Tag - shota-sometani

 
 

SHOTA SOMETANI

Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 29, 2018
'And Your Bird Can Sing': A vague take on the complexities of youth
The work of the late novelist Yasushi Sato, who took his own life in 1990, has been enjoying a minor cinematic renaissance over the past decade. Starting with Kazuyoshi Kumakiri's "Sketches of Kaitan City" in 2010, the author's stories have spawned four films to date.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film / Wide Angle
Feb 22, 2017
Asian Film Festival unspools in Osaka
Why go to Osaka to see films? I may sound like an insufferable Tokyo snob asking this, but given all the hundreds of movies on offer in the nation's capital, it's worth answering to justify the shinkansen ticket.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jan 27, 2016
Satoko Yokohama: The girl from Aomori taking on Japan's film industry
The Japanese film industry is one of the most antiquated in the world. Well, that seems to be the general opinion among media pundits here. Those working in film are slaves, enduring terrifically long working hours; budgets are minuscule; old-fashioned apprenticeships still reign; and women rarely get...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jan 27, 2016
'The Actor' gets inside the mind of a struggling Japanese actor
How do Japanese actors do it? I don't mean the stars of mainstream films — those "multi-talents" that are busy 24/7 with TV, stage and advertising gigs — I'm talking about the legions of supporting actors who may have only a single scene or line in a film, or play a body floating in a river. How...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jul 15, 2015
Successor to Hayao Miyazaki's throne turns Shibuya into a realm of beasts
Mamoru Hosoda ranks first among the Japanese animation directors seen as successors to now-retired industry giant Hayao Miyazaki — and for good reason.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Apr 22, 2015
Surviving the night of the long tentacular knives in 'Parasyte: Part 2'
When we left Shinichi (Shota Sometani) and his inseparable parasite companion Migi at the end of Takashi Yamazaki's 2014 sci-fi/horror hit "Kiseiju" ("Parasyte: Part 1"), the space-alien organisms who had found human hosts in the city of Higashi Fukuyama were not only slaughtering humans for food —...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jan 21, 2015
Sayonara Kabukicho: Life and love in Shinjuku's red-light district
Ryuichi Hiroki has become a victim of his own success, though his studio employers probably don't see it that way. This one-time maker of so-called pink films (i.e., soft pornography), who became internationally celebrated for intimate indie dramas like "Vibrator" from 2003 and "Yawarakai Seikatsu (It's...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Nov 5, 2014
Parasyte: Gory invasion of the cannibal body snatchers
The closing film of this year's Tokyo International Film Festival, Takashi Yamazaki's "Kiseiju: Part 1 (Parasyte: Part 1)," arrives in theaters with a lot of hype. Based on Hitoshi Iwaaki's best-selling manga about the stealth invasion of Earth by alien parasites, the film is the first of a two-part...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 27, 2014
Bloody hip-hop war set in technicolored Tokyo
A Japanese hip-hop musical? How about a samurai swashbuckler set on the streets of Compton, California? But Sion Sono makes his new film, "Tokyo Tribe," more than an oddity of cultural appropriation. Truth be told, I felt queasy as the story, based on a manga by Santa Inoue, began to unfold in a crime-ridden...

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Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?