SNOW@DOMIRU-MEGURO.

Having hogged my brother's Notionwerks website for years now I've finally gotten my bones together to set up my own domain. After much deliberation I've finally settled on www.playwithlight.com. ( tying into the cinematography, chiaroscuro thing ) One has to realize that with the word "light" within the name its only too easy to end up sacrosant sounding ie "stepintolight.com", nor did I wanted something too corporate, not running a business here. Right now its all but an empty shell, but go to www.playwithlight.com for a peek.

Isao Yukisada's tearjerker Sekai no Chushin de, Ai wo Sakebu ( Crying out love at the centre of the world ), though employing an egregiously cliched, age old melodramatic narrative that is sure to have teenage girls swooning for the lead actor's undying love in the film, is redeemably executed with accomplished skill and beauty ( no small part due to Shinoda's photography ). As unabashedly sentimental as the film is, the superbly timed use of Ken Hirai's moving ballad can really get one reaching for their hankies.



Regrettably, this marked the final film shot by DP Noboru Shinoda, a long time collaborator with Iwai Shunji, whose cinematography work included Love Letter, Swallowtail Butterfly and April Story.

Tokyo Tower, in all its night glory. Merry Christmas folks. :]

To celebrate Takeshi's last day of work ( Takeshi+Kojima are bound for Montreal come late January. *sniff* ) and my film school admission, we had a nice dinner at a restaurant in Nakameguro, where as we were making our way there I was told a scene in Lost In Translation was shot just a street away, outside a Pachinko Parlour. Hmm. Back home we were then treated to Kojima's exquisite Mandarin cheesecake, honto ni umagatta. With some free time on my hands finally, a few events are in order, not least some decent photo trips, Takeshi dittos that.

Perhaps the Japanese were once again exercising their usual diffidence and propriety but me and my friends just could not for cat's sake control our uproarious laughter yesterday while watching Pixar's latest outing The Incredibles. Coupled with Pixar's now reliably excellent plot and visual delivery is Brad Bird's unique direction, a style ringing close to the underrated Iron Giant. There's a hint of mischievious nature seemingly missing from Pixar's past works that is beautifully integrated here, the Warner Bro's animation touch if you will.

Highlight today however must go to the receipt of Toho Gakuen's letter of acceptance, my film school starting next April. Kojima-chan was noticably more estatic than me when told the news, chotto bikkurishita. *laughs*

Its uncomfortably cold this time of the year in Tokyo, but it can only get colder. There is a palpable change in the air, the seasons in gradual transition. Everyday as I cycle to school I witness the maple leaves cover more and more of the walkways and pavements but still the trees seem reluctant to lose their yellow skin for the scarlet reds. If only I wasn't so caught up with school work I could have spent an entire afternoon photographing this beautiful sight, imbued with nature's rich colours and textures. Let's hope there's time yet.

It would seem at long last that the talented folks up at SquareSoft ( now Square Enix ) have decided finally to make right the debacle years ago that was to become FF : The Spirits Within. I've always yearned for a Japan tight FF film with inputs only from their own design team. FF7 - Advent Children, original planned a game, was rescripted and will soon be released as a CG film direct to DVD. I've never followed the FF games but the redesigned CG character Cloud is simply put, beautiful. Better yet, his antagonist Kadaj, ( screen shot below ) looks so devastatingly cool, been a baddie has never felt so good... *rants on like an overexcited kid*

If, Miyazaki Hayao fan or no, after a viewing of his latest animation film Howl's Moving Castle one detects a perceptible difference from his previous works, not so much with the style and visual treatment, but storyline, that's because it is - the script is an adaptation of a children's book by British author Diana Wynne Jones. Though this detail does little to hinder the film's overall greatness, I cannot but feel a sense of detachment, as if the distinctive, Hallmark Miyazaki visuals are just one soul removed from the story. It is not typical of Miyazaki to center his theme and message on the romantic relationship of the protaganists, themselves usually contributing only a certain fraction to a bigger, broader subject that is the more important message he wishes to convey.



