easternKicks.com – how do you get yours?

“BREATHLESS ADVENTURE THAT PERFECTLY CAPTURES THE SKEWED CHARM OF THE GAMES.” (4 STARS) – IGN.COM

The star of the global phenomenon that has already become the biggest selling Nintendo DS brand in the UK, Professor Layton now faces his toughest puzzle yet in the brand new and exciting feature-length animated adventure for all the family, Professor Layton And The Eternal Diva, coming to DVD and Blu-ray on 18th October 2010, courtesy of Manga Entertainment.

Produced by Masakazu Kubo (producer of the Pokemon movies) and based on the Nintendo and Level 5 video game series that to date has sold 5.5 million copies worldwide and been played by an estimated 3 million British gamers. Both young and old have fallen in love with Professor Layton and the film brings the world’s greatest amateur super-sleuth to life like never before.

When Professor Layton receives a letter along with complimentary opera tickets from a former student-turned-opera singer, the contents of the note prove to be irresistibly intriguing. In it, she informs the Professor that a friend of hers who died one year ago has now reappeared as a seven-year-old girl who claims to be immortal.

Hoping to get to the bottom of this puzzling affair, the Professor, young Luke and Layton’s assistant Remi head off to the Crown Petone Theatre to attend a performance of a new opera composed by pianist Oslo Whistler and based upon research by Layton’s mentor, Dr. Schrader, into the legends surrounding the ancient Kingdom of Ambrosia, otherwise known as the land of eternal life. At the theatre, it soon becomes apparent that there is a common motive amongst many of the audience members when a mysterious figure appears on stage and announces the start of a brainteaser game. Incredibly, it is announced that the winner of the game will be rewarded with the gift of immortality. With Luke’s help, Professor Layton sets about solving the series of puzzles, unaware that mortal danger lurks at every turn.

Professor Layton And The Eternal Diva (cert. U) will be released on DVD (£15.99) and Blu-ray(£19.99) by Manga Entertainment on 18th October 2010.

The film will also be available as a three-disc DVD/Blu-ray Collector’s Edition Combi Pack(£24.99) that includes the feature presentation on DVD and Blu-ray, plus a bonus DVD featuring ‘Mystery Of The Last Song’, ‘Professor Layton And The Mystery Of The Production Company’, ‘Professor Layton And The Mystery Of The 3D CG’ and a promo video for the Professor Layton games.

Additionally, there will be a three-disc DVD/Blu-ray Deluxe Collector’s Edition Combi Pack(£49.99) featuring the same components as the standard Combi Pack plus a super-collectable 630-page Storyboard Book and rigid art box outer packaging.

The 2010 Tokyo International Film Festival will commemorate the life and enduring influence of Bruce Lee with a special tribute at the festival’s Winds of Asia Middle-East section, entitled The 70th Anniversary: Bruce LEE to the Future.

Screenings will include the film that finally catapulted him into the mass populace, Enter The Dragon, sadly released just after his death, and a rare chance to see the Japanese version of Game Of Death, distributed in 1978. There will also be exciting new films that pay homage to Lee nearly 30 years after his death, including Derek Kwok and Clement Cheng’s Gallants and Luu Huynh Luu’s The Legend Is Alive.

The 23rd TIFF will be held from October 23-31, 2010 at Roppongi Hills and other venues in Tokyo.

Find out more from their official website »

Yep, Kazuaki Kiriya’s (Casshern) latest and arguably far more enjoyable Goemon is released today, along with Tokyo Gore School and 14 Blades.

Something of a bumper day then!

