Ghost Cat and the Mysterious Shamisen

Wed Nov 23 03:32:13 EST 2011

Dear Roger,

Thank you for your review.
I'm Taku Aihara of Japan Visualmedia Translation Academy.
I unfortunately could not attend the screening but I had the privilege
of subtitling 'The Ghost Cat and the Mysterious Shamisen' thanks to
Jasper Sharp and the folks at Zipangu Festival.
There seem to be many other old classics archived as DigiBeta at NFC so
I'm hoping we get to see more of them subtitled and screened in the
future.

Best regards,
Taku

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Taku Aihara
Japan Visualmedia Translation Academy/
Media Translation Center

http://www.jvtacademy.com

Tokyo Office:
Kyodo Bldg 2F,
3-2-4 Nihonbashi Hongoku-cho
Chuo-ku, Tokyo, 103-0021
TEL: +81-3-3517-5550 / FAX: +81-3-3272-5057

LA Office:
3510 Torrance Blvd., Suite 219,
Torrance, CA 90503
TEL: 310-316-3121 / FAX: 310-316-2411
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On Sun, 20 Nov 2011 21:50:44 -0000
"Roger Macy" <macyroger at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:

> A few words about Ushihara's 'The Ghost Cat and the Mysterious Shamisen', Kaiby$B".(Bnazo no shamisen, 1938 that is on this week at the ICA in London.  Not knowing anything about it until I saw it today, I had no idea how strongly theatrical the film is.  It's a play-within-a-play where the boundaries get blurred.  We start outside an Edo-period theatre and move quickly in to the performance.  It looked to me like proper kabuki - stage, hanamachi, full orchestra, costumes, dance, etc. - except that this has starring actresses (with actors).  I interpret that - and I'm happy to be corrected - as the same kind of liberties with period as contemporary Hollywood would have made to get their stars into costume.
> But I don't think that seeming anachronism stops it being a very important record of some extended theatrical performance, as well as being a film with considerable merit - and no sentimental Ushihara here.
> It was projected from DigiBeta from a NFC print that showed the kind of degradation with which we are familiar for the period - over-copied, with intermediate contrast lost.  Just occasionally on fades to black, you could pick up the finer detail that must have been there.  I wonder whether a digital restoration could find that again without pulling the light and dark into grey mist?  At any rate, you could see far more than from the BFI print of another theatrical film of the same time 'Late Chrysanthemum'.  And 'Ghost Cat' was also far better translated than that dreadful print.
> It's showing again on Thursday (by which time I had planned to be in Vienna ...)
> 
> I thought I'd mention the theatrical character of the film as it doesn't seem to be picked up by anyone in the English literature, or on this list when we've looked at treatments of theatre in Japanese film.
> Roger
>   ----- Original Message ----- 
>   From: Jasper Sharp 
>   To: kinejapan 
>   Sent: Sunday, October 16, 2011 4:38 PM
>   Subject: London's Zipangu Fest reveals full programme: nuclear reactions, retro, animation and horror
> 
> 
>   Dear Kinejapanners, 
>   I hope you'll forgive the self-promotion, but the lineup for this year's Zipangu Fest, to be held in London from 18-24 November, has just been announced. 
>   I look forward to seeing some of you there, if you can make it!
> 
> 
>   best
> 
> 
>   Jasper Sharp
> 
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>                           ZIPANGU FEST REVEALS FULL PROGRAMME: NUCLEAR 
>                           REACTIONS, RETRO, ANIMATION AND HORROR
> 
>                           Japanese film festival to screen timely environmental films and a rarely seen 1930s ghost story
>                            
>                           Zipangu Fest is pleased to announce the full line up of its 2011 programme. 
> 
>                           In the aftermath of this year's tragedy in north-east! ern Japan, the issues surrounding nuclear energy have resurfaced and Zipangu Fest will show two documentaries on the subject. Hitomi Kamanaka's Ashes to Honey and Rokkasho Rhapsody will be screened as part of the festival's Nuclear Reactions programme, along with Hiroshima Nagasaki Download - a documentary road trip in which two college friends interview atomic ! bomb survivors living in North America.
> 
>                           On the same theme,  ;Zipangu Fest is proud to present a rare screening of the 1959 docudrama Lucky Dragon No. 5. Directed by one of post-war Japan's most important independent film makers, Kaneto Shind$B".(B the film tells the story of the Bikini Atoll hydrogen bomb catastrophe that exposed a Japanese fishing boat crew to radioactive fallout. While this incident gave rise to Japan's famous movie monster Godzilla, fewer people know about Shind$B".(Bs treatment of it.
> 
>                           Another rare screening in the form of a 1930s ghost story, The Ghost Cat and the Mysterious Shamisen, will form part of the Zipa! ngu Retro section. Subtitled especially for Zipangu Fest and never seen before in the UK, this 1938 gem is one of Japan's few surviving pre-war horror films.
> 
