Very enjoyable asadora

This asadora has all ingredients, which make it enjoyable from beginning to the end. Covering roughly 20 years from the 1960's to the 1980's, we follow the life of our heroine Nobuko, who appears to be somehow naive at first glance, but is ambitious when it comes about mastering the struggles of becoming a chef.

It is located on Okinawa in the early years, but the main story takes place in the Tokyo area. That said, we don't see too much from Okinawa, mainly the country side only. We learn a bit about Okinawa's folklore, with Nobuko's father and later her sister playing the traditional instrument sanshin. And we learn about the war time and the years after affecting the people of Okinawa.

The people around Nobuko have their own issues in life, nicely covered in small side-stories. Two sisters and a good-for-nothing brother, who has some similarities to my hero Tora-san. Moka shines in portraying the shy, physically weak younger sister. There are ups and downs, there are nice people and not so very nice people, but don't worry: it's an asadora, so it always turns out nicely in the end, except from some tragedies which are part of the life.

I enjoyed really it and did not find any weak story arcs and so I can highly recommend it.

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A wonderful adaptation of a tragic story

Twenty-four Eyes is one of the great Japanese classic movies. Based on a novel, the story is very popular in Japan and the 1954 movie adaptation might be the best work of director Keisuke Kinoshita. The great Hideko Takamine plays a teacher of a rural school on Shodoshima Island from the years before World War II until the end of the war.

If you are interested into Japanase classic movies, then this one should be on the top of your list. It might start at a slow pace, but it definitely will drag you in. There are lots of memorable moments in it, like the "train" or the bicycle.

And also the other movies of Keisuke Kinoshita are worth to explore. Not all of his movies turned out great, but you should not miss 'She Was Like a Wild Chrysanthemum' despite its unusual presentation or the the somewhat horrifying tale in 'Legend of a Duel to the Death' (aka 'A Legend or was it?')

You might have watched 'Ikiru' from Akira Kurosawa. This one is in the same league.

BTW: I had to give a rating for the music, which does not make any sense for this kind of movie. I did not want to give any bad rating, so I simply gave 10/10, but please ignore this. :-)

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The tragedy of Korea

I love Japan. I've visited a couple of times. There's so much I like about it. Korea does not fascinate me and I rarely watch Korean dramas.

But where there is light, there is shadow. Lots of things to love about Japan means there must be a lots of things to hate. And this story is told with the background of Japan stealing Korea from its people. We all know the history. Here we have romance, which is the main reason for people to watch a drama, we have good people, we have bad people. Koreans, Japanese or the other way around. But the romance thing is just the tip of the iceberg here.

The story about the characters in this historical context is just beautifully told. People are hurt, hurting each other, people are loved or loving each other. Regardless of their background. And the story is told patriotically. Patriotic, but in a good way. The outcome of this story might not be what you wish for, but the history as well as the present time of Korea is just as unsatisfying.

Then there is the cinematography. Just hit the PrintScreen key at any time and you will have an amazing wallpaper for your PC. This I know just from the good old movies of Zhang Yimou, Raise the Red Lantern, Ju Dou or Red Sorghum.

So I advice you to give this a try. If you are just looking for romance, watch any korean drama out there, it does not matter which one. If you want to get amazed: Watch this one only!

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A very enjoyable drama, maybe not what you might expect

Sairi Itoh as female lead? Of course that's what I want to see! But here she's more like a mascot, but that's not even bad at all.

Sairi Itoh is a pet shop girl, or a dog shop girl to be more precise. She's good with dogs. And then there's the bailiff, who's afraid of dogs. And because of that, he hires her to be his assistant in order to deal with the dogs of the debitors he's executing. Not a very realistic scenario I would say.

But the background stories of the debitors makes this drama most watchable. While Yoji Oda acts as the strict executioner, Sairi Ito adds empathy to the cases.

For those who might want to ask 'is there any romance?', I can say, this is just some addition to the story and there is not much progress on this, so it won't distract the overall watching pleasure.

And for those interested in dogs: they are just dogs. not solving any cases, not barking too loud, no super powers. So please be disappointed.

Only Japanese subs are available at this time from what I know.

Any subbers out there? Please pick this one up!

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Highly recommended to all fans of the Tora-san movies.

50 years after the first of 48 Otoko wa tsurai yo movies (plus 1 special) the 50th film had been released, although the main actor Kiyoshi Atsumi only appeared in flashbacks as he had passed away 23 years ago, which marked the end of these movies.

At the same time of the 50th movie, this TV series had been released. It deals with the youth of our hero Torajiro Kuruma or as everybody calls him: Tora-san. It begins with his appearance in Shibamata as a foundling and ends with him leaving his hometown. 20 years later he will return, which is the theme in the first of the movies. So, watching the movies before the TV series is highly recommended.

Most of the characters of the TV series are already known from the movies, but much younger of course. For the first time we see Tora's mother and his elder brother who, as we already know from the movies, both died durings Toras childhood days. We see his aunt and uncle who then adopted him, as well as his younger sister Sakura. And of course we see Tora's father, whose violence finally caused Tora to leave his home, making him end up as a low-level yakuza and street peddler. And of course we see him falling in love with the girls and getting dumped all the time.

This series is the perfect complement to the 48 (or 49) movies and unlike the 50th movie, it feels a lot more like the culmination of the story. The cast is excellent, as is the direction by Yoji Yamada. Machine-translated English subtitles are available in the meantime. There's also a two-part sequel that covers Tora's early days as a street peddler, but it lacks all the charm of this series.

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Natsukashii

So far the latest movie of the late and great director Yamada Yoji. Known for his legendary Otoko wa tsurai yo movie series, the samurai trilogy and all the others. Now the third time with legendary actress Sayuri Yoshinaga, among the finest selection of supporting actors / actresses: Min Tanaka, Kankuro Kudo, YOU, Mei Nagano, Akira Terao and even Yo Oizumi who I usually dislike, did an amazing job.

Yoji Yamada was 91 years old, telling this story from the point of view of someone of his age. The story takes us to the old style neighborhood in northeastern Tokyo, similar to the Tora-san movies.

Otoko wa tsurai yo? Yes, this may be the theme here: The family man played by Oi Yuzumi is struggeling in his job as HR manager. And here he is losing his connection to friends and his family: his wife, his daughter and his mother and we see how these connections are being rebuilt.

A much softer tone than in the Kazoku wa tsurai yo movie trilogy, much more natsukashii, just like in the old Tora-san movies.

And to those wo don't know the works of Yoji Yamada: If you've enjoyed the recent movie Perfect Days, then this one is surely one for you.

Highly recommended.

BTW: why do I have to rate the music for this review? So I rated it 10 out of 10 and please put it to blame on MDL.

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What a pleasant surprise!

A film with a nostalgic touch. Kiichi Nakai in his prime and that gorgeous female leading actress. The actress is fitting her role perfectly, I just wonder why she did not appear in much more roles since that. And Shofukutei Tsurube as a lecher is just hilarious.

It's fantasy, it doesn't make sense once you start thinking about it. But just don't think, just feel. It has an atmosphere similar to Nobuhiko Obayashi's films. Dreamlike depiction of life on the border between innocence and adulthood. It even has a sixties touch, from Kiichi Nakai playing the trombone. Flawless!

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