Battle Royale meets social networking on the streets of Tokyo, from Yôhei Fukuda, the director of Chanbara Beauty… (more…)

A very enjoyable manga adaption from director Yoichi Sai (Blood And Bones) and starring Ken’ichi Matsuyama (L Change The WorLd, Bare Essence Of Life), but ‘probably the best ninja movie ever’… what, really? (more…)

The cast of Death Note reunite for another live-action version of a manga and anime, this time with a gruellingly perilous walk across a girder between two skyscrapers (not for vertigo suffers!)… (more…)

We have three copies of Kamui – “probably the best ninja movie ever made” – on DVD up for grabs in our easy-to-enter giveaway! (more…)

Director Kazuaki Kiriya’s follow-up to Casshern is as visually dazzling as its predecessor – thank god it’s a bit easier to understand, too…! (more…)

Visually one of the most inventive films of the last decade, but ex-promo director and fashion photographer Kazuaki Kiriya’s movie debut is rather like watching a two and a half hour long music video – unintelligible and actually a bit dull… (more…)

Released on DVD by Manga Entertainment

“PROBABLY THE BEST NINJA MOVIE EVER MADE.” – TONY RAYNS

Based on the legendary multi-volume manga series created by Japanese artist and essayist Sanpei Shirato in 1964, directed by Yoichi Sai (Blood And Bones; Doing Time; All Under The Moon) and scripted by Sai and Kankuro Kudo (Zebraman; Ping Pong; Go), Kamui: The Lone Ninja comes to the screen as a live-action, special effects-laden extravaganza that perfectly captures the spirit and flavour of Shirato’s original vision.

A high-spirited adventure involving deadly ninjas, fierce warrior clans, treacherous pirates and fearless shark hunters, Kamui: The Lone Ninja boasts a star-studded cast that features some of Asian cinema’s hottest talent, including Ken’ichi Matsuyama (the Death Note trilogy), Koyuki (Blood: The Last Vampire; Kitaro), Koichi Sato (Sukiyaki Western Django; Starfish Hotel), Ekin Cheng (Storm Warriors; Divergence), Yuta Kanai (Death Note: L Change The World) and Suzuka Ohgo (Memoirs Of A Geisha).

It is 17th century Japan and from a young age Kamui has been considered something of an outcast, even within his own ninja clan. Disillusioned with the laws and principles, which dictate that he must use his skills to kill others, Kamui chooses to leave his past behind him and go in search of true freedom. But for a ninja liberation comes at a price and the only way to escape the bonds of the ninja brotherhood is to die.

Now a fugitive on the run from his clan, who are determined to hunt him down and eliminate him for his betrayal, Kamui finds himself constantly fighting for his life and unable to trust anyone. He eventually finds some solace when he meets an indomitable fisherman who saves his life and invites him to settle with his family. Unexpectedly, the arrangement brings Kamui face to face with a long-forgotten nemesis of his, another renegade ninja with a deadly score to settle. Meanwhile, the ninja army hunting Kamui is setting a trap from which there can be no escape…

Remaining faithful to its source material, Kamui: The Lone Ninja is a thrilling fantasy-adventure, full of martial arts action and spectacular set-pieces that vividly bring Sanpei Shirato’s unique manga images to life in dazzling style.

Kamui: The Lone Ninja (cert. 15) will be released on DVD (£15.99) and Blu-ray (£19.99) by Manga Entertainment on 9th August 2010.

ANOTHER BEWILDERING OF BABES, BLADES AND BIZARRENESS FROM THE CREATORS OF ‘CHANBARA BEAUTY’.

Farcical comedy, madcap martial arts action and gratuitous breast baring are the orders of the day in Chanbara Striptease, a crazy, crowd-pleasing, time-travelling romp directed by Akira Hirose (Drama Tetsudo Musume: Girls Be Ambitious!) and starring two of Japan’s hottest Adult Video (that’s ‘porn’ to you) stars, Ryo Akanishi and Sasa Handa.

Following the death of her mother, twenty-year-old college girl Lili has been living with her grandmother and is about to inherit her legacy as becoming the latest in a long line of female warriors adept at the deadly martial art of Sayama Hashinryu. During an informal ceremony inducting her into the legendary ranks, Lili is mysteriously transported 300 years back in time to a small village in 18th Century Japan, where she finds herself completely naked and alone. Fortunately (for her, but not necessarily the viewers!), her dilemma doesn’t last too long and in no time at all she is fulfilling her destiny as a warrior by rescuing a young pregnant girl, Miss Yae, who is being harassed by three ninja members of the Yamishika gang. It transpires that the gang is working for the evil Lady Okinu, who is running a protection racket throughout the local villages.

