disabilities, a judge has declared that a 29-year-old woman with Down syndrome can live the life she wants, rejecting a guardianship request from her parents that would have let them keep her in a group home against her will.
JAPAN / Media / DARK SIDE OF THE RISING SUN
Aug 3, 2013

Is new yakuza journal good news for Japan?

If you're a well-connected Japanese gangster, you now have your own newspaper to keep you abreast of underworld life. Another perk of the job.
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Aug 3, 2013

Closet traditionalists still populate a supposedly single moms' world

Every day some 370,000 babies are born worldwide. Of those born on July 22, 2013, 369,999 went unnoticed outside their immediate circles. The exception was a royal prince, third in line to the British throne. His first photos show him blissfully unaware of the vast excitement he was causing. He'll come...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Aug 3, 2013

Story of the modern Bonnie and Clyde

Like all the best fabled morality tales this one begins in a walk-in wardrobe. The wardrobe belongs to Paris Hilton and the interlopers into that strange fantasy land are a pair of bored high school dropouts who have wandered here in search of adventure (and free designer stuff).
Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Aug 2, 2013

Why acupuncture is giving doubters the needle

You can't get crystal healing on the National Health Service. It doesn't fund faith healing. And most doctors believe magnets are best stuck on fridges, not patients. But ask for a treatment in which an expert examines your tongue, smells your skin and tries to unblock the flow of life force running...
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Aug 2, 2013

Pity the driver: Cabbie salaries much lower than average

Deregulation and the recession have chipped away at taxi driver pay over the years.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jul 31, 2013

Big works buoyed by Dojima River's 'Little Water'

Standing in front of the largest work at the Dojima River Biennale, currently showing at the Dojima River Forum in Fukushima, Osaka, is a mesmerizing experience. A 10-meter-tall digital projection of an ethereal cascading waterfall, it glows mysteriously as its gentle rumbling permeates the dimly lit...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / MIXED MATCHES
Jul 29, 2013

Haiku brought together Polish-Japanese couple

They say that languages bring people closer together and bridge distances. So, too, does the Internet.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE FOREIGN ELEMENT
Jul 29, 2013

There is more to my son than the fact he's a 'half'

For foreign residents, having a child in Japan can be a daunting prospect. Going to the hospital and trying to figure out what the doctor is saying in complex Japanese medical terms is just one of myriad trials.
Japan Times
SOCCER
Jul 27, 2013

South Korea stuns Japan; North Korea grabs Women's East Asian Cup title

South Korea shocked reigning Women's World Cup champion Japan, winning 2-1 in the last East Asian Cup women's match on Saturday and helping neighbor North Korea claim its first title at the regional event.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jul 27, 2013

NHK drama dives into the 'idea' of idols in rural Japan

When it was announced last year that entertainment Renaissance man Kankuro Kudo would write the script for NHK's spring-summer 2013 "TV novel," a few people probably wondered how the iconoclastic writer-director-actor would respond to the broadcaster's narrative strictures. In a recent interview with...
Japan Times
WORLD
Jul 26, 2013

Bankrupt Detroit pins hopes on arts

James Morris is the owner of DSE, a downtown Detroit T-shirt business. He hadn't noticed that his city had filed for bankruptcy and he doesn't particularly care. "There hasn't been a moment when Detroit wasn't dealing with problems. Now it's just official," he said.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jul 25, 2013

Fox tackles history in 'Emperor'

Actor Matthew Fox saw his career take off in the 1990s with the role of Charlie Salinger in the American TV series "Party of Five," and he gained even more popularity as Jack Shephard, the central character in the innovative series "Lost." Now, though, his performance in the movie, "Emperor," in which...
EDITORIALS
Jul 25, 2013

Fair treatment of the disabled

The Diet enacts a law prohibiting discriminatory treatment of the disabled as well as obliging local governments to remove obstacles that disabled people face.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 23, 2013

Obama's blunder with Bangladesh

President Barack Obama's recent suspension of trade benefits on a trifling amount of Bangladeshi exports makes one question his sense and sensitivity.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 23, 2013

Streets worldwide showing the failings of democracy

Historians examining our era will marvel at the proliferation of street protests defining the appeal of political community in old and new democracies.

Longform

Totopa in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward was picked by consultants TTNE as the best sauna of the year.
Japan’s sauna movement: Relax, refresh, repeat