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Kazoku gêmu (1983)
A funny, if not a little eccentric, look at Japanese society
The movie tells of a Japanese family living in a small apartment. They have two sons, one in high school doing well in his studies, the other failing miserably because he does not care. Shigeyuki, the younger brother, is not stupid, he is just lazy, and a bit of a trouble maker. The family has hired a series of tutors for the boy, but none have helped. This changed with the introduction of Yoshimoto, the new tutor. He has quite a different look at tutoring, including kissing his subject and then smacking him, and then rubbing the young man's buttocks. As Shigeyuki begins to flourish under the odd tutor, his older brother, once considered to be the son that brought pride to the family is beginning to fall behind and cut classes. His once encouraging father insults him and his mother tries her best to hold the family. We not only explore the boys' studies, but also the family dynamic. The father works all the time, and doesn't care about his family. The mother tries to hold the family together, and like many women all over the world, is unhappy having to sacrifice her happiness for her husband and children. The film, although quite smart, is also very funny. Shigeyuki has a habit of fighting with older boys, and we hear stories of how he once lost control of his bowels in class. Shigeyuki is given porn mags as a joke, and when his tutor sees them he asks 'does looking at them give you a hard on?' to which Shigeyuki replies, 'no, i don't like girls.' the tutor fires back 'they give me hard ones, fast'. The tutor often has dinner with his student's family. During one of the final, and most hilarious scenes you see mother and father discussing their family, while ignoring the escalating food fight beside them. Not until Yoshimoto pours wine all over their small table do they take notice. This is when the fun really begins. One by one Yoshimoto smacks them all into unconsciousness, in hilarious loony toons or three stooges fashion. Kazoku gêmu, or The Family Game, is a hilarious piece of work from Japan. It is HARD to find with English subtitles, but worth the search!
Bishôjo senshi Sêrâ Mûn (1992)
amazing pioneer of the magical girl genre *contains full review of series and many spoilers!*
the original sailor moon series from Japan is made up of five seasons (sailor moon, sailor moon R, sailor moon S, sailor moon super S and sailor moon stars), 3 movies, and a few specials. the main characters are the sailor soldiers (sailor soldiers, not scouts) starting with sailor moon and what are known as the inner soldiers, sailor mercury, mars, Jupiter and Venus. for the first 2 seasons they fight bad guys in a pretty formulaic way. master villain's henchman sends out a minor bad guy. the soldiers fight it, sailor moon gives it her final powerful blow and its defeated. henchman is yelled at by the master villain and then the same thing happens again. in those episodes fighting the villain is not generally the most important part, what you really watch is how the girls are doing at school, in love, and general life, which is pretty entertaining on its on. usually for the last 5 or so episodes it gets a little different and focuses on defeating the now super powerful villain. in the first season we learn sailor moon is actually a reincarnated princess from the moon and defeats the villain. in sailor moon R she learns in the future she rules the world in a time of peace and her and tuxedo mask have a daughter (little Serena) and they defeat the bad guys once again. in sailor moon S, the third season, things change dramatically. we learn of 4 new soldiers. sailor Uranus and Neptune (who are also lovers), sailor Pluto (we met briefly in sailor moon R) and sailor Saturn, who's power is that she can destroy the world. the first three, Uranus Neptune and Pluto fight to keep sailor Saturn from appearing, while trying to keep the inner soldiers from getting in the way. mid season sailor moon develops the power to become super sailor moon. fortunately at the end the new soldiers learn that sailor moon is indeed the most powerful and pure soldiers, and that she is reliable, and is the true messiah. the girl houses the spirit of sailor Saturn is reborn as a baby, and sailor Pluto has disappeared due to using her taboo power, the time stop. it then moves on the sailor moon Super S, which is widely regarded as the worst of all the seasons. its a little more childish than the other seasons, and focuses on *little Serena* (bah on English names). sailors Uranus and Neptune don't appear, save a special that aired. the season has some of the better animation, although the story line is sub par in general. the final episode saves the season though, with a beautiful scene of self sacrifice on sailor moon's part season five, sailor moon stars, begins with the reappearance of super S's bad guy, but she is returned to goodness and for a short while things are good. this season is widely regarded as the best of them all, and it contains some of the funniest episodes, as well as the most gut wrenchingly sad ones. sailor moon and her friends are now high school students, studying at a school where the members of the idol group, the three lights, have just transferred. the leader of the three lights develops a slight crush on sailor moon, but she does not return his affection, because she has tuxedo mask. Tuxedo mask has left to study at Harvard though, so sailor moon does feel quite alone a lot of the time, and you feel alone with her. she finds companionship in a new little girl, who is quite mysterious despite being barley 2 years old or so. three new soldiers have appeared, the sailor star lights. they, like the outer soldiers in sailor moon S, find that earth's soldiers are just getting in the way. the big kicker is that the bad guys in this season are sailor soldiers themselves, lead by the uber evil sailor galaxia. at the end of the day everyone but the sailor star lights and sailor moon are killed by galaxia (who as also taken over most of the galaxy). the final episode, episode 200, is the most beautiful of all the episodes, by far. sailor moon and galaxia, now sailor chaos, are flying in the air, both with huge swords. Chaos is ordering sailor moon to fight, but she refuses, believing that there is another way and that she doesn't want anyone else to die. sailor moon is able to sense that chaos still has a little bit of the good galaxia inside of her and reaches out to her to free her. in the end, sailor moon saves everyone, and everyone comes back to life, to live on and fight another day. Pretty soldier sailor moon is a pioneer of the magical girl genre, which is followed by works by Clamp, like card-captors and magic knights, and others like Tokyo mew mew. unfortunately the north American English dub has ruined the show for many, as it is truly awful. the Japanese is highly recommended to all anime fans. it will make you laugh, it will make you cry, and it will leave you feeling with an amazing feeling about the world you live in