Executive Koala narrates the story of a koala bear who happens to be an executive in a pickle company. While trying to finalize a deal with a korean kimuchi company, Koala finds his girlfriend murdered.
He becomes the primary suspect and has to prove his innocence.
Executive Koala has been released on the 14th of January in Tokyo. It has been premiered at the hawai film festival where this lucky guy saw it.
It’s directed by Minoru Kawasaki whose previous efforts include Ika ressu (The Calamari Wresler) approprietly subtitled “Seafood Battle Royal”.
The official website is in Flash so no direct link to the trailer, you can find it by clicking on the frog guy on the far right of the navigation menu.
Thanks to twitch there’s also the Ika Ressu trailer here(wmv).

via stauffen
Urahara diva Shunji Iwai has written a script to be directed, surpisingly enough, by Ryuhei Kitamura (Godzilla Final Wars, Versus).
The movie, Bandage, is about the indie rock scene in Japan during the 90’s.
I always found weird that someone like Iwai never got his due when the asian movie craze went mainstream in the mid 90’s. I’m not 100% positive about this but i don’t think any Iwai’s flick has been released in europe in the 90’s.
This is something that has plagued most “middleground” directors of asia. Only the true genre or the true author flicks from asia are getting in the mainstream media.
The fact is Iwai’s movies are not sophisticated enough for the art crowd and not entertaining enough for the movie geeks looking for thrills.
There’s also an economic factor, Iwai’s movie were very popular in Japan at the time. The foreign distribution rights must have been more expensive than the one for Kitano’s.
Kitano’s movies were totally ignored in Japan until he got international praise at Venice with Hana-bi.
Still, i’ve always enjoyed Iwai’s sophisticated teenage dramas and he was the one to discover Tadanobu Asano.
Anyway, Kitamura is japan’s Michael Bay on crunk juice so it might be interesting to see what he can do with an Iwai’s script probably dealing with the trials, tribulations and the resulting angst of an indie rock band.
Iden, Tity & Godzilla : Final war. Can’t wait to watch that.
Here’s Shunji Iwai’s official website and Bandage official press release in japanese.

Kei Fujiwara made a little name for herself by writing, producing, editing, and designing the horror flick Organ, back in 1996.
Fujiwara has been an underground activist for some times, she notably worked with Tsukamoto and his theater troupe Kaiju theater back in the 80’s. She also played a part in Tetsuo the Iron man.
She is now almost ready to release her next picture, Id, which she started shooting back in 1999. Yes, life is hard for independant filmmaker in Japan.
Anyway, Organwas a pretty fucked up movie and did make some noise in various international film festival and amongst extreme cinema fans circles.
Id sounds equally psychotic so i guess she can hope to continue the buzz and hopeflly make
her next movie faster.
Here’s Id’s official website, in english (Fujiwara got most of her praise from outside japan so it makes sense). No trailer yet.
via twitch

Toshiaki Toyoda is one of the hottest director working in japan today. Since 1998’s Pornostar, Toyoda has been receiving an international critical praise, making him the new asian festival diva.
His last movie 9 Souls made the list of best movies of 2003 at Midnight Eye.
I think it’s mainly justified, Toyoda, like Tsukamoto in a way, is the kind of director which new movie is always better than the last. I find it always very exicting to watch the evolution of a filmmaker, specially one with a peculiar vision of the world. Toyoda’s work is already very recognizable.
Anyway, he’s preparing a new movie but in the meantime he’s toying with dv cameras and computers to organise live movie performance with the band Pharmacy. The first one will be held in Tokyo at Hatsudai Doors from the 16h of august. There will be 3 screening then he’s going to the Rising Sun festival in Ezo on the 19th.
You can find Toyoda’s website here and see the trailer for the performance here.

Well asano Tadanobu definetely doesn’t stop. He’s back in Kohei Oguri’s (Sting of Death) last movie Buried Wood (Umoregi). It’s preceded by an excelent reputation since it has been presented at the Cannes film festival this year.
The movie is about a groupe of young girls in a small village making up stories and the real story of the adults of the same villages. At some point they discover a buried forest (hence the title) and the story dreamed by the girls and reality begins to merge.
All this looks like a very poetic and dreamy movie. The kind of which doesn’t show up on cinema.3yen.com often. But you know how it is, sex and violence is the only thing that can get you an audience these days.
Which reminds me i should write more often about japanese porn.
Anyway, the official site is here and the beautiful trailer can be watch here.

The neigbor number thirteen is an adaptation of a cult manga from Inoue Santa (oh mangaka and their crazy aliases). It’s preceded by a good reputation and is showing now in only two theaters in Tokyo.
Yep, that’s how most indy flicks are treated here to the suprise of gaijin observers who usually worship japanese directors totally unknown in their own country. Tsukamoto Shinya and Kurosawa Kyoshi being two of the most prominent exemple.
Anyway Neighbor number thirteen looks quite nice, it’s about a guy with a split personality each one being played by a different actor. One of them is Nakamura Shido( Ping Pong, Iden & Tity) who’s becoming more and more popular..
No trailer per see, but if you go on the “experience” section of the official site you can see weird excerpts embeded in flash animations. The site is kinda nice and is in flash for a reason, not another gimmick with fade to black on picture and annoying music.
Anyway i want to see that one and it’s been a while since i wanted to cough up the 1800 yens necessary for a ticket.