Tripping (Gen yu den / Shen you qing ren-2006)

Starring:
Bo-lin Chen
Jimmy Hung
Lichun Lee
Tzu-chieh Miao
Ren Osugi
Rena Tanaka

Shaodea is a Japanese girl, living in Taipei with her father. He moved to Taiwan with his wife to start a Chinese herbal medicine shop. Ever since her mother died, Shaodea wants to return to Japan, but her father refuses to give up his dream. One day, after an argument with him, Shaodea goes out with her friends. While breaking in into a museum, the girl is transported back in time to feudal Taiwan. Thinking she’s on a movie set, the girl gets involved in a bank robbery and soon has to run from the authorities. She teams up with Haishon, an attractive young man who became a thief to save the economic crisis of his hometown. Together with a Tao-master, who is transporting 2 zombies back to their ancestral lands, they set off on a fantastic adventure.
Tripping is an exciting cross-cultural collaboration, combining talent from China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Japan. There’s something for everyone : a sci-fi love story, hopping corpses, costume drama, evil sorcery and exhilarating kung fu battles. Rena Tanaka (Nin x Nin: Ninja Hattori-kun, the Movie, Summer of Ubume) pulls off an engaging performance as Shaodea. Veteran actor Ren Osugi (Sonatine, Loft, Nightmare Detective) plays her father. And Bo-lin Chen (The Huadu Chronicles : Blade of the Rose, A Chinese Tall Story, Silk) shows off his martial arts skills as Haishon.



I was pleasantly surprised that this movie was as good as it was. I'm not usually fond of Taiwan or Chinese movies. This wasn't the best of movies but it was fun to watch.

Wilson (Bo-lin) Chen isn't gorgeous or extremely handsome. His cinematic charm though makes him something worthwhile to see. His kind face with the athletic body make him more than enough for most teenage girls to fawn over. Okay, I'm waaaaaay passed the teenage years but my heart says different. So I'm fawning over him.

This movie started out well. No skipping in story lines or idiotic ploys to keep you hooked. Some funny moments but not so overly obnoxious that you turn your head out of embarrassment. The follow through of this movie never left me hanging and the sweetest moment at the end tugged my heart. Let's just say that I, for one, really felt the longing of Butterfly's heart for her sweet "thief." The moments between the two were very poignant and sad because we knew she would have to go back to her real time in the end. *I can actually feel my heart getting heavy just thinking about it............*

Waiting in the Dark (Kurai tokoro de machiawase / 暗いところで待ち合わせ -2006)

Starring:
Rena Tanaka - Michiru Honma
Bo-lin Chen - Akihiro Oishi
Haruka Igawa - Harumi Mishima
Koichi Sato - Toshio Matsunaga
Mao Miyaji - Kazue Futaba
Shiro Sano
Fumina Hara
Ittoku Kishibe - Michiru's Father

Michiru has recently lost her eyesight. To make matters worse, her father dies shortly afterwards. She is now all alone and spends most of her day isolated in her home.

Akihiro is a Chinese-Japanese immigrant, that has had to deal with racism all throughout his life. He is now tormented at work by one of his older co-workers named Toshio.

One day at a train station in front of Michiru’s house, Toshio is thrown into the path of an oncoming train. The only person seen at the train stop was Akihiro. Akihiro frantically flees from the scene and manages to enter Michiru’s house without her knowledge. After a few days, Michiru starts to sense the presence of another person in her home. -- Lunapark6



I'm so glad I watched this movie. Okay, it's waaaaaaay slow but the story is so sweet that it was actually nice.

Okay, I admit that I was surprised to see Wilson (Bo-lin) Chen in this movie since it's a Japanese movie. He actually spoke the language well for the time given. Lucky him though since most of his acting was sitting in a corner not speaking at all.

I have to admit I would think that it would be scary to have someone in my home watching me if I was blind. But lucky her, he's cute and he's not malicious at all...but helpful to her. A little twist comes into the story and a relief it was for me. I had prepared myself for the worst but was surprised and elated at the end.

As I got to know the characters, I melted and yearned for their happiness. Not just as a couple but as they grew out of their shells. Even though they were different people, different backgrounds, they both shared a common bond....a personal prison that kept them from showing their true natures and their will to communicate without chains that held them to theirselves.

Really a good movie. I know most wouldn't like the movie because of how slow it moved but I thought it refreshing and meaningful to their characters.

Season of Snow (Silver Season) (Giniro no season/銀色のシーズン -2008)

Starring:
Eita - Gun Shiroyama
Rena Tanaka - Nanami Ayase
Tetsuji Tamayama - Yuji Kobato
Munetaka Aoki - Jiro Kaminuma
Eriko Sato - Erika Kitazawa
Tetta Sugimoto - Tokoaki Miyabe
Jun Kunimura - Masayuki Seto
Ellie Toyota

A struggling town in the Japanese Alps finds itself in a desperate search for tourists to its publicly-run ski resort. Unable to compete with the swank resort on the other side of the mountain, local officials and inn owners have struck upon an idea to offer a wedding-and-ski package, complete with a wedding ceremony at a charming snow chapel they have built on the mountainside. The town welcomes its first customer in the beautiful Nanami Ayase (Rena Tanaka) who has arrived ahead of her fiance so she can learn to ski down the ceremonial “rice shower” slope without falling. The townsfolk’s biggest concern, however, lies with three young down-and-out local skiers who constantly disrupt life in the town with their skiing antics and shady schemes to wring money out of unsuspecting visitors. One of them is Gin Shiroyama, a former world class mogul champ who was the local hero until a terrible spill effectively ended his career. Feeling guilty for the tremendous pressure they placed on him, the townspeople have chosen to leave Gin alone, letting him get away with anything. But they’re quickly running out of patience. When Nanami hires Gin as her skiing instructor, it sets into motion a snowballing chain of events that could change everyone’s future for the better, if it doesn’t bury the town first.



OMG! Can I be any happier today?



I just downloaded the torrent for this movie. Okay, I'm a little illiterate when it comes to bittorrents but I finally figured out how to make the English subtitles prevail! Woohoo!



First off.....my Tetsuji-san and Eita-san were in this. Eye candy! Oh heck yes! Picture in your head....a naked Eita sitting on a shower bench. Oh yeah! There was that...........



I wasn't all that thrilled with the romance thing that happened in the movie. I thought this would be more on the skiing than love. Oh well. I was hoping for more competition than anything else. And.....they didn't go into detail with Tetsuji-san's character as to why he quit the Hokkaido All-Stars team. I was hoping for a competition with him in that. *sigh*



But on the upbeat....the views were spectacular. It was filmed in Canada even though they gave the impression it was in Japan. The cast was great. It was just the script that could have been better. Less mushy and more skiing. The very beginning was sooooooo coooooool! I can't explain it but just imagine them do x-games type stuff. I guess that is what had me believe the story would be more about that.



The metaphor for this story is......never look down, look straight ahead. If you fall down, get back up and try again. That is the gist of this story. Never quit, never say die, never stop but finish it to the end...............


Eita


Tamayama Tetsuji