Note: This blog expresses only the opinions of the blog owner, and does not represent the opinion of any organization or blog that is associated with The Golden Rock.
- Speaking of TV, Japan national broadcaster NHK, which charges pretty much every Japanese household a mandatory fee, saw its latest business plans rejected by the government because they’re making too much money. Making too much money means they are charging too much.
- On a personal note of interest, one of my favorite directors Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest film There Will Be Blood was the surprise closing film of the Fantastic Fest, and the enthusiastic word-of-mouth are pouring in, first from the Hollywood Reporter, then from Twitch’s Peter Martin. I’m extremely excited to see this, but I know I probably won’t get to for a long long long time. Instead, I’ll probably go watch another Pang Brothers movie or something.
By the way, look for a new post or two at the spin-off this weekend.
- As we usually do on Wednesdays, let’s look at the Oricon charts. As expected, Ayumi Hamasaki’s latest topped the singles chart in its first week, selling just over 70,000 copies. However, that actually seems pretty spectacular when its closest competition, the latest from boy group Dong Bang Shin Ki, only had to sell 33,000 copies to get to second place. Looking further down, You Hitoto’s latest could only muster a 10th place debut after selling just over 12,800 copies of her latest. Expect the charts to be extremely quiet next week, with Ayumi Hamasaki winning the chart for a second week in a row.
Things were a little better on the albums chart, where Angela Aki’s second album topped the charts with 88,000 copies sold. Young enka star Kiyoshi Hikawa’s latest album is far behind at second place with almost 42,000 copies sold for his latest album. Leah Dizon’s debut album is already all the way to 24th place from 9th place last week, and expect things to be very quiet here as well next week when Angela Aki will probably lead the chart again.
- Hero, the Japanese drama whose film version is filling seats at movie theaters these days, remains a hit on TV. It’s not a new TV special, but a new cut of the TV special Fuji TV aired this past weekend. While it didn’t hit the original rating of 30.9 from last year, a 22% rating is still pretty damn good, considering how weak TV ratings have been overall these days.
- India decided to pick the commercial flop Eklavya: The Royal Guard to compete with films around the world for one of those final five spots in the Academy Award for best foreign film. Theoretically, it needs to be better than Laagan, the last Indian Oscar nominee in that category. Will a guy named Eklavya beat the 4-hour cricket drama?
- Today is Japanese commercial day at The Golden Rock.
First, we present the latest Softbank ad featuring Brad Pitt. In case you don’t know, this series of ads for the mobile phone service provider feature a Hollywood star walking down a street talking on their cool Softbank phone (for example, here’s one with Cameron Diaz, who’s in at least 3 of these things). This ad is no different, except this one is directed by Wong Kar-Wai. According to Apple Daily, the shooting of the “long take” (the cutting point is the pole, in case you don’t notice) took 3 days and 200 extras.
Second, Japan Probe brings us an ad for a Nagano newspaper by animation Makoto Shinkai, who scored a minor hit with his latest 5 Centimeters per Second. The animation is quite stunning, considering the plot is damn near non-existent.
Lastly, Japan Probe also has all 10 commercials Hollywood actor Tommy Lee Jones starred in for a brand of Japanese coffee. They are very very funny stuff, especially number 6.
- Korean director Lee So-Yeon’s Uninvited might have been a commercial flop in South Korea, but that doesn’t mean he’s not talented. His latest screenplay Hwan Gung, about a man who believes himself to be a warrior sent to send a woman who thinks she is a mermaid back to the sea, won the Busan Screenwriting Competition, which gives him a grant of 20 million won (roughly US$20,000).
- Under “I just can’t get interested in this” news today, Taiwanese idol Wu Chun will be joining the cast of Jingle Ma’s Wu Xia Liang Zhu (or a martial arts version of the classic tale Butterfly Lovers). Twins’ Charlene Choi will be playing the other ill-fated lover, and Nicholas Tse is also in talks to join as another potential suitor for Charlene’s cross-dressing character who will probably fight while hooked on some wire.