After being introduced to, and falling for, Miss Yae’s brother, Hikoichi, Lili agrees to help the villagers by taking on Lady Okinu and her henchmen in a bid to free them from the tyranny under which they are being forced to live. Believing her samurai swordfighting skills – not to mention her magical, power-enhanced breasts – to be unmatched and unbeatable, Lili is confident she can overcome the despot. But Lady Okinu is not all she seems, as Lili soon finds out.

Featuring an endless parade of topless katana duelling, alfresco coupling, inappropriate choices of nightwear as battledress and plenty of sword-wielding mayhem, Chanbara Striptease is the sexiest martial arts action-comedy to come out of Japan in quite some time.

Chanbara Striptease (cert. 18) will be released on DVD (£17.99) by Manga Entertainment on 26th July 2010.

FROM THE PRODUCERS OF ‘THE GRUDGE’ AND THE DIRECTOR OF ‘CASSHERN’

Five years ago, acclaimed Japanese fashion photographer and music video director Kazuaki Kiriya made an explosive and groundbreaking assault on the movie world with his directorial debut feature, the visually stunning and hugely ambitious sci-fi epic, ‘Casshern’. Now, Kiriya returns in his own inimitable style with the equally spectacular period, fantasy action-adventure, Goemon.

Produced by Kiriya and legendary producer Takashige Ichise (The Ring; Dark Water; The Grudge; Shutter) and boasting a star-studded cast that includes Yosuke Eguchi (Shaolin Girl), Takao Osawa (Ichi; Sky High), Jun Kaname (Blood; K-20; Casshern), Tetsuji Tamayama (Norwegian Wood; Casshern) and Susumu Terajima (Casshern; Ichi The Killer), Goemon is based on the exploits of the film’s eponymous, ninja bandit hero – the Japanese folklore equivalent of Robin Hood.

The year is 1582 and the ruler of Japan, Oda Nobunaga, has been brutally murdered leaving the country in a state of political chaos. Meanwhile, a chivalrous thief known as Goemon, whose loyalties lay with Nobunaga, has risen as a hero figure amongst the populace thanks to his propensity for stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. Goemon’s latest haul, stolen from one of his arch-enemies, includes a small wooden box of Western origin which he believes to be worthless and accidentally bestows upon a young street urchin. In truth, the box is a priceless artifact – a true Pandora’s box that holds a deep secret coveted and sought by Japan’s most powerful and deadly warlords.

Realising his error, Goemon seeks to regain possession of the box before it falls into the wrong hands. But its existence has also attracted the interests of a legendary swordsman, Matahachi, the legendary ninja Hattori Hanzo, and Goemon’s fearsome former friend and current rival, Saizo. With such a prize at stake, the stage is set for a series of bloody frays between Japan’s most skilled and deadly ninjas and swordsmen in a conflict that will have a profound effect on the country’s future.

A mind-blowing, eye-popping action epic that easily matches the visionary ambitions of Kiriya’s debut movie, Goemon is a fast-paced historical adventure packed with the same kind of dazzling costumes, set designs, inspired visuals and awesome special effects that made ‘Casshern’ such an original and singularly spectacular cinematic experience.

Goemon (cert. 15) is released by Momentum Pictures and will open at selected UK cinemas on 23rd July 2010.

Another magical children’s tale brought to life by Hayao Miyazaki – retirement? What retirement? (more…)

Over the next month the BFI Southbank celebrates Akira Kurosawa and his influence over cinema, screening not only his finest work, but also that of the filmmakers he inspired. The season includes:

» Yojimbo together with remakes A Fistful Of Dollars by Sergio Leone and the underrated Last Man Standing by Walter Hill;
» Rashomon,  Martin Ritt’s The Outrage, Zhang Yimou’s Hero and Ingmar Bergman’s The Virgin Spring;
» Seven Samurai and (of course!) The Magnificent Seven;
» Hidden Fortress (recently remade), Ikiru, Sanjuro and many more.

(Although oddly Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, which famously copied the central theme of an epic story as seen by two lowly servants, has been left off the list. Come on, BFI, don’t be so pretentious!)

Rashomon will also be screened in cinemas around the UK.

Find out more and book tickets from the BFI website »