>                           J-Horror meets J-pop in Shirome, a mockumentary that involves director Koji Shiraishi luring pre-pubescent idol band Momoiro Clover into a supposedly haunted abandoned school - the result lies somewhere between the Blair Witch Project and the X-Factor. Shirome is part of the previously announced Sounds of Zipangu section, which will open the festival with the stunning new film KanZeOn. A fictional companion! piece to KanZeOn, Abraxas, tells the story of a punk musician turned Buddhist monk and it was a surprise hit at the 2011 Sundance Festival.
> 
>                           Zipangu Fest's Beyond Anime: The Outer Limits programme will present some of the most interesting Japanese indie animations from recent years, and in case you missed our previous announcement - experimental films by Takashi Makino and others will be showcased at the ICA and at a benefit night at Dalston's CafOto.
> 
>                           Festival director and head programmer, Jasper Sharp, comments:  "This year's festival presents a really interesting mix of old and new. I think it is a far more robust line-up than anything I've been involved in before, with all of the films linked by a tone or a theme that I think will really have audiences coming away thinking about Japanese cinema in a different way."
> 
>                           The second Zipangu Fest - celebrating the best of cutting edge and avant garde Japanese cinema - will be held at London's Institute of Contemporary Arts and CafOto from November 18th to 24th, before moving to venues around the UK. The festival will showcase a selection of Japan's finest features, documentaries, shorts, a! nimation and experimental films.
> 
>                           For full details and descripti ons go to: http://zipangufest.com.
> 
>                           For further press information please contact:
>                           Sarah Macdonald: sarah at zipangufest.com
>                           (0208 689 3824)
> 
> 
>                           To receive timely Zipangu Fest news, please subscribe to our press list:  http://zipangufest.com/press/2011 
> 
> 
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>                           -End! s-
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> 
>                           Notes to Editors
> 
>                           About Zipangu Fest
>                           The first UK-wide festival devoted to Japanese film, Zipangu Fest aims to demonstrate the many identities of Japan by introducing works new and old by some of the country's most exciting and revered talents. Last year's inaugural festival took place at various venues around London's East End before travelling to regional events in Bristol, Leeds, Coventry,Nottingham and Newcastle in the UK, and further afield to Tallinn in Estonia.
> 
>                           About Jasper Sharp
>                           Jasper Sharp is a writer and curator based in the UK. He co-edits the web site Midnight Eye, the premier English language resource on Japanese cinema, which he founded with Tom Mes in 2001. He is a regular visitor to Japan, having lived in Tokyo between 2001 and 2005, where he co-authored the Midnight Eye Guide to Japanese Film (Stonebridge Press, 2004). His critically acclaimed study of the Japanese pink f! ilm industry Behind the Pink Curtain, was published by FAB Press in 2008, while his latest work, The Historical Dictionary of Japanese Cinema will be published by Scarecrow Press later in 2011. His writing has appeared in numerous anthologies and magazines across the world. He has curated a number of high-profile seasons and retrospectives at the British Film Institute, the Deutsches Filmmuseum in Frankfurt, as well as Austin Fantastic Fest, Montreal's Fantasia Film Festival, Wroclaw's New Horizons Festival, and the Thessaloniki International !
 Film Festival. He is the co-founder, with Chris MaGee, of the Shinsedai New Generation Japanese Cinema Festival in Toronto.
>                            
>                           Links
>                           Institute of Contemporary Arts: http://www.ica.org.uk/30695/Seasons/Zipangu-Fest-2011.html
>                           Zipangu Fest http://zipangufest.com/
>                           CafOto: http://cafeoto.co.uk/nippon-reread.shtm
> 
> 
>                           Friend on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/zipangufest
>                           Follow on Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/zipangufest/
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>   Zipangu Fest: Japanarchy in the UK
>   http://zipangufest.com/
> 
> 
>   Jasper Sharp, writer & film curator
>   http://jaspersharp.com/
> 
>   Midnight Eye: The Latest and Best in Japanese Cinema
>   http://www.midnighteye.com
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> 
>   Jasper Sharp: Writer & Film Curator Homepage
>   http://jaspersharp.com/
> 
>   Midnight Eye: The Latest and Best in Japanese Cinema
>   http://www.midnighteye.com
> 
>   Zipangu Fest: Japanarchy in the UK
>   http://zipangufest.com/
> 
> 
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