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Movies that feature or take place in Tokyo?

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Old Oct 30, 2014, 11:53 pm
  #61  
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Originally Posted by AlwaysAisle
It is a movie about ramen noodle shop, isn’t it?

The movie was filmed at:

Harumi (restaurant, commonly known as “Horumon Harumi”)
4-7-13 Shibaura,
Minato-ku, Tokyo
(090) 8101-6330

It is a small dive Japanese barbeque (yakiniku, 焼肉) restaurant open for lunch only. It is not ramen place in real life. Closest station is subway Sengakuji station (Tokyo Metro Asakusa Line), the location is about 600 m (650 yards) east of the station.
Originally Posted by Pickles
The sarariman at the fancy restaurant scene (one of my all-time favorite film scenes) was at La Tour D'Argent at the New Otani:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRVLqUpHDJE
かたじけない, AlwaysAisle and Pickles.

Now to find the supermarket and the kitchen from the omuraisu scene...
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Old Oct 31, 2014, 2:33 am
  #62  
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The locations for the "mother's last fried rice meal" scene and the chitlings with wasabi and shoyu scene are shown here:
http://tanken.life.coocan.jp/weblog2/?p=2074

The house with the fried rice scene was demolished some time ago, but the railroad crossing should still be there.

This page had a good round up of information about locations:
http://blog.livedoor.jp/mostly_bente...s/1612625.html

I don't read or write Japanese, a translation tool will give you the same sense of the information I got (it's actually finding pages in Japanese that I find trickiest)
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Old Oct 31, 2014, 9:59 am
  #63  
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Originally Posted by LapLap
The locations for the "mother's last fried rice meal" scene and the chitlings with wasabi and shoyu scene are shown here:
http://tanken.life.coocan.jp/weblog2/?p=2074

The house with the fried rice scene was demolished some time ago, but the railroad crossing should still be there.

This page had a good round up of information about locations:
http://blog.livedoor.jp/mostly_bente...s/1612625.html

I don't read or write Japanese, a translation tool will give you the same sense of the information I got (it's actually finding pages in Japanese that I find trickiest)
Thanks for your help, LapLap! Have you made a pilgrimage to any of the sites?

(For some reason, I've only ever searched for the soundtrack. This thread has proven particularly useful.)
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Old Oct 31, 2014, 12:05 pm
  #64  
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I'm not that kind of tourist. Anyway, the films that touch me most about Japan are those directed by Ozu.

If I was going to visit somewhere solely because of Tampopo it would be the Taimeiken restaurant in Nihonbashi. I've been making omu rice for a while because I have a young child, it's not my favourite dish (few of the yoshoku favourites are, and I am no admirer of Japanese Curry), but I'd be interested in going to the place where Juzo Itami went to for help in developing the version seen in the movie.
Here's an article with more information - in English - about the Itami/Taimeiken gastronomic collaboration:
http://justhungry.com/tampopo-omurai...oku-restaurant
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Old Oct 31, 2014, 4:29 pm
  #65  
 
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Originally Posted by LapLap
Anyway, the films that touch me most about Japan are those directed by Ozu.
^

I didn't see it mentioned up thread but I saw Adrift in Tokyo a few years ago on a NH flight and quite enjoyed it. It features two men walking around/through Tokyo and just sort of talking. My description does the film no justice but I found it to be entertaining and quirky. It also stars Tomokazu Miura, aka Momoe Yamaguchi's husband.
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Old Jan 7, 2023, 11:28 pm
  #66  
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Originally Posted by joejones
It looks like nobody has mentioned the 2005 Steven Seagal movie "Into the Sun." The plot is vaguely along the lines of "Black Rain" and the film is mind-blowingly terrible, but somewhat amusing if you can appreciate the comical value of Steven Seagal.
As a fan of martial arts films, I did see "Into the Sun", I even have it on DVD after finding it on sale at Walmart in the US for about $2.00 bundled with a few other Seagal films. Yes, it is a bad movie, I'm surprised that Sony Pictures invested $30 million to make this dud, especially at a time when Seagal's star had already fallen and he was at the "straight-to-DVD" phase of his movie career. The movie only grossed $175,563 worldwide. Subsequent DVD sales probably added only a few thousand dollars to that.

A more recent dud that I saw was "Bullet Train" starring Brad Pitt, a mind-numbing and hard-to-follow story that was actually filmed at a studio in Hollywood on reconstructed train cars. It's kind of a Tarantino knock-off, so there's a lot of gratuitous violence. Surprisingly, the movie made a profit but was mostly panned by critics. I'd take a hard pass on it and recommend watching the 1975 action movie "The Bullet Train" starring Ken Takakura and Sonny Chiba instead. At least you'll get the chance to see what an early Shinkansen with a dining car looked like back in the day, and it's far more exciting.

