Samurai Assassination Movie

There's a movie coming out in Japan that really looks good. It's a movie about an assassination of the chief minister of the Edo shogunate government in 1860. Student's of Japanese history will know this as the "Sakuradamon incident." It was also the last hurrah for the samurai.

Authentic photo from 1860 of the Sakuradamon incident

The Sakuradamon incident occurred when Japan's pro-foreign Chief Minister Ii Naosuke was assassinated by xenophobic samurai who wanted foreigners kept out of Japan (an understandable concern!)


Now, there's a lot of bad movies coming out of Japan, but when it comes to samurai films, Japan still does a pretty good job (well, duh!) 


The Mainichi Newspaper reports: 

A famous ambush assassination of a high-ranking government official in Japan's late samurai period has been adapted into Junya Sato's new movie "Sakuradamongai no Hen" (The Sakuradamon Incident). The film carefully depicts the country's upheaval at the end of the samurai era from the view point of the assassins, making it easier for everyone to understand the historic background of the incident. The climax of the movie is the assassination of Naosuke Ii (starring Masato Ibu), the chief minister of the Edo shogunate government, by a group of 18 samurais on a snowy day 150 years ago.


Here's the trailer for the movie. It's in Japanese but you don't need to speak the language to see how good this movie is going to be!





Link: http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20101023p2a00m0na021000c.html


Thanks to News on Japan

Roots of Japanese anime? 24 traditional Japanese monsters

One of my favorite blogs on Japan is Pink Tentacle. Pick Tentacle is a blog about Japanese Art, Culture, Science and Technology.


I highly recommend it.


Today, they have an unusual collection of 24 traditional Japanese monsters. Have you ever wondered where the Japanese get their ideas for those silly monsters in the Godzilla movies? I have. Well, the fact of the matter is that Japan has had some very strange (or silly) looking monsters for a long time.


Pick Tentacle has uncovered a collection of 24 of them and made high quality scans for your viewing pleasure! The description reads:     


The Bakemono Zukushi handscroll, painted in the Edo period (18th-19th century) by an unknown artist, depicts 24 traditional monsters that once used to spook the people of Japan.


This is an interesting collection as, usually, the only other places you can see these spooks is at a local festival... And speaking of festivals, it's festival season now in Japan so get your notebooks out and jot down these characters now... They all look the same until you know the names...

Odoroshi (おどろし) is a red-faced monster with big eyes, black teeth, and long hair.

Yume-no-seirei ("dream ghost" - 夢の精霊) appears as a thin old man in a white robe.

Yamamba (山姥) is a mountain hag.

I like this last one. There was a while there, about 5 or 6 years ago, when Shibuya girls wore outrageous makeup on their faces and broad white eyeshadow. That fashion was called, "Yamamba" like the mountain hag above.

If you want to see more scrolls, click here.