Archive for the Live Action Category


AND THEN: A Girl-Meets-Girl Short Film

March 21st, 2021

In the middle of spring 2020, Jenn Ravenna Tran launched a Kickstarter for a short film And Then, which she described as “A Girl-Meets-Girl Short Film Set in Tokyo.” As a backer on Kickstarter I received a cut of the film, which is slated for an Autumn 2021 public release. Now that I have finally had a chance to watch it, I wanted to tell you all about it!

And Then begins with Mana, played by Erika Ishii, who receives something in the mail that reminds her of her time in Tokyo. We then flashback to that time, as she wanders the town, sketching and experiencing life there. Mana runs into Haru, played by Rina Hoshino. The story follows them as they criss-cross in and out of each other’s lives. As the braid grows tighter, they are brought together.

The Kickstarter had stretch goals to send the crew back to Tokyo to film more footage, but the pandemic brought that to a halt and instead the money was used to support the crew who had lost work because of COVID-19.  Ravenna managed with the footage that had been previously  filmed…and we get enough of a sense of place that these establishing shots feels only slightly abbreviated. These shots are filled with the kind of colorful nightlife street scenes one expects from a story about “Tokyo.” I found myself nodding and grinning as Mana walks the streets, wanders into a shrine, or a cafe. Shibuya Scramble, Tokyo Tower at night, Kamniarimon, it’s all the warm, welcome, typical visual shorthand of “Tokyo.” 

The relationship between Mana and Haru works beautifully, even with such little dialogue and a short time to develop.  Hoshino and Ishii do a great job with few words. The only weakness comes at the end, as they part with a finality that simply makes no sense for the 21st century.

I’ve written about this before. When I reviewed Dear Brother in 2015, I referenced a movie called Stella Dallas in which being divorced was a reason why a mother could never see her child again. In 2018, I talked about this kind of disconnect with the end of After Hours. We have communications devices that allow us global, near-instant access, it’s hard to imagine a reason for such an abrupt separation without, say, exchanging LINE info. That said, since this movie is excellent, I will allow this. We will sketch in a subtextual reason that makes their parting more immediate and permanent and we will accept that it exists.

I have rated this story as Yuri rather than as a queer movie because the relationship is not explicitly about queer identity (although they do dance together at reknowned lesbian bar GOLDFINGER in one scene.) More importantly, the “girl-meets-girl” of the title puts this safely into our genre standard. ^_^

As a short movie, it has a pretty substantial feel and it absolutely makes me want to know what happens after the credits roll. That’s the finest compliment I can give a narrative – I want more. ^_^

Ratings:

Cinematography  – 7
Characters – 8
Story – 8
Service – 0
Yuri – 10

Overall – 8

I’ll of course keep my eyes open for a public release – and I hope, when you are able, you’ll take a moment and enjoy And Then.





The Complete Guide to “Yuri Movies” (「百合映画』完全ガイド) 

March 7th, 2021

While on the Yuri Tour in 2019, one of the last places I visited was Toranoana’s Yuri section. I mention this because, while it does not have a Yuribu like Animate, Gamers, or Shosen, Toranoana’s logo-less “Yuri Corner” is by far and away my favorite. Of the Yuribu, I think Shosen gets closer than the others, with curation that spans a wider range of interests for Yuri fans, but nothing approaches the scale or comprehensive curation that Toronoana offers. It begins next to a broom closet on the 4th or 5th floor of the Toronoana in Akihabara (I can never remember which floor) that’s covered with fake brick designed paper ( which you can see on the second picture.) The Yuri Corner goes along the wall, across the wall on the side where the registers are, then down back along the first full size bookshelf, then it turns the corner and is now another, growing section  on the other side of that same bookshelf. Here a few photos of the section. You can see how low-rent the sign is…totally printed from a computer.

 

 

 

 

BUT – and here is the key point – this is the best Yuri section in Tokyo.

Why?  Because it has manga and novels and light novels and reference guides and mooks and other nonfiction and doujinshi. And so when I am in Tokyo, I always save this store until last, because it will not only have everything I wanted to get, but couldn’t find anywhere else and things I didn’t know I wanted, but it will also have books I didn’t know existed and obviously need to read.  Books like the subject of today’s review.

In actual fact, I bought this on Amazon JP last year, but I guarantee that had I been able to visit in 2020, I would have found this book on those shelves.