Last edited by Nagasaki Joe; Jan 7, 2023 at 11:34 pm
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Old Jan 8, 2023, 11:37 am
  #67  
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Originally Posted by Nagasaki Joe
A more recent dud that I saw was "Bullet Train" starring Brad Pitt, a mind-numbing and hard-to-follow story that was actually filmed at a studio in Hollywood on reconstructed train cars. It's kind of a Tarantino knock-off, so there's a lot of gratuitous violence. Surprisingly, the movie made a profit but was mostly panned by critics.
I don't know what prompted me to see that this summer, maybe the concept of a shinkansen as a film set. It was spectacularly bad, not even funny bad. Mrs. Pickles refused to see it with me, calling it, pre-emptively, "dreck." She was correct.
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Old Jan 9, 2023, 1:31 am
  #68  
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Originally Posted by Pickles
I don't know what prompted me to see that this summer, maybe the concept of a shinkansen as a film set. It was spectacularly bad, not even funny bad. Mrs. Pickles refused to see it with me, calling it, pre-emptively, "dreck." She was correct.
I had seen the movie trailers beforehand and had a strong feeling that I wouldn’t like it, but since I’m interested in seeing how Western movies portray Japan, I’m willing to sit through a “dreck” movie once in a while. In the 50s through the 80s, foreign movies about Japan often focused on crime and the Yakuza, now it’s mostly pop culture, which quickly gets tiring. TBH, I can’t think of any good foreign (Western) movies filmed in Japan that aren’t filled with cliches. Still, I like to watch them, especially the older ones to see how life was portrayed in an earlier time. Of course, there are quite a few excellent Japanese movies, mostly but not exclusively from the 50s and 60s, IMO.
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Old Jan 9, 2023, 4:21 am
  #69  
 
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Originally Posted by Pickles
I don't know what prompted me to see that this summer, maybe the concept of a shinkansen as a film set. It was spectacularly bad, not even funny bad. Mrs. Pickles refused to see it with me, calling it, pre-emptively, "dreck." She was correct.
She definitely over-rated it.
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Old Jan 9, 2023, 8:43 am
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Originally Posted by Nagasaki Joe
As a fan of martial arts films, I did see "Into the Sun", I even have it on DVD after finding it on sale at Walmart in the US for about $2.00 bundled with a few other Seagal films. Yes, it is a bad movie, I'm surprised that Sony Pictures invested $30 million to make this dud, especially at a time when Seagal's star had already fallen and he was at the "straight-to-DVD" phase of his movie career. The movie only grossed $175,563 worldwide. Subsequent DVD sales probably added only a few thousand dollars to that.

A more recent dud that I saw was "Bullet Train" starring Brad Pitt, a mind-numbing and hard-to-follow story that was actually filmed at a studio in Hollywood on reconstructed train cars. It's kind of a Tarantino knock-off, so there's a lot of gratuitous violence. Surprisingly, the movie made a profit but was mostly panned by critics. I'd take a hard pass on it and recommend watching the 1975 action movie "The Bullet Train" starring Ken Takakura and Sonny Chiba instead. At least you'll get the chance to see what an early Shinkansen with a dining car looked like back in the day, and it's far more exciting.
Originally Posted by Pickles
I don't know what prompted me to see that this summer, maybe the concept of a shinkansen as a film set. It was spectacularly bad, not even funny bad. Mrs. Pickles refused to see it with me, calling it, pre-emptively, "dreck." She was correct.
On a recent AA flight, I started to watch the movie Bullet Train (i.e. it was free) and I think I made it till a little less than the first quarter of the movie. Then I switched to a live NFL game feed....

Steven Seagal lived in Osaka for 13 years between the age of 17 and 30 and studied aikido and tai chi. Steven Seagal was married to a Japanese woman and has two kids; Kentaro Seagal (actor in Los Angeles) and Ayako Fujitani (actress in Japan). Steven Seagal used to appear on Japanese TV programs often with his daughter Ayako Fujitani. Steven Segal spoke pretty decent Japanese, although once in a while his daughter had to step in as a translator.
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Old Jan 9, 2023, 9:52 am
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Bullet Train reminded me of Snatch, which is one of my all-time favorites. You have to enjoy violent screwball comedy in order to get it. It was not trying at all to be an authentic portrayal of Japan, or any other aspect of reality for that matter.
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Old Jan 9, 2023, 12:23 pm
  #72  
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Originally Posted by joejones
Bullet Train reminded me of Snatch, which is one of my all-time favorites. You have to enjoy violent screwball comedy in order to get it. It was not trying at all to be an authentic portrayal of Japan, or any other aspect of reality for that matter.
Are you seriously comparing Bullet Train to Snatch? Snatch is a masterpiece. The only thing they have in common is Brad Pitt mugging for the camera. Pitt was brilliant as the pikey in Snatch.
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Old Jan 9, 2023, 2:42 pm
  #73  
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I’m thoroughly enjoying this popcorn moment.

Bullet Train came out in Spanish cinemas just as I was about to return to London with my daughter. She wanted a break from Spanish and we looked at what was available in English. This was the only choice so we contemplated it (you need to be 12 and over there), and even this chance to see an R rated movie didn’t sway her.
I did wonder if we had missed out.
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Old Jan 9, 2023, 3:33 pm
  #74  
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Originally Posted by LapLap
I did wonder if we had missed out.
You didn't miss out on anything. Was the movie dubbed in Spanish? That would make it even more ridiculous. Perhaps so ridiculous it would be an unintentional work of art. Dubbing movies is a criminal act.
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Old Jan 9, 2023, 5:19 pm
  #75  
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Originally Posted by Pickles
You didn't miss out on anything. Was the movie dubbed in Spanish? That would make it even more ridiculous. Perhaps so ridiculous it would be an unintentional work of art. Dubbing movies is a criminal act.
Most of the showings were dubbed but there was a VOS (version original subtitulada). We passed.
I might end up seeing Bullet Train dubbed into castellano in a few years time, I can imagine it as the entertainment on an old RENFE carriage on the Alicante to Madrid rail journey.
Angry Birds 2 is one of those oddities, unwatchable in the original English but somehow redeemed with Santiago De Segura doing the Spanish version.
And Rooney’s Yunioshi gets a sanitising treatment with Desayuno Con Diamantes, one doesn’t cross one’s legs quite so tightly through cringe.
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