Honestly, this sounds like it’ll be a pretty shitty movie already.
- Before you in the West go watch it, Ang Lee would like to tell you that his latest film will probably disappoint you and whomever you go watch it with in your local American arthouse.
Like I wrote before, not much news for the weekend, finishing off what I gathered from Friday and some
- After winning at Berlin and the Fribourg Film Festivals, Japanese actress Kaori Momoi’s directorial debut Faces of a Fig Tree just picked up the best director and best actress awards at the Vladivostok International Film Festival of Asian Pacific Countries, with both awards going to Momoi. It looks interesting, but its official website doesn’t even seem to have a trailer.
- Luc Besson - AKA European cinema’s favorite Asianphile - speaks to the Daily Yomiuri during his promotional tour in Japan to promote his animated film Arthur and the Invisibles. What does this have to do with Asian cinema, you ask? The American distributor of Arthur and the Invisibles is the Weinstein Company, who cut Besson’s film for the American release, and Besson was definitely not happy about that.
- China continues to attract outside talent as they just signed co-production deals with two Asian countries. Korea’s CJ Entertainment will be co-producing the latest film by Jacob Cheung (Battle of Wits) - a martial arts epic named Thangka to be released in Lunar New Year 2009 - and they will also be part of a joint venture with 3 other production studios based out of China and Hong Kong to nurture young Chinese filmmakers.
- Now to the more negative side of Chinese entertainment, the government has published a new mandate that will pretty much kill the reality talent show genre on Chinese TV. The new rules stipulate that the shows cannot be shown between 7:30pm and 10:30 pm, “scientific judging standards” for the contestants, allowing only live voting, and each show may not last longer than 2 months, or no more than 10 shows at 90 minutes each. Just when you thought things were looking better…
- I know I didn’t really follow the rest of the Summer 2007 drama season, but now that’s it’s one or two finales away from being officially over, let’s look at how they did.
The highest-rated drama of the season is the comic-based Hanazakari No Kimi Tachi He, which ran into a bit of a tough spot in the middle, but came out on top with a 21.0-rated finale and a 17.0 average rating. The biggest disappointment is the Monday 9pm Fuji drama First Kiss, which started strong with a 19.7 rating but fell quickly to a 12.4-rating finale and only a 14.1 average. On the other hand, Fuji continues to find success in their new experimental Saturday nights 11 pm period with second drama Life. It started with just a 11.0 rating, but it kept up over the course of the season. In the end, it scored a 17.0 rating finale (extremely good for that time slot) and a 12.2 average. That’s actually even better than last season’s Liar Game.
With an average of 7.5, I have no idea who’s going to be showing up for the Sushi Ouji movie.
Tokyograph also has a preview of the Fall 2007 dramas already, so start your engines and get to picking which ones to downl…buy in a legitimate fashion when they come out with English subtitles.
- This is for real - apparently the South Korean government is planning to present North Korea dictator Kim Jong-il, an avid movie buff himself, not only a home theater set, but also a bunch of South Korean movies. One of the possible flicks? D-Wars.
- American home video distributor Viz Media has picked up the theatrical and home video distribution rights for the two Death Note movies. This is a surprise to me in that I wonder why Warner Bros., whose Japanese division co-produced the film, didn’t sell the hell out of it for the American release themselves. Then again, Viz Media were great enough to bring Linda Linda Linda and The Taste of Tea to the United States, so maybe they’ll do ok with this one. But no DVD release until Summer 2008? That’s a mighty long wait.
- Lastly, Variety has the reviews for Chinese-American director Wayne Wang’s latest two films, which see the director returning to his indie roots, and both shown at the Toronto Film Festival - The Princess of Nebraska and A Thousand Years of Good Prayers.
