Spanish Filmin Buys Lars Von Trier’s ‘The Kingdom’ Trilogy
12.05.2022 - 20:03 / variety.com
Patrick Frater Asia Bureau ChiefUpgrade Productions, the production company launched last year by Matt Brodlie and Jonathan Kier, is working on an epic Japanese-language TV series.The company has teamed with venerable Japanese studio Shochiku to produce “A True Novel” as an eight-part adaptation of Mizumura Minae’s 2003 Yomiuri Prize-winning novel. Inspired by Emily Brontë’s “Wuthering Heights,” the sweeping family narrative is set in the decades after World War II in Japan and the U.S.The series, adapted by screenwriter Sakaguchi Riko (“The Tale of the Princess Kaguya,” “Mary and the Witch’s Flower”) will bring to life a love story spanning three generations and told by different characters.
“The extraordinary team at Shochiku, one of Japan’s most innovative and successful studios, is the perfect partner on this show. ‘A True Novel’ is a beautiful story with universal themes. And to be collaborating with the incredibly talented Sakaguchi Riko is a dream come true.
It’s an epic story which is appealing to global audiences,” said Upgrade co-presidents Brodlie and Kier.The series will be produced by Akita Shuhei from Shochiku and Brodlie and Kier. Upgrade Productions will be credited as executive producer.“We are excited to be adapting this powerful story, based on a prestigious and popular Japanese novel.
Collaborating with Upgrade will help us bring this series to the world,” said Shochiku’s head of sales Koyama Meri and Shochiku producer Akita.The oldest of Japan’s big four studios (founded 127 years ago), Shochiku is a film production and distribution major, and the leading producer of Kabuki theater. Its has been home to Ozu Yasujiro, Mizoguchi Kenji, Naruse Mikio and Yamada Yoji, who is responsible for the world’s
.Spanish Filmin Buys Lars Von Trier’s ‘The Kingdom’ Trilogy
Japanese Breakfast was joined by Wilco‘s Nels Cline during her set at Solid Sound Festival in North Adams, Massachusetts, over the weekend.The musical moniker of Michelle Zauner, Japanese Breakfast welcomed Cline onstage towards the end of the set, to help in playing ‘Posing For Cars’ from her 2021 LP ‘Jubilee’. During the song, the Wilco guitarist shredded his way through a masterful guitar solo, captured by fans in the audience.“Nels Cline just ripped a fucking solo on my fucking song,” Japanese Breakfast shared on social media, later returning the favour for the rock outfit and joining them onstage for ‘Jesus, Etc.’.
Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent“Plan 75,” Hayakawa Chie’s Japanese dystopian drama which world premiered at Cannes’ Un Certain Regard, has been sold in a raft of territories by Urban Sales. The movie is set in Japan, in a near future where a government program called Plan 75 encourages senior citizens to be voluntarily euthanized in order to remedy the aging society. The film weaves the stories of an elderly woman who isn’t able to live independently, a pragmatic Plan 75 salesman and a young Filipino caregiver.
Following the sparsely attended media conference for Close at Cannes this morning, journalists packed their way into the press room to hear Broker director Hirokazu Kore-Eda and cast, giving them a standing ovation.
Patrick Frater Asia Bureau ChiefKore-eda Hirokazu, director of the well-received Cannes competition film “Broker” says his diverse and lonely characters constitute a family of choice.“This film tells the story of a family which came together by choice. Each character had been rejected. They set off on a car journey, as if by accident.
In Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Palme d’Or winner “Shoplifters,” a group of small-time thieves forms their own makeshift family, living every day not only through pure survival instinct but a genuine love for each other. For his first film set in Korea, the Japanese filmmaker reflects on similar themes in “Broker,” a road trip odyssey reflecting on the family we choose and the family we tearfully let go of.
The Palme d’Or can be a blessing and curse, a gold-plated sword of Damocles hanging over the heads of filmmakers lucky enough to claim it. After the first waves of shock and joy recede, and their subsequent year-long victory lap reaches the finish line, those same filmmakers are left alone with one troubling thought: What’s next? Director Hirokazu Kore-eda offers a fine case study in how that question might trip someone up.
Esteemed Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda walks a fine line between keen social observation and overt sentimental emotionalism in Cannes competition title Broker.
Peter Debruge Chief Film CriticWhile Americans’ attention is consumed with the issue of abortion, halfway across the world, director Kore-eda Hirokazu (“Shoplifters”) focuses on the alternative for mothers who carry their pregnancies to term, but can’t raise the children on their own. A warm and unexpectedly nonjudgmental look at the Korean gray market for adoption, “Broker” was inspired by the idea of “baby hatches” — essentially, a donation station for unwanted infants — and follows the director’s natural curiosity through to its most humanistic conclusion, as audiences unexpectedly come to empathize with practically everyone involved in the buying and selling of a little bundle of joy.What is Kore-eda, who is Japanese, doing making a film in South Korea, you might ask? It’s not his first time working abroad.
Japanese Breakfast will feature as a musical guest on the Apple TV+ show Helpsters.From the makers of Sesame Street, Helpsters is a children’s show about a group of monsters who work together to solve the problems of customers in their shop. The first season launched alongside Apple TV+ in 2019, with the third season set to debut on Friday (May 27).Japanese Breakfast’s Michelle Zauner performs a track with Cody and her friends in the third season.
