2021 crime comedy Baby Assassins introduced audiences to assassin/slacker team Mahiro (Saori Izawa) and Chisato (Akari Takaishi) when they stumbled into a face-off with members of the yakuza. Now, they return with a brand-new adventure that finds them on the outs… Read More ›
Sometimes there are movies that just entirely escape your radar. Then you realize a boutique label is giving the film the treatment it arguably deserves and you decide to take the plunge and watch it for the first time. Before… Read More ›
**Disclaimer: The following home release review was written before additional allegations came out regarding a larger issue with lead actor Tak Sakaguchi, detailed in a March 3rd thread by Tom Mes. We feel it’s important to note that this is… Read More ›
Running from March 1st – 14th at Film Forum NYC, a 25-film Japanese Horror festival gives New Yorkers the chance to see Nobuhiko Obayashi’s (The Little Girl Who Conquered Time; His Motorbike, Her Island) House (1977). This Japanese blockbuster was… Read More ›
One of the best action films of 2023 is headed to home video and you’ve got a shot to win a copy. Originally released as 1%er, writer/director Yūdai Yamaguchi’s One-Percent Warrior starring Tak Sakaguchi is a meta-martial arts action crime film… Read More ›
A war photographer, a stewardess, and a chance meeting set the stage for an 87-minute technicolor adventure of crime, mystery, and romance in director Yasuharu Hasebe’s (Retaliation) 1966 caper Black Tight Killers (俺にさわると危ないぜ). The first of several collaborations with lead… Read More ›
In the world of animation, there are well-known names like Walt Disney (Steamboat Willie) and Matt Groening (The Simpsons; Futurama), niche names like Rebecca Sugar (Steven Universe), and then there are names so large that they crafted entire houses around… Read More ›
Running from February 2016 until March 2020, the shonen manga Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba by Koyoharu Gotouge was adapted into an animated series by Studio ufotable in April 2019 and is set to release its latest story arc soon…. Read More ›
If you’re not familiar with Japanese theatrical troupe Europe Kikaku, they are the talent behind 2021’s lo-fi sci-fi comedy Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes and 2023’s lo-fi sci-fi rom-com River. Both directed by Junta Yamaguchi and written by Makoto Ueda,… Read More ›
It’s 1985 and author Toshio Shimao releases “The Sting of Death” and Other Stories, a collection of works, the primary one being described as autobiographical. Five years later, writer/director Kōhei Oguri (Muddy River) would adapt that central tale into his… Read More ›
After its world premiere during Slamdance 2023, the feature-length debut from writer/director Reiki Tsuno (Crying Bitch), Mad Cats, traveled the globe jumping from one film festival to another. At each stop, audiences were invited to enter a world in which… Read More ›
There have always been stories about grifters, liars, and thieves for about as long as there have been heroes and heroines. Sometimes they’re lovable arbiters of chaos, sometimes always in it for themselves. Each time, though, they are often thought… Read More ›
Memory is a strange thing. It doesn’t work like I thought it did. We are so bound by time, by its order. But now I am not so sure I believe in beginnings and endings. – Arrival (2016) In 2019,… Read More ›
Whimsical, musical, juvenile, comedic, romantic, adult, absurd — each of these singular words could easily describe the work of filmmaker/artist Masaaki Yuasa. Whether telling a “one crazy night” story or a rom-com or a time-traveling serial killer rock show, each… Read More ›
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 ›