- Looking at the Oricon charts, it was a pretty busy week for the singles market. KinKi Kids’ latest takes the top spot with an impressive first-week sales of 190,500. On the other hand, Koda Kumi’s latest sold 65,000 copies, which would’ve earned it a number one spot any other week. Ken Hirai’s latest’s debut is a little soft, selling just over 20,000 for 6th place. Also, at 7th place is the latest electropop group Perfume, and it’s also their first single to debut on the top 10. Next week, expect Ayumi Hamasaki’s latest (that was fast) to take the top spot yet again.
Things were slower at the albums chart. As expected, Johnny’s Entertainment’s V6 took the top spot with their latest album, selling 76,000 copies in the first week. The Cro-Magnons, whose lead and guitarist were part of the legendary The Blue Hearts, saw their latest album sell 32,000 copies for a 7th place debut. Somewhat disappointing is the debut of model-turn-pop-star Leah Dizon, whose debut album sold only 27,000 copies for a 9th debut. Looks like the Japanese public knows there’s a difference between being able to model and being able to release a competent album. Next week, expect a busy albums chart, but nothing will sell very spectacularly.
- With just a little more than a month to go, the Tokyo International Film Festival has finally released its full line-up. As announced beforehand, the action film Midnight Eagle will open, and the French period drama Silk will close. the busy Takashi Miike’s latest Crows will also have a special screening at the festival.
- A television network in Japan decided to cancel the broadcast of the last episode of the animated series School Days after a 16-year-old girl killed her police officer father with an ax in Kyoto recently. The final episode apparently features high school girls acting violently, which I’m sure never happen in real life.
- Under “Doesn’t he have anything better to do” news today, Francis Ng is reportedly publishing an English novel about a Tibetan monk. However, he admitted that his writing is not good, and that he would find a ghostwriter. But shouldn’t writing well be a basic criteria for publishing a novel?
- Variety’s Dennis Harvey gives us a short review of Hollywood Chinese, a documentary about Chinese people in Hollywood (mostly the lack thereof).
- Quite frankly, I wasn’t all that thrilled about a lot of the news today (although I’m sure you would be if you’re a fan of anything I mentioned here today), so I should give myself some motivation by devoting this entire paragraph to the news that the Shiina Ringo-led Tokyo Jihen will be providing the ending theme song to the film Myoro No Hako. I care because this is the first time the Jihen will be providing a song for a film. Also, I’m sure Shiina Ringo will subsequently sing about 20 covers on it on different albums and concerts.
- According to Apple Daily (NOT one of the more trustworthy newspapers in Hong Kong), netizens have been trashing Pang Ho-Cheung’s Exodus quite brutally. One netizen wrote this in reference of the film’s message: “When a movie becomes so bad, some people might believe it’s art. But it doesn’t mean there’s no such thing as a bad art film.” Another person wrote: “The more incoherent it is, the more it means it’s an exceptional film.” Ouch…..?
- The mega-expensive Korean drama Guardian Gods, starring Bae Yong-Joon, premiered in Korea with a very solid 20.4 rating. Then, according to Korea Pop Wars, it even got boosted to a 26.9 rating on nights 2 and 3. It’s not quite indicative of how the rest of the show will be, but it seems pretty clearly that Yong-sama’s spirit lives on.
- Shamo, Soi Cheang’s follow-up to Dog Bite Dog, was apparently done all the way back in May (at least done enough to go to Cannes). However, it has yet to see a release date, despite already getting a category II-B for “strong violence and sexual content” all the way back in May. I’ve been told that it’s not very good (please note that I’m understating this very much), so could that have something to do with it?
- What IS the big deal about this damn thing? Disney’s straight-to-TV movie High School Musical 2 not only broke records for American cable TV, it also broke Disney Channel records in Singapore and Malaysia. It was also the highest-rated program on pay TV in Hong Kong during its premiere.