Of course, this simply isn't a Miyazaki story to begin with. Certainly my deplorable level of japanese is also hindering my ability to understand the story fully. ( no, no subtitles for a Japanese film in Japan, it makes sense. ) Let's hope I get to see the dvd soon with subtitles and personally no, nothing comes too close to Mononoke Hime , period.

It was only yesterday did I discover that the National Museum of Western Art in Ueno Park houses a most impressive collection of paintings running the gamut from movements like Romanticism, Post-Impressionism, Dada to Pointilism. ( Being able to recall these semantics, admittedly, credit must go to my Victoria School AEP teacher, who tormented us with lengthy essay assignments on art movements. ) Some noteworthy names included Monet, Renoir, Van Gogh, Tiepolo, Pollock, Rosetti, heck, they even had an El Greco. But certainly the highlight had to be the Delacroix ( housed in a quaint, original Delacroic frame ) even though the painting on display was a lesser known work I couldn't remember, but standing in its presence where the master had worked his magic some 200 years ago still gives one considerable kick. Now all that's left to do is to see Liberty Leading The People in Louvre.

As visual echoes of the lusciously photographed 2046 continue to course unbridled through my brain, threatening to inundate and flood out lesser, perceived inferior imagery, one lucid observation comes quickly to mind - Doyle and WKW have once again topped their personal standards of the brillant marriage of visuals and content. Pausing momentarily to evaluate recent chinese film history, with the exception of perhaps John Woo, ( with his gun totting, slow mo antics ) no director and DP have created film images so strong and intense in personal style that they are almost instantly recognizable as such. As Tony Leung converses with a character we could never see, often hidden behind a door or out of frame, we are at once cut off and unable to assert our presence, lessening the experience more akin to that of a voyeur. This motif continues from In The Mood and becomes ever more pervasive here, alienating our role as an unobtrusive, obscured viewer.



Watching 2046 gives the attuned moviegoer a collective chance of appreciating the best work of 3 masterful auteurs - Doyle, WKW and Tony Leung, all in excellent form, with the sum of their respective creative inputs culminating into a portmanteau work that is nothing short of a masterpiece.

There's an extraordinarily electrifying and exhilarating scene in Kazuaki Kiriya's live action rendition of the anime Casshan: Robot Hunter, where the protaganist Tetsuya, having realized that he is the reborn warrior Casshern, lays complete and utter waste to an impending army of invasion robots without so much as breaking a sweat, in between looking devastating stylish and with his affection Luna tucked safely in his arms. The adrenaline rush can be likened to watching the finer moments of those antiquated Hong Kong kungfu flicks where the hero finally learns his skills and starts to kick some, only this is shot with tons more style and coupled with excellent music.



Having raised the bar to its apex hitherto however, the plot starts its descent into sanitized morality issues and lengthy, philosophical ramblings on the ravages of war, but with a fairly disjointed and convoluted narrative so far, one finds it hard to relate to any of the characters, much less their idealistic musings. My take would be to sit in for the stunning visuals, but leave the human ethics lessons at home.

" How happy is the blameless vestal's lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd. " -- Alexander Pope

Not enough praises can be sung of Michel Gondry's Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, indeed, though filmlovers familiar with screenwriter Kaufman's work have come to expect much from his writings, the basis of which gave birth to bold and inventive works like Being John Malkovich and Adaptation, none of them exhibits the sensitivity and romantic longing that envelops Eternal Sunshine "like a soft blanket on a chilly night", quoting BFI's Sight and Sound. This added emotional element raises the film to a higher plane where, bar entities devoid of feelings, makes anyone wonder about their memory backlogs and if Lacuna(www.lacunainc.com)is really such a good idea.



Michel Gondry makes up a third of the triumvirate of genius minds, along with Spike Jonze and Chris Cunningham, whom with their pool of vastly influential MTVs have undeniable shaped the look of the industry. Come the day when Cunningham embarks on his feature, the creative circle would then be complete.

Early autumn is upon Tokyo and temperatures are taking a steady dip, hitherto 15C and going straight down till winter. Certainly one of the highlights of autumn here would be the beautiful fall foliage, think the gradiose setting where Maggie Cheung and Zhang Ziyi slugs it out in Hero, minus the morbidity of course. Gotta head down to Shinjuku Kouen for some shots once the leaves starts to scatter and will post them here soon.

