Category:japan
So Lonely: The Police in Asia
The music video for The Police 1980s hit So Lonely is a classic example of the early 1980s low budget guerilla filmmaking that characterized the pre-MTV era. The video features Sting, Andy Summers, and Stewart Copeland wandering through the underground corridors and trains of the Tokyo metro system singing into walkie-talkies while other scenes take …
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Imagining Tokyo: Kanda Shrine and Love Live!
Tokyo is a city with two lives: the day to day reality of a bustling metropolis and a virtual life recreated in games, film and anime. As the capital of Japan, the city looms large in the Japanese imagination, occupying a space that is equal to Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York combined in the …
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The Origins of Godzilla: Castle Bravo and the Daigo Fukuryu Maru
Often lost in the modern fan fascination over kaiju and the status of Godzilla as a pop culture icon is the fact that the origin of the King of Monsters is inextricably bound to the atomic age, the fear of nuclear Armageddon and the anxiety over Japanese experiences during World War II. While the Godzilla …
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Darling in the Franxx and Shinto Marriage
Darling in the Franxx (or Studio Trigger does Evangelion), takes its inspiration for the Franxx pilot suits from an unexpected direction–traditional Shinto wedding attire. The eponymous Franxx robots in Darling in the Franxx are piloted by male/female pairs. The show equates the mental and physical connection between pilots necessary to operate the giant machines to …
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Die Hard: Nakatomi Plaza and the Fear of a Rising Japan
For some, John McTiernan’s 1988 Die Hard has undergone a cultural transformation into the unlikely position of a favorite Christmas classic. The setting of the film on Christmas Eve and the inclusion of Christmas in Hollis by Run DMC, Let It Snow over the end credits, and Ode to Joy from Beethoven’s 9th playing as …
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