- In production news, Singapore’s Kelvin Tong is shooting his latest film with Ekin Cheng and Shawn Yue in Hong Kong right now. No word on whether Ekin Cheng plans to act or just be wooden throughout the shoot.
- The mega-expensive Korean drama Guardian Gods, starring Bae Yong-Joon, premiered in Korea with a very solid 20.4 rating. Then, according to Korea Pop Wars, it even got boosted to a 26.9 rating on nights 2 and 3. It’s not quite indicative of how the rest of the show will be, but it seems pretty clearly that Yong-sama’s spirit lives on.
- Shamo, Soi Cheang’s follow-up to Dog Bite Dog, was apparently done all the way back in May (at least done enough to go to Cannes). However, it has yet to see a release date, despite already getting a category II-B for “strong violence and sexual content” all the way back in May. I’ve been told that it’s not very good (please note that I’m understating this very much), so could that have something to do with it?
- What IS the big deal about this damn thing? Disney’s straight-to-TV movie High School Musical 2 not only broke records for American cable TV, it also broke Disney Channel records in Singapore and Malaysia. It was also the highest-rated program on pay TV in Hong Kong during its premiere.
- In production news, Singapore’s Kelvin Tong is shooting his latest film with Ekin Cheng and Shawn Yue in Hong Kong right now. No word on whether Ekin Cheng plans to act or just be wooden throughout the shoot.
- Reviews for this year’s Venice surprise film - Johnnie To’s Mad Detective starring Lau Ching-Wan - are out from the two big trade papers. Variety’s Derek Elley calls it a neat idea that doesn’t quite hit the bull’s eye, and that it’s a rewrite or two away from achieving the rigor of a To movie. On the other hand, Hollywood Reporter’s Ray Bennett, who can’t seem to spell “Johnnie” right, is a lot kinder, calling it concise and artful.
- Sony is changing their focus, putting more emphasis on foreign films when they realized that these foreign films don’t need investors, but rather a widespread distribution network that Sony can offer.
- Leah Dizon is really starting to get huge not just in Japan (forget the fact that her last single didn’t sell much), but in the rest of Asia as well. Her debut album, which will no doubt feature lots of easy-to-sing song with carefully pronounced Japanese, will be released simultaneously in 9 countries. However, I doubt a number of her fans are fans because of her singing. I suspect this might have something to do with it.
- The Singapore-based Asian Film Archive is getting a donation of 90 Malaysian classic films that will be restored and archived (but of course. That’s what an archive is for).
- They’re outsourcing everything to India these days. Even Sony is outsourcing the production of their direct-to-video sequel to the animated film Open Season to India and New Mexico (that’s in America, not Mexico).
- Reviews for this year’s Venice surprise film - Johnnie To’s Mad Detective starring Lau Ching-Wan - are out from the two big trade papers. Variety’s Derek Elley calls it a neat idea that doesn’t quite hit the bull’s eye, and that it’s a rewrite or two away from achieving the rigor of a To movie. On the other hand, Hollywood Reporter’s Ray Bennett, who can’t seem to spell “Johnnie” right, is a lot kinder, calling it concise and artful.
- Sony is changing their focus, putting more emphasis on foreign films when they realized that these foreign films don’t need investors, but rather a widespread distribution network that Sony can offer.
- Leah Dizon is really starting to get huge not just in Japan (forget the fact that her last single didn’t sell much), but in the rest of Asia as well. Her debut album, which will no doubt feature lots of easy-to-sing song with carefully pronounced Japanese, will be released simultaneously in 9 countries. However, I doubt a number of her fans are fans because of her singing. I suspect this might have something to do with it.
- The Singapore-based Asian Film Archive is getting a donation of 90 Malaysian classic films that will be restored and archived (but of course. That’s what an archive is for).
- They’re outsourcing everything to India these days. Even Sony is outsourcing the production of their direct-to-video sequel to the animated film Open Season to India and New Mexico (that’s in America, not Mexico).
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