A typhoon’s coming… Typhoon Club (1985) that is! Arriving November 27th from Third Window Films, Shinji Sōmai’s youth cinema masterpiece debuts on Blu-ray. Note: This review is based on a pre-production check disc and will not cover any packaging or… Read More ›
From October 1995 to March 1996, dystopian mech anime Neon Genesis Evangelion, the brainchild of filmmaker Hideaki Anno (Shin Godzilla), broadcast in Japan, eventually coming available elsewhere in the world. It told the story of an alt-Earth in which the… Read More ›
Despite what one might think when it comes to anime, the adventures aren’t just about super-powered beings fighting one another (My Hero Academia), gifted individuals trying to protect the world from curses (Jujutsu Kaisen), or maybe that time you came… Read More ›
It is not uncommon for a film to be based on material from a different medium. For one, it allows the filmmakers a sense of whether there’s a desire for the film before they even start pre-production. For two, audiences… Read More ›
Who doesn’t love a little meta-angle in their entertainment, something that’s willing to poke fun at itself all while telling its own version of the very thing it’s potentially satirizing? We’re talking movies like Hollywood Shuffle (1987), The Player (1992),… Read More ›
At the 2022 Fantastic Fest, actor/stunt choreographer/director Kensuke Sonomura unveiled his second feature film Bad City, the follow-up to the 2019 release HYDRA. His sophomore crime drama packed in as much intrigue and even more blood-letting, all aided by stellar… Read More ›
It’s been nearly a year since its screening at Fantastic Fest 2022 and Kensuke Sonomura’s bloody crime drama Bad City is finally releasing on physical formats in the United States in September 2023 after a brief digital-only period which started… Read More ›
With the tragic death of Bruce Lee, there was a massive hole left in the martial arts cinema community that led to a genre of exploitation films centered on capturing the essence of Lee through imitation via actors Bruce Li… Read More ›
One of the best films I discovered during Fantasia 2021 was director Junta Yamaguchi’s feature-length directorial debut Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes (ドロステのはてで僕ら), a time travel comedy presented entirely in one take. Now, two years later, Junta returns to Fantasia… Read More ›
Remember in school during group projects when you would be randomly assigned with the worst possible people possible, and then, unsurprisingly, you end up doing all of the work? And the ensuing urge to tell the teacher as many times… Read More ›
Released in March earlier this year in Japan, Shin Kamen Rider (a.k.a. Shin Masked Rider) is the fourth film in the Shin series developed by writer/director Hideaki Anno and others in order to make modern reimaginings of popular Japanese tokusatsu… Read More ›
There are some films whose descriptions pique your interest and under-deliver, some which meet expectations, and some which blow your mind (the diamonds in the rough). The 2021 crime comedy Baby Assassins, written and directed by Yûgo Sakamoto, is the… Read More ›
Born first as a manga series that ran from 1990 – 1996 under the title Slam Dunk, the creation of Takehiko Inoue has been adapted for television, film, and video games since its debut. The series ran in Shueisha’s Weekly… Read More ›
*Disclaimer: Elements of Madness received check-discs of this product, and as such this review will not cover any box art, packaging, or included literary materials that are included with the product.* Katsuhito Ishii, Japan’s Robert Rodriquez, rebel V-Cinema wave filmmaker,… Read More ›
Trigger Warning: Shin Ultraman features multiple sequences featuring flashing lights that might impact those with photosensitivity. In 2016, Shin Godzilla hit theaters and rocked audiences with a version of the kaiju story that hadn’t been presented in such a way…. Read More ›
Shoni Imamura’s final film, Warm Water Under a Red Bridge (2001) has finally come to Blu-ray. The last work of this Japanese New-Wave master, Warm Water Under a Red Bridge finds office worker Yosuke Sasano, played by Koji Yakusho (Cure,… Read More ›
Photosensitivity Warning: During an interrogation scene late into the film a brief but prolonged flashing sequence occurs. Within crime stories, there is a specific subgenre born from Japan: yakuza films. These stories center on the lives or operations of members… Read More ›
Since November 2021, physical media boutique distributor The Criterion Collection has included at least one in 4K UHD in their monthly new releases. These might be first-time additions to their collection (Terry Gilliam’s The Adventure of Baron Munchausen) or remasters… Read More ›
There was a viral tweet going around recently of a meme account getting roasted for implying that high school in 2002 was “so chill,” leading millennials of that age to share their horror stories of attending high school in a… Read More ›
Writer/director Makoto Shinkai’s been telling stories since the late-1990s, but didn’t become as widely well-known in the United States until his 2016 release Your Name. (君の名は。) which combined science fiction/fantasy elements through a natural disaster with young love, creating one… Read More ›