Picks of the Week

QUOTE OF THE WEEK: "I Just Love Turd"
















Thanks to Scott "Unpainted" Huffines for forwarding me this Quote of the Week from Chic LeRose's Phlegm Noir ("The blog that could only be made in Northern Virginia...where Life is CHEAP!"). Sandra's Ng's startling confession to Suki Kwan is from the 1987 Hong Kong film Operation Pink Squad 2 (Thunder Cops).

This reminded me of all the zany English subtitles I've encountered watching Hong Kong movies, where either there is no equivalent for the Chinese expression or the English translation is too literal. There are a lot of funny lost-in-translation examples on the Web. I recommend the exhaustive A-through-Z "Actual Hong Kong Film Subtitles" examples from BWG (BigWhiteGuy.com - "the Adventures of a Big White Guy Living In Hong Kong") and PlanetMike.com's HK subtitle list, full of such treats as "Fatty, you with your thick face hurt my instep!," "Yah-hah, evil spider woman! I have captured you by the short rabbits and can now deliver you violently to your gynecologist for a thorough extermination" and "Greetings, large black person. Let us not forget to form a team up together and go into the country to inflict the pain of our karate feets on some ass of the giant lizard person." With translations like these, I'm beginning to see how one can come to love turd in Hong Kong!

FOTO OF THE WEEK: Devil Dick Bike Man

This disturbing pic is from Grady Hendrix's wonderful Asian Film Blog, Kaiju Shakedown. Though Devil Dick Bike Man appears to be naked, and hence rather vulnerable, at least he's sporting a rather sturdy looking protective helmet. Wonder how he signals for turns?











BIRTHDAY OF THE WEEK: Takashi Miike
The prolific cult director turned 46 on August 24, 2006. The birthday notices are my favorite part of the Cherry Blossom Eiga blog, and Stephen McVey has a nice one for Miike, where he lists some of his favorite Miike films. I notice he didn't list Audition and Zebraman, my two faves, the latter because it's an homage to the whole Japanese transforming superhero genre a la Kamen Rider, Ultraman, Kikaider and so on. You get the feeling it's not so much a spoof as a tribute by someone who grew up watching that sort of stuff. Worth checking out.

FILM BLOGS OF THE WEEK:

Twitch
"Twitch is a film news / review / discussion site that pays particular attention to independent, cult, foreign and genre film. Twitch is a site run by film fans who are interested in digging a little bit deeper and chasing a little farther to find a hidden gem. We don't believe that the arthouse and the grindhouse are mutually exclusive, nor does the fact that we love our weird little independent films prevent us from dipping into the Hollywood pool from time to time. We are fans writing about the things that interest us and the content will thus inevitably mirror the diversity and range of our tastes."

Kaiju Shakedown
This is Variety.com's Asian Film Blog, written by Grady Hendrix. Kaiju Shakedown is also a great resource for links to other Asian film sites and blogs, like: MonkeyPeaches, Planet Bollywood, Naachgaana, Koreanfilm.org, and Midnight Eye (the BEST Japanese film site, period!).

GreenCine Daily
This blog is joined at the hip with GreenCine (www.greencine.com), the online DVD sales and rental and video-on-demand service "For People Who Like to Watch." GreenCine Daily is primarily written by GC Editor David Hudson with contributions as noted. Also has great sidebar Film Primers, Bloglists and cool cinema links (like a list on online film clip viewing sites) and assorted ephemera.

UPCOMING FILM SERIES PICK OF THE WEEK:
Japan Society's "Lolita in Full Bloom: 1980s Irresistable Heroines"

This excites me!

Where: New York City
Who: Japan Society
When: Friday, Nov. 10 - Sunday, Nov. 19, 2006

Lolita in Full Bloom features five hit films from the 1980s starring Japanese pop stars known as “idols”. Major studios produced a large number of “idol” films, reaching a pop culture peak in the 1980s. The “idol” heroines of these films are sassy, spunky, and innocently sexy teenagers. Rarely before seen in the United States, these legendary films capture the most vibrant moments of the “idol’s” adolescence. Presented in conjunction with Performing Arts program’s Fall 2006 season theme Girl, Girly, Girlish.

Films include:

• Sailor Suit and Machine Gun (1981, by Shinji Somai, with Hiroko Yakushimaru)


• Exchange Students (1982, 16mm, by Nobuhiko Obayashi, with Satomi Kobayashi)


• The Little Girl Who Conquered Time (1983, by Nobuhiko Obayashi, with Tomoyo Harada)


• Typhoon Club (1984, 16mm, by Shinji Somai, with Yuki Kudo)


• W’s Tragedy (1984, by Shinichiro Sawai, with Hiroko Yakushimaru)