I went to see Miyazaki Hayao’s newest film, The Wind Rises, yesterday at the Dallas Angelika where I could see the subtitled version. The crowd was fairly small, about a dozen people, but I suppose that’s not too bad for a subtitled film that’s been out for a couple weeks already on a Wednesday evening. Part of me felt obliged to see it, because I’d failed for no good reason to see Howl’s Moving Castle or Ponyo, so I haven’t seen a Ghibli film in theatre since Spirited Away.
I’ll give Uzumaki this: I’ve never seen anything quite like it. Author Ito Junji’s concept sounds like one hell of a creative writing challenge: the town of Kurouzu-cho is cursed by spirals. Every chapter repeats the “spiral” motif somehow, and though some episodes succeed more than others, I have to tip my hat to Ito just because he could write a three-volume comic using such an odd hook.
The first few stories are the most effective, in part because the supernatural elements only appear late in the episodes.
I went to see Evangelion 3.0 at the Plano Angelika theatre yesterday, and though it was less fun than it could’ve been since the person I’d planned to see it with had to be out-of-state, I still enjoyed the experience and thought I’d share a few brief thoughts about it.
The highlights: driving down Dallas North Tollway with hardly any traffic was pretty fun; the one cosplayer did a fine job as Gendo; the Angelika is probably the nicest theatre I’ve been in.
Once in a while, I come across a work of fiction that should be better than it is, and unfortunately Bram Stoker’s Dracula fits firmly into that category. The premise carries the novel through, and the story does have some strong points, but Stoker does a couple of things that undermine the whole work.
The first major problem is that Stoker wrote this as an epistolary novel. I believe this style used to be much more common than it is now, but was already long past its prime when Stoker wrote Dracula, and good riddance.
Some films are good and some films are bad, and some films are such a thorough mix of good and bad that one struggles to decide whether the work as a whole is good or not. The 1978 animated adaptation of Lord of the Rings, directed by Ralph Bakshi, is just such a movie. Parts of the film look excellent, and it takes a few chances that do pay off, but there are a few major faults that may ultimately sink it.
I’ve written before about my attempts, some more successful than others, at reading Japanese comics in the original Japanese. Since this strategy has worked fairly well at learning that language, last month I decided to order some comics in French. Since I don’t know many French comic artists, I figured I’d import the first four volumes of Pika Edition’s printing of Suetsugu Yuki’s Chihayafuru, which doesn’t look like it’ll receive an English-language release anytime soon.
A little over a year ago, I wrote about the first two seasons of the Rozen Maiden anime adaptation (leaving out the OVA, which I haven’t seen). Now, an adaptation of Peach-Pit’s sequel has recently concluded, RM: Zurückspulen. I wrote last year that RM: Träumend is probably the best expression of Rozen Maiden’s concept, but in some ways Zurückspulen may be slightly better. At the very least, if you liked the previous Rozen Maidens, you need to see this new version, as well.
I’ve been following Tanigawa Nico’s comedic manga Watamote (short for the succinct Japanese title, translated: No Matter How I Look at it It’s You Guys' Fault I’m not Popular!) for about a year, and like it enough that I’ve imported the first three Japanese volumes and am reading them at that slow, agonising pace that characterises my attempt at that language. When the anime adaptation was announced, I had mixed feelings.
Yeah, dropping the post subtitling thing after one week. Maybe next time, if I think of something good.
Anyway, this past month may mark the beginning of a change in the way I read books, since I’ve subscribed to Audible. I’ve listened to a handful of audiobooks in the past, and though I don’t like them nearly as much as sitting down and reading through a physical book I decided to give this a try since I often find myself listening to podcasts while, say, cooking or working out.
So, after a tumultuous, often uncertain journey of seven years, I’ve finished Gunslinger Girl. I’ve written a couple posts on Aida Yu’s series before, after its return from publishing limbo in North America, one enthusiastic (of volumes 7-8), one rather concerned about the direction the author had taken (of volumes 11-12). Though volumes 13-14 were fine, I’m afraid that this final (fifteenth) volume largely, though not completely, justified my concerns.