Festivals: Camera Japan
Camera Japan Rotterdam 2023 Review: DECEMBER
Courtroom drama films, they are a dime a dozen. The why of it is no mystery: they allow for the telling of excellent stories, twists can be inserted aplenty, and the upcoming verdict carries an automatically incorporated suspense. And for...
Camera Japan Rotterdam 2023 Review: NEW RELIGION
Horror comes in different flavors, from fun slashers to controversial gore, but the Japanese have a decidedly special brand, with some very unsettling, creepy productions. Just over 20 years ago this brand became an international craze, after the worldwide breakthrough...
Camera Japan Rotterdam 2023 Review: GOLD KINGDOM AND WATER KINGDOM
In the Netherlands, we only get the most successful anime films in the cinema, the record-breakers. For all the others, you need to check the festivals, and thankfully the Camera Japan Festival always has at least a few titles in...
Camera Japan Netherlands 2023: What The Audiences Liked Best
Last weekend saw the second leg of the Camera Japan Festival, which takes place in Amsterdam (following the first leg a week earlier in Rotterdam). Films were seen, food was eaten, origami got folded, and Japanese natural wines were drunk....
Camera Japan Rotterdam 2023: Heads-Ups And Recommendations
Each year, in the second half of September, the Camera Japan Festival is held in Rotterdam for a few days, after which the festival moves to Amsterdam for the next weekend. This year is no exception and as always...
Camera Japan Rotterdam 2022: THEY SAY NOTHING STAYS THE SAME Is A Stunning Masterpiece
Apparently, there was some discord between the programmers of Camera Japan this year about Joe Odagiri's drama They Say Nothing Stays the Same. All liked the film but some thought it was too old, having seen its International première way...
Camera Japan Rotterdam 2022 Review: THE GREAT YOKAI WAR: GUARDIANS
While Rotterdam's Camera Japan Film Festival sometimes mostly seems to consist of a wide variety of dramas, there are always a few crazy and/or spectacular titles to check out as well. And the festival scores big on both categories by...
Camera Japan Rotterdam 2022 Review: POPRAN, A Dickhead Looking For His Dick
Over four years ago, our very own Josh Hurtado wrote one of the most positive reviews ever published at this here site. Its subject: a low-budget (no-budget rather...) making-of-a-zombie-flick called One-Cut of the Dead by some guy named Ueda Shinichiro....
Camera Japan 2019 Review: RISE OF THE MACHINE GIRLS Doesn't Elevate Its Niche
Back in 2007, our site got one of its highest traffic spikes when we hosted the outrageous trailer for Iguchi Noboru's The Machine Girl. For many people, it was their first exposure to Japan's bloody splattergore genre. And when the...
The Dutch Camera Japan Festival 2019 Is Upon Us
As the end of September nears, so does one of the most fun yearly Dutch film events: the Camera Japan Film Festival! Dedicated entirely to Japanese films, food and (other) culture, this festival visits Rotterdam from the 25th till the...
Ard's Dozen Of Musings About 2018
In 2018 I saw 156 films, or 155 if you count two of the three Deadpool 2s as one. While that may seem like a lot to some people, what this number tells ME is that I've spent less time...
Camera Japan 2018 Review: DESTINY, THE TALE OF KAMAKURA Is Sugar Sweeeeeeeet...
This year, the Dutch Camera Japan Festival is being held for the 13th time, and to celebrate that, its theme is "superstition and the supernatural". Opening the Rotterdam leg of the festival was Yamazaki Takashi's new fantasy Destiny, The Tale...
The Dutch Camera Japan Festival 2018 Reveals Its Great Line-up
September is almost upon us, and here in The Netherlands it doesn't just mean the arrival of Autumn and a downturn in the weather, but also that the Camera Japan Festival will soon start. Beginning in Rotterdam and moving a...
BEFORE WE VANISH: New Trailer For U.S. Theatrical Release
Super LTD will be releasing Before We Vanish the twentieth film from acclaimed horror director Kiyoshi Kurosawa in U.S. cinemas on February 2nd. The director of perennial favorites like Cure and Pulse looked to reinvent the alien invasion movie as...
Camera Japan 2017 Review: In BEFORE WE VANISH, Kurosawa Kiyoshi Gets Emotional
An alien invasion film, made by Kurosawa Kiyoshi? That almost sounds too good to be true. And it is, kind-of. Yes, there is an alien invasion, but not surprisingly, Kurosawa is not much interested in displays of grand destruction, monsters...
Camera Japan 2017 Review: KODOKU MEATBALL MACHINE Minces A Lot Of Meat
Twelve years ago, a small film called Meatball Machine by directors Yamaguchi Yudai and Yamamoto Yun'ichi made a bloody splash in the festival circuit. In it, you could see two star-crossed loners falling in love with each other, only for...
Our Favorite Faces Of Jackie Chan
This week saw the North American wide release of Martin Campbell's thriller The Foreigner, starring Jackie Chan and Pierce Brosnan. For Jackie, it's actually his second film in the current box office top-10, as he also voices one of the...
Camera Japan 2017 Review: Lee Sang-il's RAGE Keeps You Guessing
A lot of films tend to look unpolished, and bland, handheld video is often accepted to be good enough it seems. Not so with the films of Lee Sang-il, which look as bright and shiny as if the visuals have...
Camera Japan 2017 Review: LOVE AND OTHER CULTS Minds The Details
It's fair to say that ever since his Greatful Dead was released, we've been fans of director Uchida Eiji. That film presented a decidedly offbeat look at Japanese society, and Uchida showed he wasn't afraid to use pitch-black comedy and...
Camera Japan 2017 Review: NAPPING PRINCESS (aka. ANCIEN AND THE MAGIC TABLET)
Japanese director Kamiyama Kenji has been around in the anime landscape for decades, also as writer, artist, animator, and producer. Peer carefully and you can find his name on the credits of titles like Akira and Roujin-Z already. He is...