Earlier on a post dinner conversation with Takeshi+Kojima and Shige had them caveating me about the killer winters here in Domiru Meguro where we reside, for a resident here had apparently froze to death last winter. I counted "can't sleep too much" far too many times to dismiss it as a joke, I suddenly feel like an eskimo living in the caps, give or take the polar bears. "SCHOLARSHIP STUDENT IN JAPAN FREEZES IN SLEEP, REQUIRES THAWING."

Now that would be quite a heading.

Oh and er, can someone please remind from time to time that I ought to be keeping up to speed with the Korean movie scene. Oldboy, Spring, Summer, just to name a few to get hold of.

Wes Anderson's audaciously eccentric The Royal Tenenbaums, though clearly not suited for all tastes, joins the ranks of films ( Hu Jinho's One Fine Spring Day been another ) that when given a second viewing, garners a considerably deeper dimension and quality.



Perhaps upon initial viewing in the theatres during its cinematic run I had yet to acquire a nuanced taste for Anderson's bizzare narrative style, but this time round the excellent performance of the actors, with their outrageously hilarious dialogues had me laughing out maybe too laughly. Coupled with an eclectic soundtrack, beautifully executed art direction and photography, this is one unforgettable film. With the Criterion edition dvd going for just 16.39, its impossible to pass this up.

Watch out for his next feature, The Life Aquatic.

In the climatic showdown from Mamoru Oshii's original Ghost In The Shell, Major Motoko Kusanagi confronts the cyberhacker Puppetmaster codenamed 2501, under the aegis of a formidable Type X10-er crab tank. This intense and impactful battle within the "floating museum", coupled with Kenji Kawai's haunting score is remembered as one of recent anime's most memorable scenes.



Innocence, though retaining most of the prequel's characters, embarks on a different storyline, this time told through the travails of Bateau and Togusa, both looking even more stoned than in the original. The film, now augmented with considerably more 3D shots, introduces sleeker mecha designs and stunning sets, while still keeping up with superb 2D animated characters. ( the quality varies at times, one thinks this might have to do with sub-outs for different animation houses ) Though not nearly matching the first film's brilliance, the weaker finale is alleviated in part by Motoko's return, whose "ghost" have been drifting in the network eversince her union with the Puppetmaster. Worth a look just for the visuals alone.

Not unlike the Pasar Malam we have at home, Tokyo's Meguro version of the bazzar ( called Matsuri, ie festival ) substitutes your local Kueh TuTu's and glassjelly assorted drinks with Takoyaki and Yakiniku stalls. Though missing the accompanying fairground that usually pairs with the Pasar Malam, the Masturi offers Kingyosukui - the goldfish scoop. The workings are austere; you pay 300 yen in exchange for a paper scoop - and you're free to scoop as many goldfishes as you like off a shallow tray - if you are good enough.



Takeshi and I had a field time watching this small little girl dressed in Yutaka attempting a bountiful catch, where she had 3 sizable goldfishes up against her scoop, her eyes lighting up momentarily till the combined weight tore through the thin paper. Kojima-chan laughs and adds the ambitious girl's going make it big when she grows up.

At the outset, Zhang Yimou's latest wuxia film House of Flying Daggers ( simply named Lovers here in Japan ) is a delightful visual treat - everything is just so beautifully photographed, from the flowy, opulent garbs adorned by the courtesans, with hues so intense the colours threaten to bleed off the screen, the rich, smooth tones of skin worn by the actors, bloodied nose notwithstanding, and the quintessential bamboo forest battle, drapped in a lush, misty green tint, just to name a few hightlights. In fact, one can probably argue that the director and DOP ( Zhang Xiaoding, who also shot the brilliant film Spring Subway ) spent more effort in prettying up the sets and characters than even the last grandiose work Hero.



Having said all these, it becomes all the more painful that the story fails on so many grounds, undermining the fantastic cinematography and what the film could have ultimately been. Perhaps it was a blessing that I was able to watch this amidst the proprieties of the Japanese, for I wager the singapore crowd would have had zero tolerance for any hammy spectacles, filling the cinema with uproarious laughter.

