Toranaide Kudasai!! Gravure Idol Ura Monogatari eps 1-3

Bframe has been talking about Toranaide Kudasai!! for a bit so I decided to check it out. Behind the scenes show with gravures? Can't think of a reason not to watch it and frankly, I'm disappointed I did not notice it sooner. Checked out the d-addicts torrents and no one is seeding them. :(

My only choice was to go down to my local DVD shop and get those chinese DVDs. The original price was $25 but they were doing a 3 for $30 special so I grabbed Tightrope no Onna and Taburakashi, too shows I have not seen that looked remotely interesting.

Bframe told me that at the back of his DVD box, it says this dorama was fiction and it really is. I know reality tv is scripted but Toranaide Kudasai!! doesn't even try to pass itself off as reality. Way too many shots where the lighting is better than cheap doramas cause you want to get the girls in their best light and sometimes with conversations, the camera goes back and forth from two viewpoints.

So Toranaide Kudasai!! is a dorama about the making of a documentary that doesn't even try to pretend to be a real documentary featuring real gravure idols playing themselves in situations that true to life. So far at the end of each episode, every girl gets to have their JCVD monologue moment. If you've not watched the movie JCVD, its this famous long monologue where Van Damme bares his soul to the audience in a monologue.

I really like Kawamura Yukie's monologue. I think she was pretty good at that part because a lot of it is true. This is unreality, the opposite of reality tv. Gravure idols playing fictional characters based on themselves you keep wondering how much is real but it looks more like a dorama than a documentary. I guess it just weird me out why they don't make it more realistic

I'm only three episodes in but the formula of one girl per episode will probably wear thin soon. It will be very hard to do interesting individual stories for all the girls. I like the connectivity between the stories with girls running into each other.

I was really happy when the back of the DVD box said it had Japanese subs. Then I realised the Japanese subtitles aren't even correct. They sort of correspond with what is being said on the screen but are not accurate. Its as if auto translated the Chinese subs into Japanese!

Jmovie review: Be Sure to Share / Chanto tsutaeru

This movie has been sitting on my hard disk for years and I finally got around to watching it after looking for Ito Ayumi movies because of Tsumi to Batsu. I always had a thing for her since Wedding Planner but I hardly see her in jdoramas/movies. I completely forgot Be Sure to Share was a Sono Sion movie, probably cause Akira from Exile is in it and surprisingly, he actually does a decent job in this movie.

Be Sure to Share is Sono Sion's most mainstream movie ever, even more than Land of Hope. It is also his most personal movie. I think he did it after Love Exposure. If his name didn't appear in the beginning, you would not be able to tell its the same director who is doing Minna! Esper Dayo!

Be Sure to Share is a father-son movie. Akira's father is hospital for cancer and everyday, he goes to visit him. Over the course of the movie, we get to see details of their relationship through very well done flashbacks. We see that Akira's father was the demon coach of the school and how their relationship was as he was going up. Actually its as much a father-son movie as it is a movie about two people at different stages in their lives.

I love how Sono Sion structures the flashbacks to tell the audience what we need to know and how it affects the present day. It prevents to need for exposition dialogue and takes us deeper, step by step into the characters, their relationships and their thoughts.

It is a mark of how great Sono Sion is as a writer/director that he can write something as crazy as Love Exposure and also do something as simple and touching as Be Sure to Share. The only thing remotely Sono Sion-like occurs in the end but its such a beautiful scene.

Ito Ayumi is great in this as well as Akira's girlfriend and she does the emotional heavy lifting in this one. I want to see her in something where she has a career defining role. Looking at her filmography, there are plenty of her movies that I haven't seen so she may have already done it.

While I would still place Love Exposure and Noriko's Dinner Table as Sono Sion's best films, Be Sure to Share is his best mainstream movie. Its what Japanese melodramas should be, simple, poetic and memorable. Absolute must watch.  

Tsumi to Batsu: A Falsified Romance ep 5+6

I first watched this series a year ago and the first few episodes blew my mind. The last two episodes I didn't really like but didn't write about it since I watched there were no subs and lots of dialogue was lost on me. Luckily, Unsolved Cases subbed the whole series and I could finally decide whether Tsumi to Batsu belongs among the top doramas of 2012.

The one subbed scene I was hoping would flip the switch for me was the prosecutor's talk with Miroku. Miroku has basically gotten away with murder. Someone has confessed to the crime and certain people in power want the matter swept under the rug. Yet, this idealistic and delusional writer Miroku is haunted by his crime. He is haunted becauses he discovers that he is not a predator like Sudou. That his ideas about justifiable murder are not true.

Frankly, Miroku is interesting when he is doing stuff out of his misplaced daddy issues. When he is wallowing in guilt not so much. Tsumi to Batsu is about Miroku's guilt and him seeking peace in the form of a life sentence. I just don't buy that talk with the persecutor in his room. Not sold that living with guilt is better than life imprisonment or a possible death penalty. Plus, who's going to guarantee his safety in prison from the yakuza?

The most interesting character is at the end is Echika. I finally understood the falsified romance part of the title. Echika is not a character who wallows in self pity but she embodies the term misery likes company. As Miroku says, her love is violent. Echika just wants to be needed by hopeless men and Miroku is even more hopeless than her husband.

There's always something interesting about two totally screwed up people getting together but alas, the last two episodes are about Miroku making peace with what he has done and making peace with himself. I can see Tsumi to Batsu is trying to do a psychological story about someone who believed he has done righteous murders realising his guilt but it just doesn't work for me. Miroku is only interesting for me when his resentment causes him to do stuff. Good try by WOWOW though. I'll take this over  any nonsensical police dorama any day.

