Traffic lights at a cross junction in Nishi-Ogikubo, where I cycle past everyday to and fro work. In Tokyo cross junctions allow you to well, cross diagonally (unlike Singapore), which can really be a live saver when one is in a hurry. Speaking of which, the busiest scramble crossing in Tokyo will have to be in Shibuya, made famous by Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation.
I’ve been a big fan of renowned Japanese illustrator Yoko Tanji ever since I saw her work after arriving in Tokyo 3 years ago, so you can imagine how elated I was when she replied an email I wrote to her a few days back. ( considering she must receive fan mail by the hundreds everyday. )
I had learned about her latest works while visiting the blog of her friend Enrico Casarosa, ( an amazing storyboard artist from Pixar with a penchant for Japan, who was super nice to add my blog link on his. ) prompting me to write to her while in a brazen, excited state of fanboy stupor.
In her reply she remarked that she had bought Freedom 1 dvd *Yay!* and had enjoyed watching it, which understandably made this fanboy very, very happy.
Be amazed by her beautiful illustrations at http://www.tanji.jp/
Watching 300 on the big screen was a pretty intense experience. ( Yes, I know, Singapore had already screened it during the last ice-age, but in Japan the folks so need their subtitles. ) I don’t think I’ve felt so exhilarated watching a film ever since Ang Lee’s Hulk took to the skies, and that’s a full 4 years ago. I guess Japan makes up for its slow releases by printing really nice Pressbooks ( pictured below ) neat little booklets that feature the film’s synopsis, photographs, etc. As far as I know Japan is the only country that has movie Pressbooks.
While we are on the subject of 300, let’s talk alittle about Gerald Butler ( King Leonidas ). Did you know that he once appeared in 007’s Tomorrow Never Dies ? ( the one with Michelle Yeoh as the Bond Girl ) He was a crew member on a battleship and appears on screen for about one second and had a one liner – blink, scratch your nose, and you’ll miss him. Even the radar he was reading off had longer screen time. Here’s another actor with a similar story; Alfred Molina ( Doc Oct in Spiderman 2 ) in Spielberg’s Raiders of the Lost Ark. ( made in 1981, when I was two, my goodness ) Remember the early scene when Jones steals the Aztec Gold figurine and his partner makes off with it, only to get impaled on spikes ? Yep, that was Alfred Molina for you.
What’s my point ? Everyones’ gotta start somewhere, I guess. We might be small fries now, but with hard work, perseverence, and a little luck, we might just make it big in whatever we are doing…or not. Still, you enjoyed that little movie trivia…no ?
Natsu wa Soumen da ! Sappari shita !
There’s nothing like some refreshing Soumen with Tempura in the sizzling summer heat. Peculiar as it seems summer temperatures in Tokyo can get higher than Singapore, so to keep cool eating Soumen’s a great idea, not to mention tasty.
I remember my first summer in Tokyo 3 years ago, when I was still staying with my good friends Takeshi+kojima. It was a particularly hot day and I had prepared a bowl of steaming kimchi ramen for lunch, something which my two Japanese friends found incredibly amazing. As a person born in the tropics I was certainly up to the task of finishing that bowl of ramen even in summer temperatures, but to the two of them the notion of eating hot noodles in summer was so insane they that stared at me as if I was about to feast on some live centipedes.
I’m in the midst of a much needed one week holiday after the completion of Freedom 4 and am just spending most of my free time doing nothing…and enjoying every minute of it.
Takeru graces the lid of a Nissin Cup Noodle, illustrated by Sajiki-san. In Japanese it says “Mobile item get campaign”, to spare you a splitting headache from trying to figure out what that means its basically a promotion for a chance to win some Freedom merchandise by accessing Nissin’s website using your mobile phone. I’ve known this to exist for quite a while now but its the first time I’ve actually bought one that came with the contest form attached.
The earlier campaigns featured the Otomo Katsuhiro illustrated Takeru ( the image I have on my sidebar ) which had Freedom fans eating insane volumes of Cup ramen just to collect it.
Meanwhile at work Freedom 4 is finally completed after slogging 18 hours daily on fine-tunes for the past few days. *Minor spoilers ahead* This episode must be the most hilarious so far with Takeru and Bisu’s misadventures on earth. We’ve also spruced up the opening sequence, I can’t show any images as yet but stay tuned for more updates.
The article as in appeared in Straits Times. Big thanks to all the folks who sent word of support, and also Mr Kwan for the article.
Its mad rush hour again for Freedom 4, but I will try to write a little more if time permits.
Freedom’s official English (US) website is up here :
http://www.bandaivisual.us/freedom/
Just as I suspected they have completely removed all Nissin Cup Noodles elements; check out this previous post here. As far as spiffiness of web design is concerned, the Japan site is definitely the much better of the two.
Screen caps from Freedom’s 5th television commercial, airing on Japanwide TV from today on. ( 20th April ) You can watch it from Freedom’s website by following the link below :
http://freedom-project.jp/?filenumber=4018
The theme song for this spot was initially Utada Hikaru’s “Flavour of Life”, but was changed during production to her latest single, “Kiss and Cry”. In any case, I love both the songs.
Freedom Committee’s celebration parties are always the best time to catch up on some industry news and gossips, considering all of us are always buried under a ton of work on normal working days. Yesterday we were out celebrating the completion of Freedom’s 5th television commercial that is to go live on Japan TV from the 20th April, I will post some pictures once press is released. Matsui-san, my lighting chief, handed me the reins for this project; I must have lighted about 75 percent of all the cuts in this commercial. Tiring, but satisfying too.
Anyway, here are the snippets:
Trivia 1) During the early pre-production stages for Freedom, Otomo Katsuhiro was deciding who should head the project, and Makoto Shinkai, whose achievements on Distant Star is somewhat of a legend, was also considered. It would have been interesting to see how Freedom would have turned out if he had indeed been director.
Trivia 2) Small talk turned to Genius Party, Studio 4C’s soon to be released animation film. Interestingly, Morita-san, Freedom’s director, used to work in 4C.
Trivia 3) Tatsuyuki Tanaka is one of the directors for Genius Party, author of the amazing artbook “Cannabis Works“. Tatsuyuki worked as an animator on Akira; remember Tetsuo’s mutating hand ? Sajiki-san, Freedom’s character and concept artist, calls him “an absolute genius”. Ditto.
What’s Spring in Japan without some (pretty) pictures of Sakuras to show.
Respect for Production I.G’s Ghost In The Shell Stand Alone Complex creative team; 26?! mind- blowing episodes that left me completely hooked and hungry for more. As far as quality of the production is concerned, if I may be allowed to translate in our local island colloquial; “biangz, dun play play.” Hanpa ne-.
Respect also, for Japanese photographer/filmmaker Ninagawa Mika. This lady has a near frightening, unbelievable sense of colour. Bleeding from the eyes may result from prolonged viewing of her imagery. Bleed away right here : http://ninamika.com/
Bollocks. Gotta work harder.
Its confirmed: Freedom Project will be seeing its US release on the 26th of June 2007, with both DVD and HD DVD versions to be made available. I’m wondering how the entire marketing campaign for the US version will turn out should they remove the Nissin Cup Noodles elements, ( Freedom been a huge tie up animation project with the giant noodle company Nissin, a ubiquitious, household name here in Japan but probably not in the states, making it somewhat irrelevant ) but I hope it turns out catchy in any case.
