Gosick trailer released

So a trailer for Gosick has been released on the webbertubes:



It... kinda makes it look like boring crap. I hear Gosick's supposed to be great, though. Andrew had lots of good things to say about it, so maybe he can predict whether the trailer just sucks (like most Japanese trailers do) or if the anime seems to be missing the point.

Another luscious-looking film from Makoto Shinkai

Makoto Shinkai (of Voices of a Distant Star and Place Promised in Our Early Days fame) has a new film coming out and a trailer's been released:


As expected, Hoshi o Ou Kodomo (Children Who Chase Lost Voices from Deep Below) looks gorgeous. The backgrounds and environments are alway stunning on his projects.

He's also a master of atmosphere, but can sometimes be a bit lacking in an actual plot. The trailer hints are more action than is typical for his work, and the character designs seem much more polished, moving past his sometimes-charming amateurish style.

I'm hoping that suggests this one will be a bit more of a complete package, instead of just an incredible and immersive atmosphere with a very thin story.

Anime News Network : YouTube

Fuck it, let's just make the entire stunt team movie stars

Red Eagle

Remember Tears of the Black Tiger? Director has a new movie.

Neck

So Maijo Otaro wrote the story for a movie. I didn't really think there were many people capable of tapping into his unique wavelength...

...but I am entirely unsure how they managed to make something with that much Maijo insanity clearly evident still look really generic. The Japanese film industry is kind of a meat grinder. Throw anything into it and it will shit out a wacky comedy or a weepy melodrama.

Full Redline trailer

Now with more Engrish.

Spaceships! Melodrama! Amazing hair! YAMATO!

Redline

Embedding is disabled, but shiiiit. Now angry that the lame ass Seattle Film festival failed to book this AND Yatterman.

Gantz live action

It has to be better than the Gonzo version, right?

France still crazy

And by crazy I am being literal. What the fuck is up with any of this? Particularly the audio, which is so jumbled I actually stopped the trailer to see if I'd left my mp3 player running in the background.

Miike's 13 Assassins

Looks really boring.
Last thing I want to see him waste his time on is Generic Samurai Epic 101.
I mean...this might well be a solid film, with stirring action scenes and intently mannered drama delivered by competent actors, but ANY director in Japan could make this movie in their sleep. No sense in wasting Miike's time with it.

Secret of Kells

In limited release around the country now. Absolutely amazing; so absurdly beautiful I came out angry with reality for not looking as nice.

Ong Bak sequels

Ong Bak 2 is one of the most bafflingly bad films I have ever seen. I am the last person on earth to hate a kung fu film if it manages to have a sufficient quantity of great fight scenes, but Ong Bak 2 was just so fundamentally misconceived that it managed to undermine it's own action. Between having Tony Jaa's character played by a child actor for LITERALLY half the movie, and the Tinkerbell ending...
I should probably not be looking forward to the sequel.
But here's the trailer, and it looks like it at least knows how stupid it is; since they're clearly never letting Tony Jaa direct again, perhaps it won't be paced like mud trickling down the back of an elephant's corpse.

Japan still has it

What the fuck IS this!? Looks like the best cinematic folly since Southland Tales.

Shaolin

Looks pleasingly grim.

Zebra Miniskirt Police manages to look not at all fun

The news that Aikawa Sho personally cast the girls means we now know exactly what his type is, I guess. Sadly, the rest of it looks more dull than gleefully trashy, serious when it should be over the top.

Junko's Shamisen

I don't even know what the hell this is, but I want it.

Junko's Shamisen - Trailer from sol friedman on Vimeo.

Yuasa's new thing

Really? We didn't have a tag for Yuasa yet?

Ip Man

Donnie Yen and Wilson Yip appear to be hell bent on reviving the entire martial arts genre by their damn selves. If we just forget about the incoherent second half of Dragon Tiger Gate, they've done a pretty solid job.

I'm the first to scoff at fools who give a shit about anything but the fight scenes in a kung fu movie, but occasionally a movie comes along that absolutely delivers the fu, and gives a shit about the story, and actually has the script and restraint to pull that story off. It's a bit hard not to compare this to Jet Li's Fearless, a movie that has more or less the same plot -- one kung fu master inspires China to kick out the Japanese -- and may have had more spectacular fight scenes, but was a dreadful, sappy, incoherent, embarrassing mess otherwise. An opinion only strengthened by seeing Ip Man do it so much better.
I used the word restraint for a good reason; histrionics are pretty much inevitable in Chinese movies, but Ip Man more or less avoids them, and when it does indulge, it makes damn sure it's earned them. Which is not to say Donnie Yen doesn't completely blow the one really emotional beat the script hands him, but you're willing to overlook that in the context of a performance that completely drops all traces of his usual ego-maniacal self-absorption and finds the cool in always being polite, cultured, and able to fights swords with a feather. I was particularly impressed with Ip Man's relationship with his wife, which manages to find a new angle on something I think everyone else pretty much gave up on finding new angles on.
Got to admit, I kinda wished I'd waited to see it in theaters, though. It better be coming.

The return of Luc Besson?

I understand his post-hiatus projects have been underwhelming...but then, some people seem to have found his Joan of Arc movie underwhelming. Do not comprehend.
Either way, this certainly looks more interesting than crap looking kid flicks or self-indulgent black and white romances.