Patrick Frater Asia Bureau ChiefKawase Naomi, the Japanese auteur who won the Camera d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 1997 and has had films in competition on multiple other occasions, is paying a flying visit to the festival with “Official Film of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games Side A,” which screens on Wednesday evening.A feature-length documentary, “Side A” is focused largely on the athletes. “Side B,” Kawase’s next project, casts a wider net and captures what Kawase calls a turning point for Japanese society.The International Olympic Committee hired me to do it. I was elected or nominated by the IOC.
Hirokazu Kore-eda‘s next directorial effort is the baby-napping (kidnapping for babies) drama “Broker” which stars Song Kang-ho, who previously played the patriarch in the Best Picture winner “Parasite” and is a fixture of South Korean cinema. Kore-eda, a Japanese filmmaker, made waves in the film awards circuit with his fantastic 2018 drama “Shoplifters” which won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival and even etched out a Best Foreign Language Film Oscar nomination.
Japanese Breakfast made her Saturday Night Live debut last night (May 21) on the show’s season 47 finale – watch her play ‘Be Sweet’ and ‘Paprika’ below.The singer-songwriter, aka Michelle Zauner, released new album ‘Jubilee’ last year, and appeared alongside host Natasha Lyonne, star of Russian Doll and Orange Is The New Black.Zauner played two of the biggest hits from ‘Jubilee’ on the show. For ‘Be Sweet’, she was dressed in deep red and backed by a four-piece band all in white, before she donned a white frock and was joined by a horn section for ‘Paprika’.Watch the two performances below.Last night’s SNL season finale also saw the departure of longtime cast member Pete Davidson.Fellow cast members Aidy Bryant, Kate McKinnon and Kyle Mooney also announced they were to leave the show after last night’s episode.The news comes after Davidson remarked in 2021 that he was “ready to hang up the jersey” with regards to his stint on SNL.Elsewhere on the 47th season of the show, Post Malone made his Saturday Night Live debut, with Selena Gomez also be making her debut on the NBC programme as host.During his performance, the rapper was joined by Fleet Foxes to premiere ‘Love/Hate Letter to Alcohol’, a song from his forthcoming album ‘Twelve Carat Toothache’.The May 7 episode of SNL, meanwhile, featured Arcade Fire as musical guests, following the release of their latest album ‘WE’ last Friday.
Emilio Mayorga New York-based Kino Lorber has acquired all North American rights to horror pic “Virtual Reality,” from Argentine director-producer Hernán Findling (“Impossible Crimes”).Other deals on the pic closed by FilmSharks include Media 4 Fun (Poland), AV Jet (Taiwan) and Laon-I (South Korea). Japan, Latin America, the U.K.
Todd Spangler NY Digital EditorThis year, Global Accessibility Awareness Day falls on May 19. And Netflix is using the occasion to announce major plans to expand the global translations of its audio descriptions and subtitles for customers who are blind, deaf or hard-of-hearing.The streamer will expand audio description (AD), subtitles for the deaf or hard-of-hearing (SDH) and dubbing in more than 10 additional languages throughout the year starting this month — so that more Netflix members with disabilities can experience shows and films made in another country in their local language. That’s not the norm in the entertainment industry at large.Netflix is starting with French, Spanish, Portuguese, German and Italian, and expanding from there to Asian languages including Korean and Japanese as well as European local languages.
Leo Barraclough International Features EditorBeta Cinema has sold the English-language tragicomedy “My Neighbor Adolf” to several major territories. The film stars German actor Udo Kier and Scottish actor David Hayman, and is directed by Israel’s Leon Prudovsky.All rights for North America have gone to Cohen Media Group, Signature Entertainment has acquired the U.K./Ireland rights, I Wonder took Italy, Lumix Media has South Korea and Tohokushinsha Film took Japan.The film, set in 1960, centers on Polsky, a Holocaust survivor, who lives in the remote Colombian countryside.
Japanese Breakfast is set to make her Saturday Night Live debut next week, appearing as the musical guest on the show’s season 47 finale.The singer-songwriter, aka Michelle Zauner, released new album ‘Jubilee’ last year, will appear on the May 21 edition of the long-running show, with Russian Doll and Orange Is The New Black star Natasha Lyonne on board to host.“Help!!!!!!!!” Japanese Breakfast simply wrote on Twitter to announce her performance. Last month in an interview backstage at Coachella, Zauner told NME: “This year is about enjoying myself.
Over recent years, people who experience periods have worked tirelessly to combat the stigma that surrounds that ‘time of the month’. Whether it’s raising awareness of what constitutes a ‘normal’ period or whether it’s renaming feminine hygiene aisles, changes are being made to how we treat, and talk about, menstruation. And now Spain has come under the spotlight after the country’s government has acknowledged the impact that severe period pain can have on people’s lives.
TOKYO -- Katsumoto Saotome, a Japanese writer who gathered the accounts of survivors of the U.S. firebombing of Tokyo in World War II to raise awareness of the massive civilian deaths and the importance of peace, has died.
EXCLUSIVE: Rock & Roll Hall of Famer Laura Nyro, one of the most revered singer-songwriters of the 20thcentury, will be the subject of an upcoming documentary from Vistas Media Capital.