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Imagine you’ve just been proposed to in a rickety bus on your way to the actual proposal site. You say yes, but before you know it, you’re in a scary accident, and the man you’ve just agreed to spend the rest of your life with suddenly doesn’t exist anymore. Then imagine he gets a new lease on life of sorts when an unknown man who gets his heart also receives his memories. Would this mean the love of your life lives on? Would you want to meet this other person? Would you fall in love with this other person? Or would you just stay away from them and think it’s for the best to move on? The Japanese drama Beyond Goodbye explores this plot in a cute and upbeat TV series. I know, I said upbeat, but that’s because this isn’t the tearjerker you expect it to be,...

A new film incentive and the weak yen are attracting more international productions to Japan, according to the Japan Film Commission (Jfc).

The incentive, which launched in 2023 following an earlier pilot programme that helped finance projects such as HBO series Tokyo Vice, offers a cash rebate of 50% to selected productions whose direct production costs in Japan exceed $3.3m (¥500m) or whose total production costs exceed $6.7m (¥1bn) and whose direct production costs in Japan exceed $1.3m (¥200m ). The upper limit for subsidies is $6.7m (¥1bn).

The incentive has been awarded to six projects this year, including Brendan Fraser vehicle Rental Family...

Michihito Fujii has been working like a factory lately for Netflix, with the majority of his latest works featuring in the streaming service, including “Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045”, and the more recent “Hard Days” and “Village” among others. His latest work, however, signals a change to a “tamer” narrative, as “The Parades” is a drama about the afterlife, inspired by the Fukushima disaster.

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Minako, a TV reporter and single mother, finds herself roaming the area she lived in after the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, in search of her lost boy. Soon she realizes though, that she is dead and that the living cannot see or hear her. While getting totally lost about her new reality, she is discovered by Akira, a writer who is in the same situation, who takes her under his wing and introduces her to his...

The Parades is a movie written and directed by Michihito Fujii starring Masami Nagasawa, Kentaro Sakaguchi, Ryusei Yokohama, and Nana Mori.

From Japan comes “The Parades”, a lovely film that, we warn you, goes straight to the heart and speaks from the deepest human emotion and the most profound concern of human beings: death.

A film that starts precisely from there, and gradually contrasts it with life, creating a whole ode to life itself in death.

A film, as you may have imagined, full of sentiment and nostalgia, but also of life and hope.

Synopsis:

After an earthquake, a woman feels confused and disoriented as she tries in vain to find her son. A stranger takes her to a camp where he tells her the truth: she is dead, and she still has unfinished business to take care of before she can move on to the other side.

About the film:

This Thursday,...

Netflix added another title to its rapidly expanding Japan live-action originals slate Wednesday with the announcement of the romantic drama series Beyond Goodbye.

The series is an original story by prolific Japanese screenwriter Yoshikazu Okada (Bl Metamorphosis, The Last 10 Years). It co-stars Kasumi Arimura, known for the Japanese blockbuster We Made a Beautiful Bouquet and the Netflix feature Call Me Chihiro, and Kentaro Sakaguchi, a TV drama regular and recent star of the feature drama success The Last 10 Years (2022).

The film tells the story of Saeko (Arimura), who suddenly loses her fiance Yusuke in a tragic traffic accident. As she tries to overcome her grief, she meets Naruse (Sakaguchi), a man who strangely reminds her of Yusuke. Little does she know that Naruse had received Yusuke’s heart a few months prior to their encounter — a heart still in love and holding all the memories of Yusuke and Saeko’s relationship.

A gentle stillness revives itself at the end and beginning of every breath, its vibrancy tangible when tuned into its frequency at each precise moment. It is a calmness, a small measure of peace, seldom found under the neon buzz of a megacity such as Tokyo or any given metropolis around the globe wherever the urban frenzy is ceaseless. Life far removed from time's boorish grasp – its frantic march toward the inevitable, its relentless demand for toil and progress – finds a gentler purpose: an opportunity for spiritual detoxification, a glimmer of strength to face the past head-on. For lurking in the periphery, obscured by shadow, are the ghosts and demons in constant pursuit, and no amount of running can keep them at bay forever. In “Side by Side”, Chihiro Ito painstakingly curates this serene tapestry in which Kentaro Sakaguchi's Miyama eschews his trauma and makes his escape.

Side by Side...

The Japan Academy Film Prize Association held the 46th edition of its awards ceremony on March 10, 2023. The nominees are selected by industry professionals from the pool of film releases between January 1 and December 31, 2022 which must have screened in Tokyo cinemas. Award categories are modelled after Hollywood's Academy Awards®.

Following its success at the recent Blue Ribbon Awards, and leading with 13 nominations in 12 categories, Kei Ishikawa's “A Man” walks away with 8 Japan Academy Awards including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress. The full list of winners is described below.

Picture of the Year

A Man

Shin Ultraman

Phases of the Moon

Anime Supremacy!

Wandering

Team from A Man Animation of the Year

Inu-Oh

Lonely Castle in the Mirror

Suzume

One Piece Film Red

The First Slam Dunk

Director of the Year

Kei Ishikawa – A Man

Takashi Koizumi – The Pass: Last...

Hell Dogs is a Japanese action movie adaptation of the 2017 manga novel of same title by Akio Fukamachi. The film is written and directed by Masato Harada, starring Junichi Okada, Kentaro Sakaguchi and Mayu Matsuoka.

Premise

The police officer Shogo Kanetaka, suffers from trauma when his loved one was murdered. All Shogo has on his his mind now is revenge. He then receives an order to go undercover as a yakuza member. The police instructs Shogo to pick a fight with yakuza member Hideki Murooka as a stepping stone to gain entrance into the organization. The police have data that shows Shogo is matched with Hideki 98. Meanwhile, Hideki is the son of a death-row convict. He has a physical condition, where is he always hungry and constantly eating. Also, neither her nor the yakuza can control his emotions.

Director

Masato Harada

Cast

Junichi Okada / Shogo Kanetaka

Kentaro Sakaguchi / Hideki Murooka...