On a side note, my taiwanese friends were quick to quip that Andy Lau has been finding it hard to shake off his undercover woes ever since Infernal Affairs.

Sometimes there are moments in the course of one's languid mundane life when a piece of music playing off the radio or amps immortalizes a particular, brief span of one's life past, dizzying memories spinning back into your psyche, the zeitgeist rekindled. For filmmakers, animators and individuals working with moving visuals, the experience comes in the form of an unborn but lucid mise-en-scene, as yet defined but flushed with creative possibilites, its mood utterly defined by the music coursing through one's consciousness. Track number 3 on the Nouvelle Vogue CD is the latest additional to this family.

Now whatever filmwork that may be spurred on by this music is too early to say, but its definitely caught the attention. And if not, well, its still some great Bossanova music.

I'm starting to get quite numb to the mini quakes that come and go every few other week, nasty little critters that start by rocking the foundations and then everything else begins shaking in tandem motion, pretty much like a wasted you on a swell PVD night at the disco, only more real. These days I keep telling myself if its not capable of dethroning my stopclock off the top of my monitor there's no immediate need to evacuate. Takeshi+Kojima ups the ante by saying if it doesn't wake them up ( the last one, most powerful to date, came on a morning about 3, with only me still awake but they were obviously unperturbed, ), its trivial. For someone who usually doesn't rouse from my sleep unless I'm stabbed in the heart, that's so very comforting.

Anyway, a planned trip to the sea today with Takeshi+Kojima was thwarted by an impending typhoon, Takeshi conjuring up vivid and graphic descriptions of my gaunt and frail figure getting carried away by the gales and my molecular structure getting re-arranged in the process. Maybe next time. We ended up hanging around Ebisu, Shibuya and Ueno. Click here for Takeshi+Kojima's post.

Kickstarting the 2nd installment of the Spiderman series with a montage of comic panels by the great artist Alex Ross was certainly a welcoming way to setup the right mood, prepping the audience for the story ahead, and despite in my opinion, parts of the film that suffered from a rather awkward pace of editing and several repetitive scenes that didn't quite add additional value to the narrative, Spiderman 2 still scores pretty well with fantastically choreographed action sequences ( those who are somewhat familiar with CG, compositing and rotoscoping will have an idea just how much work was needed for the seamless integrated movement of Dr Oct's tentacles ) and the ever enjoyable J.Jameson, Parker's Daily Bugle boss spewing note-perfect, rapidfire caustic. Of course, "drowning" out a mini sun in the city's river depths was laughably ridiculous.

A night's out cycling trip with Takeshi+Kojima had me realize that Tokyo Towers ( made notably famous by the serial OverTime ) was but a mere 30 minutes cycle away, which makes it nearer than Shinjuku from our place. Anyway we were enroute to a bookstore in Roppongi Hills, your posh, up culture living district of Tokyo where seemingly everything is wafted with a palpable feel of swank. Washed in inadequency I sank into the comfort of books, the joint a classy 24 hr Basheer+borders, only cooler, but the price of this boon is levied in the cost of the books. Next we walked over to Roppongi Hills Mori Towers, where the Japan Premiere of The Last Samurai was held. Here a 5 star-ish cinema stands and heck, if I am to pay 25 dollars for a movie, let it be here, not so much for its posh deco and feel but because I at least get to choose where I sit.

Oh and, Steam boy is showing right here.

Just got word that Kazuaki Kiriya's sci-fi flick Casshern will be released on dvd in late October. I've yet to watch this, but I really like the main character design and if the trailer's any indication of how the film's final colour grading will be presented, its going to look fantastic, very much like what we've seen in UH3.

Meanwhile, news on setting up of Lucasfilm's Singapore branch have been confirmed, great news indeed. It'd be most interesting to see where the local animation scene will go from here.

Exhibiting palpable influences from an eclectic mix of Art Noveau, the Impressionists, Surrealists, Gustav Klimt, and manga art, Japanese illustrator Yoko Tanji's works ellicit an unspoken feel of quiet poignance, cast in autumn shades with gloom forever lurking round the corner. With a colour palette awash in sombre, intense reds and browns, oblivious, detached characters, felicity is probably not the artist's favourite subject.

www.tanji.jp