The Complete Guide to “Yuri Movies” (「百合映画』完全ガイド)  by Fujinoyamai is a fascinating look at someone outside the anime and manga industry looking at media through an explicitly “Yuri” lens.

The book begins with an interesting explanation of the history of Yuri, and then a justification for the use of the term Yuri for looking at movies that have lesbian content without lesbian identity…a distinction that breaks down only towards the most modern of the choices here.

The guide itself is split into three parts. It begins with Japanese movies, beginning with the 1933 silent film Japanese Girls at the Harbor  (港の日本娘) and continues to 2019’s A Girl Missing,  Yokogao よこがお.  Each entry includes a synopsis, a short analysis and details of staff and forms of release.

The second part of the book cover non-Japanese movies. These begin in 1931 with the German film Mädchen in Uniform and continue through 2020’s The Half of It, which I reviewed here on Okazu.

The third part might be the most interesting for us here on Okazu, as it covers anime movies, from 1986’s Doreamon movie, Doreamon –  Nobita and the Steel Troops (ドラえもん のび太と鉄人兵団,) to 2020’s High School Fleet (ハイスクール・フリート), neither of which I knew anything about. So that’s all to the good.

Some of the anime choices are – to my mind, obviously – not “Yuri” as I understand it, which doesn’t bother me in the least, and one or two that I might have included that are not there. I won’t hold it against Fujinoyamai-san, they’ve taken on a huge topic with this book and done an interesting and thoughtful job with it.  I found the book to be a really interesting read. I’m particularly happy to have a guide to Japanese movies I might not otherwise have known about, with English-language lesbian film history being so Europe- and America-centric. On the whole, I’m inclined to agree with their choices.

Ratings:

Overall – 8

If Yuri as a genre interests you, and like me, you believe that it is a useful genre term for media outside anime and manga, this book is a great addition to your shelves…and these movies to your watchlist! And, if you get a chance to get to Tokyo post-pandemic drop by the Akihabara Toronoana and see what other unique Yuri printed material they have for sale. You never know what you’ll find.





Batwoman, Season 2 on CW

February 28th, 2021

It seems much longer than just two years ago that I reviewed the Batwoman live-action TV series on CW. It had some good elements and considering it came with a lot of baggage it inherited from the comic Batwoman: Elegy, overall it was pretty decent. Ruby Rose did fine job as Kate Kane, intense, never quite hopeful, but never totally hopeless. I didn’t much care for the Alice story, overall and honestly dislike the manic pixie nightmare type character that the Bat-verse is so fond of, but Rachel Skartsen did a fine job as Alice. And then Ruby Rose announced that she was leaving and Javicia Leslie was taking over and I thought…well, cool! Then they told us that she’s be an ex-con struggling against the system and I thought, well, ugh, white people writing performative black trauma, how unique and not at all stereotypical.

But here we are at Season 2 of Batwoman and it is significantly better than season 1. All the things that did not work at all in Season 1, are now working to the series advantage.

Skartsen’s Beth has turned out to be a great character once Kate was taken out of the equation. Nicole Kang’s Mary Hamilton, the character I liked best in the first season, has been able to step up, Leslie’s Ryan Wilder is a far, far, more interesting character than Kate, whose existence had been written as stagnating in the wake of her past experiences. Even Kate’s romances were left over from her past, Sophie and Kate were annoying. Yes, they do that do Ryan as well. I agree the lesbians do hang on to exes, but this is a little tired. That said, Sophie and Beth make a far more interesting working partnership and Ryan making Sophie see that “all crows are bastards” is not a terrible allegory. The writers seem to be taking care to be writing about the criminalization of poverty and the inequality of the justice system, rather than racism, but also not being completely gormless about how they are intertwined. And Leslie’s character is trying to move forward.

What had been an ensemble flapping around Kate, waiting for her to listen to any of them, has now coalesced into a solid team looking for Kate (whatevs) and fighting new and different baddies, something I can get behind, finally.

If it were me, I would have them find Kate, wrap up all that offscreen and move the hell on to some future baddie.

Notably, where the first season was lesbian, this season is queer af. Gay, lesbian, gender fluid, pronouns, all come up in discussions. Gay trauma not performed when it might have expected to be, which wasn’t bad. Queer baddies and goodies which I also like. This show has more than doubled the number of lesbians in Gotham so far, as well. Now we’re up to, like 7, lesbians. Not quite enough for a softball team. Maybe 8 if Mary is queer too.

