japanamerica

Sleeper hit anime 'Blue Giant' gets an encore In 2023, releasing a big-budget anime feature about three Gen Z boys in a post-bop jazz band sounds like commercial suicide. Jazz is boomer music; anime is for kids weaned on Pokemon. But the sleeper hit of the year was by far director Yuzuru Tachikawa’s “Blue Giant,” an adaptation of Shinichi Ishizuka’s jazz-centric manga series. The film was so popular with audiences in Japan and overseas after its first run this spring that it warranted an even bigger budget for a re-edited second release, which premiered last month at this year's Tokyo International Film Festival (TIFF) before opening in cinemas across Japan. Jazz has been featured in popular anime soundtracks since the 1970s, when Yuji Ohno’s funky fusion scores for the “Lupin III” series were broadcast on network TV and incorporated into Hayao Miyazaki’s first feature film, “Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro.” Jazz and sci-fi anime cemented their synergy with Yoko Kanno’...

One of my favorite recent English-language books on Japan is AMETORA ("American Traditional"), the enthralling, novelistic story of postwar Japan told through its brilliant refashioners of Western fashions (Take Ivy! Selvedge Denim! BAPE!). I will host a talk w/author W. David Marx at The Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan on Wednesday, Dec 13th , 6pm JST, both live and via Zoom. If you're in Tokyo (or not), please join us by registering here :  https://www.fccj.or.jp/event/book-break-w-david-marx-author-ametora-how-japan-saved-american-style-presentation  "Tokyo-based author W. David Marx will speak about his 2015 cultural history of American fashion in Japan — AMETORA: How Japan Saved American Style — which has recently been re-released by Basic Books with a new afterword after surprising global success. Marx will give a presentation in conversation with JAPANAMERICA author and moderator Roland Kelts on this fascinating micro-history of how Amer...

  Kaori Drome Of all the projects I've worked on over the years, this one is the dearest and most rewarding. So I'm thrilled to announce our first LIVE streaming event to launch the latest edition of MONKEY: New Writing from Japan , the world's only annual English-language literary magazine of Japanese stories, poetry, art and essays. I will be joining co-founding editor Motoyuki Shibata and author-artist Satoshi Kitamura to introduce our new issue for the Japan Society of Boston on Tuesday, December 5th at 6pm EST / Wednesday, December 6th 8am JST . Please join us to learn how Japanese stories have come to captivate a global audience. This event is free and you can now register here : https://www.japansocietyboston.org/events/how-japanese-stories-hook-the-world We first launched 12 years ago, spreading the word about several award-winning Japanese writers who are now internationally renowned bestsellers. We're back this 2023/2024 holiday season with Volum...