Right-winger gives controversial ‘Yasukuni’ stamp of approval

TOKYO - The leader of the right-wing group Issui-kai has given his approval to the controversial film “Yasukuni,” Chinese director Li Ying’s documentary on Tokyo’s Yasukuni Shrine that multiple theaters in Japan have refused to screen.

“The movie is very well done,” said Issui-kai’s Mitsuhiro Kimura in an exclusive interview from his office in Tokyo’s Shinjuku ward for The Tokyo Reporter. “The director’s feeling has been shown very clearly.” Read more

Fest nix yak pix

TOKYO - In days past, a film festival held within rough-and-tumble Kabukicho might be assumed to feature a sampling of the work from gangster-flick director Seijun Suzuki (”Tokyo Drifter,” “Branded to Kill”), or perhaps “Yojimbo,” the Akira Kurosawa classic where a samurai arrives in a village run by two groups of gambling mobsters.

But with its smiley tag line, “Let’s go to Kabukicho!” the Tokyo International CineCity Film Festival, which begins Nov. 23 at the Shinjuku Milano 1 theater, will be focusing on giving a more positive image of the district. Read more

Evolving anime films follow new inspirations

TOKYO - Akihabara, the Tokyo district that’s paradise for purchasing electronics and toon-related DVDs and costume wear, has recently been undergoing a makeover. The smaller specialty shops that have made the area so appealing to legions of nerds and geeks (who are known as otaku) are slowly being squeezed out by mainstream emporiums.

But the Akihabara Enta Matsuri (Entertainment Festival), running concurrently with the Tokyo Intl. Film Festival from Oct. 20 to 28, might give these otaku a reprieve. Read more

The improvized world of Shibusashirazu

TOKYO - A show by jazz ensemble Shibusashirazu usually starts off innocently enough: the reed and brass players march onto the stage playing a progressively building number. They take their seats in a semi-circle in the center as more members - guitarists, drummers, and violin players - fill out their places behind them. Slowly, guitar chords and percussion are contributing rhythm to the mix. Before long the thirty-strong membership is nearly causing the walls of the venue to throb.

At the center of the commotion is the band’s shaggy-haired and hunched-over conductor, Daisuke Fuwa. With his back to the audience, steady plumes of smoke rise from the menthol cigarette in left hand as he gives direction to his crew with his right. He intermittently calls for solos, whereby each player stands and gives it their best shot in the spotlight. Read more

Riding the wave of Boris

TOKYO - Many would prefer that such musical genres as psychedelic and hard rock, circa 1970, be tossed onto the dust heap of obsolescence right next to shag carpet. Not so for Boris, a Japanese trio which for more than a decade has been wrapping itself around that era’s kaleidoscope of sound.

Kicking off a recent show at Shimokitazawa’s Shelter club is “Rafflesia,” a sonic blast of feedback and fire that slowly floats over the audience not unlike a dry wind. The song is the first track off last year’s “Rainbow,” the band’s Pedal Records collaboration with guitarist Michio Kurihara, perhaps best known for his playing with folk-rock band Ghost. Read more

A publisher in the shadows

TOKYO - Hiroharu Kimura dresses in black: sport jacket, shoes, socks, slacks, and gold-rimmed sunglasses. Aside from his blue dress shirt, his attire follows the vampire bat trademark used for his sex-trade publication Manzoku, meaning satisfaction.

“Bats cannot see,” says the chairman of Creators Company Connection, reclining in the sofa of his office in Tokyo’s Okubo district, “but they have a special sense.”

Indeed, Kimura operates his business - printing magazines that cater to Japan’s sexual services and hostessing industries - by feel. Read more

Right-wingers in Kudanshita

TOKYO - With his broad shoulders rippling beneath his dark blue jumpsuit, Shinichi Kamijo has taken a sidewalk position on Yasukuni-dori, not far from Jimbocho subway station in Tokyo’s Chiyoda Ward.

It is 2 p.m., and given that he is about to engage in battle, Kamijo is surprisingly calm as he leisurely sips from a bottled drink on this hot summer day. “We must stop them from advancing to the shrine,” implores the 38-year-old member of Gishin Gokoku-kai, an uyoku dantai (right-wing group) that he started at the age of 26. Read more

Government subsidy stripped from naked news program

TOKYO - The government subsidy afforded to SKY PerfecTV satellite porn channel Paradise TV for providing sign-language assistance within its naked news feature will stop next year, but the unique program will continue, according to officials from the station.

“Hadaka no Shuwa News” (Nude Sign Language News) is a short segment within the channel’s “Nude News Station,” which is broadcast each Friday between 9 p.m. and 9:55 p.m. Read more

Tokyo Digital News: Bikinis hit the air

TOKYO - There’s an old saying that goes: You can take the man out of sleaze but you can’t take the sleaze out of the man. Or something like that.

As the founder of sordid satellite network Paradise TV seven years ago, Michiyuki Matsunaga has since moved on to Tokyo Digital News, a slightly less provocative broadcasting station that transmits stories via the Internet and mobile phones in which the announcers are young girls clad in bikinis.

Yes, the fifty-eight-year-old Matsunaga is more or less sticking to his smutty guns. Read more

Tokyo Midtown to transform hedonistic ‘High Touch’ haven

TOKYO - As any good street tout will tell you, high foot-traffic is the key to success. Sure, he might toss out his chest, flash his best smile and smoothly sell you an explanation for the apparent contradiction between the shapely, high-class ladies he promises and the remarkably low entry price to his establishment, but even a true charmer will not be effective talking to a sidewalk of empty concrete.

So it is conceivable that with the opening of Tokyo Midtown, Tokyo’s newest mixed-use, high-rise complex, lucrative business opportunities will be abundant for the throng of hustlers roaming the pavement of Gaien-Higashi- dori just west of the intersection with Roppongi-dori. Or will they? Read more

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