Minna! Esper Dayo! ep 7

Episode 7 is a disappointing filler-like episode.

First of, I just want to say I want to be a teddy bear when I grow up.

Second of all, nothing really interesting is being done with Mano Erina's character besides her not believing in Espers.

We do finally get to see the creepy long haired guy in action.

Let's just say he's responsible for the town's female population becoming Tenga girls.

I'm quite impressed they got so many extras but I guess most of them are probably real Tenga girls and Tenga is a sponsor.

Creepy long hair dude's aim in this episode was to get our hero to a simple realisation.

Its unfortunate that this could have been an awesome zombie parody episode and instead it fell flat.

I guess its more mind control than zombie but nothing really funny happened except Tenga dude getting swarmed by Tenga girls.

I must have missed something in this episode because it doesn't advance the story at all.

I never thought one day Mano Erina would be a Tenga girl.

I still have no idea what Minna! Esper Dayo! is. It doesn't seem to be a super power team up.

Its not funny enough to be a gag dorama. 7 episodes in and it hasn't built any threat.

The triangle relationship has been stalling so its not really a relationship dorama. Whatever it is, Minna! Esper Dayo! needs to find its voice soon.

Rinjo: The Last Message

I like the Rinjo series. Its one of the very few police procedural jdoramas that gets it right. Its your usual police maverick who oversteps his boundaries show but not everyone in the organisation is portrayed as incompetent and Moriyama sensei from Doctors plays Kuraishi's superior who begrudgingly respects Kuraishi's abilities. None of that main character has proven him/herself over and over but everyone hates the main character cause they are useless at their jobs. Most importantly, Rinjo is about how Kuraishi solves the crimes and not manufacturing cheesy/cool moments.

Which brings us to this Rinjo movie, The Last Message which starts of with one of the fakest mass stabbing scenes brought to screen. I appreciate them going for a wide continuous shot but lack of visual contact with the knife is does nothing to sell me on the scene.

The Last Message has a good story but two things take away from it. First is the story about the mother of one of the stabbing victims which just feels tacked on just to lead to a tear jerker reason for her daughter to be at the scene of the stabbings. I guess that's why the movie is called the Last Message but drawing a family picture over graffiti is hard to buy.

Second is the long debate at the end with the karmic stabbing ending which just feels so contrived. Its like stupid shit has to happen because the karmic jmovie laws decree that people always have to pay for their sins at the end of a movie.

Besides those two gripes, I like the story and the twist and turns, especially with the old policeman. They've also got a good reason to introduce this new police dude who's always pissed at Kuraishi. Watchable, just don't not as good as the series.

Haitatsu Saretai Watashitachi ep 2

I really like this show. Not enough to call it must watch yet, but its certainly pretty good. Spoiler talk ahead if you haven't watched episode 1 which I urge you to do. You know how in jdoramas, there is always this throwaway redemption thing? It was there in episode one with Yu's mother and I just loved how Sawano pointed out that it was a meaningless exercise to lessen Yu's mother's guilt and Yu replies, "You think I don't know that?".

Redemption and feelings of abandonment and guilt cannot be resolved so easily and Sawano's cynical view of the world is a breath of fresh air in the black and white world of jdoramas. Emotional wounds are complicated things and its not like anyone suffering from PTSD for example can utter the words ,"I am a mechanic!" and be magically cured. If you didn't get that reference, just move along.

I really like the humour in episode 2, especially with Sawano's doctor. He's got a more rounded view which is a fun way to view depression. Instead of let's list all the symptoms of depression and make it morbid and pitiful, Sawano's doctor's view is this is what we know about depression, this is what we can do and people suffering from it can still function in their own way. It doesn't try to make Sawano into a sob story.

There's certainly a lot of Sawano's backstory to explore though and judging from the previews, it looks like the stories that we get from the people receiving the letters serve Sawano and Yu's story rather than them being just bystanders. The more I think about Haitatsu Saretai Watashitachi, the more I realise it does so many things right. I hope at the end, I can declare it a must watch.

For those who like the ending song for Minna! Esper Dayo! Yakan Hikou, you can grab the song here. I'm so hooked to this song.

Minna! Esper Dayo! ep 6

Bad news is Furransu has stopped creating torrents for Minna! Esper Dayo!. Luckily we get to see a lot of Kaho this episode. :)

Good news is you can watch good quality rips at dailymotion and download them using keepvid. If only it had Japanese subs but beggers can't be choosers. Beggers can only find alternative sources. The above subtitle is Japanese translation of English. Sono Sion's translation for 'fucking assholes' is 'baka na otoko'.

Three good things about this episode. First is we finally find out the source of why seemingly everyone in the town is an esper. Let's just say its very funny and Kaho does a good embarrassed look.

The second is a short Mano Erina is tied up scene and finally Mano Erina gets her Sono Sion moment, doing a short soliloquy accompanied by Beethoven symphony no 7.

Problem is, I'm still waiting for this series to go someplace interesting. Hmm, this would make a great wallpaper.

Next episode looks like a zombie spoof episode. Is Minna! Esper Dayo! going to be more than just fanservice and dirty jokes? At least Mano Erina doesn't have to act perfect anymore.

I can't believe how many times the F-word is used in this episode, not that it would offend the Japanese anyway.