Absolutely still may fave character is Mary Hamilton. She’s the secret Scarlet Pimpernel in the cast and I hope they don’t break her spirit for another psycho baddie plot. That would be the day I stop watching.

Ratings:

Cinematography – Still way too dark -7
Characters – 8
Story – 8
Queer – 9
Service – Kissing, sex implied

Overall – 9

A much, much, stronger cast and writing than season 1 which was held down by Elegy‘s plot. I look forward to more.

Between this and WandaVision I have come to believe that, freed of their comic book storylines, we’re actually seeing some excellent television writing for comic book characters.





GUNJO, by Nakamura Ching Getting a Movie on Netflix!

October 27th, 2020

Thanks to YNN Correspondent Mercedes for bring this to my attention early today. Nakamura Ching’s GUNJO is being made into a movie by Netflix. This true-crime style story follows the aftermath of a murder. A desperate woman has the woman who has loved her for years kill her abusive husband. The story happens as they run from the police. The Netflix movie will star Kiku Mizukara and Honami Sato.

Komatsu-san at Crunchyroll News has the details.

Volume 1 of GUNJO is available in English at Nakamura-sensei’s site, on a per-chapter basis. I was able to edit is, with Erin Subramanian doing a fantastic job on translation. I hope you’ll read it! With luck, we’ll get a collected e-book volume soon.





Wild Nights With Emily

October 25th, 2020

Wild Nights with Emily, streaming now on Amazon Prime, directed by Madeline Olnek, starring Molly Shannon as Emily Dickinson, was exceptionally silly. That is not a criticism.

Most of us encounter Emily Dickinson in High School, where we are taught her poetry in the way least likely to allow us to actually enjoy any of it. Using it as an example of meter and rhyme, we all end up singing “Because I could Not Stop For Death He Kindly Stopped For Me,” to the tune of the Yellow Rose of Texas, without really touching upon the commonalities of 19th century hymnal music that would give context to that fact.  I had an exceptionally terrible 10th grade American lit teacher, who we called Fifi, who managed to parrot the party line about Dickinson being a “recluse” and I was still able to guess that she was actually a dedicated writer who had no interest in taking care of someone’s household. What I did not know at the time was that she was gay af.

In 1998, it was discovered that mentions of Emily’s sister-in-law, Susan, had been physically erased from many of her letters and poems. The collection of her letters at Amherst have managed to put together some of their story, which you can find online at the Dickinson Electronic Archives.

Wild Nights With Emily begins from the perspective that given how passionate Emily and Susan’s relationship was…how did we get from there to the “aloof recluse” we were taught about in school? The agent of that new, less passionate, Emily is one Mabel Todd, the woman who published Dickinson’s poetry posthumously. The movie follows the life and loves of the Dickinsons, Emily and her brother Austin, sister Lavinia and their various entwinements with Mabel Todd.  Emily is portrayed as an amusingly snarky and intense person, Susan as the voice of reason who is wholly supportive of Emily. Pretty much everyone else comes across as ridiculous. Austin’s affair with Mabel Todd is tawdry, the men who nitpick Emily’s work are self-involved and mendacious. Todd herself take the brunt of seeming ridiculous, and the sound of her erasing Susan from Emily’s letters accompanies the final credits. We found ourselves barking with laughter, rather more often than we imagined we might.

The one genuine weak point was the acting. The first half of the movie felt like everyone was reading their lines, rather than performing them. It did settle down a little by the end, although Todd’s lines are excruciating throughout…on purpose, I presume, to make her look more foolish. The pace of the movie is frantic and non-linear, which worked fine to keep the story on point.

In the end, we found the movie to be a goofy, yet, effective way to address the enormity of the erasure of Emily’s passionate nature, and the devolution of a brilliant woman into a distant recluse whose poetry had to be shoehorned into more “acceptable” form to be received with any critical acclaim.

Ratings:

Cinematography – 6
Acting – 4
Story – 8
Characters – 8
LGBTQ – 10

Overall – 7

This is not a masterpiece of movie-making. But it is a sharp-tongued commentary on Dickinson’s passionate love for her sister-in-law having been largely bowdlerized from her writings and biography.