Japanese Cinema Eclectics日本映画撰集

Due to unforeseen circumstances, Donald Richie is not able to attend this evening's screening. Mark Schilling, noted film scholar and critic for The Japan Times, will moderate the session, introducing the film and responding to questions after the screening.

A Multipart Series Devoted to Unexplored Tangents of the Japanese Film
Curatored by Donald Richie, moderated by Mark Schilling.

Film: Casshern
Written and directed by Kazuaki Kiriya, 142mins. (2004)
Introduction and Q&A by Donald Richie in English (Film in Japanese with English subtitles)



Japanese Cinema Eclectics official site

CASSHERN

Written and directed by Kazuaki Kiriya. With Yusuke Iseya, Kumiko Aso, Akira Terao, Kanako Higuchi, Fumiyo Kohinata, Hiroyuki Miyasako, Mayumi Sada, 142mins. (2004)

It is the late 21st century. Earth is in crises and mankind is at risk. Legend tells of a hero who will arise and set things right. In the mean time, it is the last day of the Fifty Year War and the robot armies are still rioting. The Neo-Cell is being developed by dedicated scientists but will this panacea be perfected in time? Meanwhile our hero’s mother is going blind and his fiancée is kidnapped. In the face of the rebels of Zone Seven he has but little choice. He, himself, must become Casshern, the legendary hero who will save mankind.
This single showing (the original Japanese with English subtitles) is made possible through the permission of Shochiku (Japan).

Mark Schilling

Mark Schilling is a noted film scholar and critic who has reviewed films for The Japan Times since 1989 and reported on the Japanese film industry for Screen International, a British film trade magazine, from 1990 to 2005. He is currently Japan correspondent for Variety. His articles on Japanese culture and society have appeared in a wide range of publications, including The Asian Wall Street Journal, the Japan edition of Newsweek, USA Today, Interview, Winds, The Japan Quarterly and Kinema Junpo.

In 1997 Schilling published The Encyclopedia of Japanese Pop Culture and in 1999 Contemporary Japanese Film, both with Weatherhill. In 2003 he published The Yakuza Movie Book -- A Guide to Japanese Gangster Films with Stone Bridge Press.

He has contributed to several other books, including Japan Pop! (M.E. Sharpe, 2000), Ichikawa Kon (Cinematheque Ontario, 2001) and Encyclopedia of Contemporary Japanese Culture (Routledge, 2002), as well as translating and writing the introduction for Princess Mononoke -- The Art and Making of Japan's Most Popular Film of All Time (Hyperion, 1999).

In 2005 he programmed a 16-film retrospective devoted to the Nikkatsu Action genre for the Udine Far East Film Festival and published an accompanying book, No Borders, No Limits: The Wold of Nikkatsu Action with the festival organization, Centro Espressioni Cinematografiche. In 2006, he contributed to Asia Sings!, a book the Centro published as part of the Udine festival retro on Asian musicals. His latest book, No Borders, No Limits: Nikkatsu Action Cinema, was published FAB Press in September, 2007.

About Donald Richie

Donald Richie, former Curator of Film at the New York Museum of Modern Art, is the author of many books on Japanese cinema, including his most recent, One Hundred Years of Japanese Film. He has also written widely on many other aspects of this country where he has spent most of his life, including the classic travel book, The Inland Sea, and his latest, Botandoro.

Presented by the Institute of Contemporary Japanese Studies
Temple University, Japan Campus
in Association with SuperDeluxe