Does anyone else remember when Japanese urban legends were everywhere on the Internet? American j-horror remakes had kind of fallen out of favor, and people were going straight to the source for unique thrills and chills. That's what Stay Pretty, No Pity - a new short film out of Tokyo, based on a legend from [...]

New York Asian Film Festival (NYAFF) - This review needs a lot of qualifiers. For starters, Last of the Wolves, better known as The Blood of Wolves II, is not a standalone movie. Not really. It's easy enough to follow without having seen the first installment, The Blood of Wolves (2017), but without the context of [...]

I am not a whimsical person. In fact, I have an outstanding reputation for being where whimsy goes to die. Although I am painfully aware that my grim exterior may be somewhat off-putting, it’s a situation that simply can’t be helped. Just as a bird is born to fly, it would seem that I’ve been put [...]

Fantasia Film Festival 2020 Screening - In the early 1970s, Osamu Tezuka created what is known as one of the most legendary erotic mangas, Barbara. In 2019, his son Makoto set out to adapt this masterwork into a film - TEKUKA’S BARBARA. Osamu Tezuka created such beloved media as Astro Boy and Kimba, and let [...]

One of the most critically-acclaimed genre films of the past decade and a record-shattering blockbuster in its native Japan, ONE CUT OF THE DEAD first appears to be a one-take indie zombie film... but something magical happens 37 minutes in: the film's director yells cut and - throwing all cinematic conventions and viewer expectations to [...]

Kiyoshi Kurosawa's (Pulse, The Cure) new movie Creepy is aptly named.  It is a slow-burning film that is seemingly about two totally unrelated storylines that build and grow stranger as they go on, only to snap together with quiet, deadly precision. It might start out as a weird suspense story, but it ends up being [...]