Within the past two years I have watched Avatar: The Last Airbender in its entirety from beginning to end no less than ten times. Maybe it’s actually a lot more than that, now that I think about it… maybe more like twenty. If one were able to easily retrieve their Netflix viewing history (I don’t … More On Watching Avatar: The Last Airbender
When eleven year old Tomo’s already mostly absent mother takes off again after a night of heavy drinking, Tomo finds her uncle Makio at the bookstore where he works to tell him. The bond between the pair is apparent as they make their way back to his apartment together. They talk about the video games … More Close-Knit (2017) (Karera ga honki de amu toki wa)
When it comes to Japan, I can sometimes feel, I don’t really know how to describe it… protective? defensive? I realize that everyone who has spent time living abroad or studying a place, its culture, its history, and so on, might also feel something like this about the way in which others choose to depict … More Kubo and the Two Strings 2016
When I heard sometime last year that Sanjay Leela Bhansali was coming out with a new film with Ranveer Singh and Deepika Pakudone, I decided then that it would be my first Bollywood theatre experience. Bhansali films are gorgeous with breathtaking scenery and beautiful costumes. They are colorful and lavish, and I imagined that if … More Padmaavat (2018)
I am about halfway through Anurag Kashyap’s Bombay Velvet (2015), and wanted to talk a few things through before I finish the film. I’m going to be honest about this: I started watching the film because Ranbir Kapoor is great and I found out that Kashyap directed it after consulting IMDB when I realized that the film was … More Thoughts on Anurag Kashyap ~ halfway through Bombay Velvet
The conversation around the ways in which the current political climate in the United States has divided and pitted people against each other kept surfacing while I was watching Deepa Mehta’s film Earth. The film takes place in Lahore, India (now Pakistan), during the partition of India. Through the eyes of Lenny, a Parsi child, we are … More Watching Deepa Mehta’s Earth (1998) in 2017
I’ve been on a bit of a Bollywood watching rampage lately. So much so, actually, that I want to start learning Hindi. This is what happened to me several years ago with Japanese films. I fell in love with Japanese movies, from Ozu Yasujiro to Koreeda Hirokazu, and became determined to study the language. And … More Talaash (2012) & back to back with the Khans of Bollywood
Pardes (1997), director Subhash Ghai’s ode to India, opens and closes with a dedication to India’s 50th year of independence, which provides some explanation for the film’s patriotic tone (the song “I love my India” can be heard no less than three times in the first two hours of the film). Pardes examines the relationship … More Pardes (1997)
comprehensionthroughrepetition 