Strawberry Shortcakes

The story is adapted from a comic about four women searching for their purpose in life.

Liked some of the funny moments but the overall mood was a bit too pessimistic. It was interesting how the writer split different aspects of an ordinary woman: the innocent girl, the career woman, the faithful girlfriend and the passionate lover into four characters!

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Where Chimneys are Seen

The story is about life in a rural neighborhood near Tokyo. A couple suddenly found themselves with an abandoned baby and one of their tenants decided to help them to trace his parents.

Liked the nice voice of Takamine Hideko as an announcer and the interesting phenomenon of the vanishing chimneys!

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Immortal Love

The story is about how landowners exploited their tenant farmers seen through the eyes of a tenant farmer's daughter who was forced to marry the young master after being raped by him.

Liked the epic plot that spanned many years and how everything tied together very nicely in the end!

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The Munakata Sisters

The story is about how traditional values clashed with the modern way of doing things seen through the eyes of two sisters.

Liked Takamine Hideko's comical facial expression and her cheeky behaviour towards her elder sister's ex-lover! Was quite upset by the elder sister's husband who was a good-for-nothing!

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Yearning

The story is about a young widow who spent much of her life looking after her mother-in-law's provision shop and her relationship with her younger brother-in-law.

Great acting by the actress! Liked the parts that showed the widow and brother-in-law working hard together for the shop!

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Hideko, the Bus Conductress

The story is about a bus conductress thinking of ways to save her bus company from going out of business together with the driver.

I had wanted to see this film after watching Takamine Hideko as a bus conductress in Lightning at the 2002 Japanese Film Festival, so I was very happy that this film was part of the 2011 Japanese Film Festival line up! Liked the interesting adventures on the bus and the nice voice of the bus conductress!

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Poetry

The story is about an old woman, who is slowly losing her memory, learning how to write a poem while having to deal with her delinquent grandson.

Liked the interesting screenplay and the great acting by the actress! The poems recited by the different people sounded very nice!

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Ajantrik

The story is about the close relationship between a quirky taxi driver and his car.

Liked the great sound effects and the interesting taxi trips across the country! Quite sad for the old car in the end though.

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Carmen Comes Home

The story is about a strip dancer returning home to the countryside from Tokyo for a few days of holiday with her colleague.

Liked the beautiful countryside scenery and the reaction of the villagers towards the two girls from the city!

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Mr Popper's Penguins

The story is about how the life of a businessman called Mr Popper changed after he inherited a few penguins from his father.

Liked Ms Pippi who spoke in rhymes and looked quite pretty! Didn't find the penguins cute though and pitied Jim Carrey for having to put up with them.

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Tokyo Chorus

The story is about the struggles of an insurance agent who was fired for arguing with his boss.

Don't think I would recognize Takamine Hideko if nobody told me that she was in this film! She looked quite cute as a child with a few missing teeth! Great drama about teacher-student, boss-employee and parent-child relationship!

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The Valiant Ones

The story is about how a group of people with very good martial arts skill tried to eliminate the Japanese pirates during the Ming dynasty. Their job was made more difficult as some officials were being bribed by the pirates.

Liked the exciting martial arts choreography and how cool Hsu Feng looked as the wife of Wu Jiyuan! The use of the weiqi board as well as the black and white stones to display the situation picture was ingenious!

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Pulgasari

The story is about how a monster called Pulgasari helped the farmers overthrow the evil king. It was created by an old blacksmith before he died.

Liked the interesting special effects and how cute the monster looked!

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Adieu Philippine

The story is about how a man who worked in the media industry as a camera man spent his time with two pretty girls before he was enlisted for the war in Algeria during the sixties.

Liked the quirky television commercials that were produced then and the two pretty actresses!

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White Light Black Rain

This is a documentary about the impact of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Liked how the news clips complemented the interviews by the survivors and how it showed both the American and Japanese side of the story!

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Assassination

The story is about how a mysterious expert swordsmen manoeuvred his way between the Emperor and the Shogunate supporters during the 1860s in Japan.

Liked the great sword fighting sequences and I learnt a bit about Japanese history!

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Kung Fu Panda 2

This is about a Panda who is pretty good at martial arts and fights against bad guys with his friends: Tigress, Crane, Monkey, Mantis and Viper.

Liked the beautiful scenery and the amazing martial arts choreography! The front part that explained how Shen became a bad guy was a bit confusing for me but it could be because I missed the first movie.

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So Wrong, They're Right

This is a documentary about fans of the 8-track format which is the predecessor of the cassette tape.

Liked the interesting interviews and the whole user experience of using the format, from listening to the sound made when the 8-track was put into the machine to visualising how the 8-track operates through its transparent cover!

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Kairat

The story is about the dreams and aspirations of a young man from Kazhakstan called Kairat who was waiting to retake his University exams while working as a tram driver.

Liked the interesting dream sequences that showed the inner thoughts of Kairat!

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Street Without End

The story is about how two waitresses who were good friends achieved work and family life balance.

Liked how the director illustrated the pros and cons of both the housewife and the actress path! Thought the sister-in-law would look fiercer without her dimples.

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