Spirited Away (千と千尋の神隠し) at Maridon Museum, May 23.

Butler's Maridon Museum will present the 2001 Japanese animated film Spirited Away on Friday, March 23. A brief summary of the Hayao Miyazaki / Studio Ghibli film from a 2002 A.V. Club review:

Spirited Away centers on Chihiro, a sullen, fearful Japanese girl whose parents are moving so far out into the country that they predict they'll have to drive to the next town just to shop. While traveling to their new home, they discover an abandoned, disintegrating theme park, which they cheerfully explore in spite of Chihiro's shrill protests. Suddenly, a boy approaches her and commands her to leave before nightfall. But before she can gather her wayward parents and escape, night does fall, in a breathtakingly eerie sequence that almost subsumes Chihiro's danger with its technical achievement. Chihiro is trapped in the spirit world, and in order to save herself, her parents, and eventually her new friend, she has to come to terms with herself and her unwitting captors. Gradually, in a series of almost episodic adventures, she learns to be brave and face up to her responsibilities to herself and the people she loves.

Wikipedia sums up its reception:

When released, Spirited Away became the most successful film in Japanese history, grossing over $274 million worldwide. The film overtook Titanic (at the time the top grossing film worldwide) in the Japanese box office to become the highest-grossing film in Japanese history with a $229,607,878 total. Acclaimed by international critics, the film is often considered one of the greatest animated films of all-time [and it won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature at the 75th Academy Awards, the Golden Bear at the 2002 Berlin International Film Festival (tied with Bloody Sunday) and is among the top ten in the BFI list of the 50 films you should see by the age of 14.

The Maridon is an Asian art museum located at 322 N. McKean St. in downtown Butler, roughly 40 miles north of Pittsburgh (map). The movie begins at 6:00 and is free and open to the public; reservations are required, though, and can be made by calling 724-282-0123. The movie is dubbed in English.

The "PITT" リサイクルコットン Tee, seen in Kagawa Prefecture. Part of the Spring 2014 collection by Free Rage.


From the Free Rage website.

Taiwanese film Yi Yi (一一) at Maridon Museum, May 15.

The Taiwanese film Yi Yi (一一, A One and a Two) will play at Butler's Maridon Museum (map) on May 15 as the last of three installments of the museum's Spring Film Series.

A lengthy 2011 Alt Screen post quotes from numerous contemporary and retrospective reviews the 2000 film. From a hyperbolic 2009 Salon review of what "might be the greatest [film] ever":

For me, Edward Yang’s “Yi Yi: A One and a Two …” may be the greatest film ever, let alone the best of the decade. What does that mean? For starters, it means that Yang’s final film lies somewhere between formalist hard-assery and middlebrow accessibility, between slow-burning Ozu and — in the abruptly climaxing story lines of the last hour — understated soap opera. In telling the story of a Taiwanese family in crisis, Yang has three hours to zero in on what makes one family’s members tick while positioning them exactly in the center of late-20th-century global economics: micro- and macro-, both specifically Taiwanese in its business scenes and universal in its familial dynamics.

The movie starts at 6:00 pm, is presented by Slippery Rock's Dr. Ken Harris, and runs nearly three hours.

CineFestAsia in Erie, May 9 and 10.

The Erie Asian Pacific American Association and the Film Society of North Western Pennsylvania will present CineFestAsia on May 9 and 10 at the Erie Art Museum (map). Friday's opening reception is free and is followed by the world premiere of the Korean documentary Entering the Second Half (잘 살거야) and a discussion with the filmmaker, Heyjin Jun. The Korean title translates to "I Will Live Well" and is

a short documentary on victims of leprosy who have been exiled from society for decades but came to dream of their new lives and talked about hope for the future at their ages of 70s since they learned reading, writing, singing, computer and performing on the stage for the first time of their lives. They are scared but try to step forward towards the society which once abandoned them.

(The name of the South Korean island is Sorok-do, and a Google search will lead to more on the topic.)

Singapore's Ilo Ilo will also run on the 9th, while Transit, The Lady, and Bhaag Milka Bhaag will play on the 10th. Tickets are $5 each. Times and trailers are available by visiting the Erie APAA website and clicking CineFestAsia.

Peelander-Z in Pittsburgh, May 7.

From Facebook.

Japanese punk band Peelander-Z will play Altar Bar in the Strip District on May 7. The show starts at 7:00 pm, and tickets are $10. Wikipedia provides an overview of their shows:

They perform on stage and appear in color-coordinated costumes, which they state are not costumes, but their skin. The costumes range from sentai style suits, to kimono, to rubber Playmobil style wigs. There is also a tiger costume and a giant squid/guitar costume to coincide with the song "Mad Tiger". Another aspect of their routine is their on-stage antics such as human bowling (diving head-first into bowling pins), pretending to hit each other with chairs in imitation of pro-wrestlers, and mid-performance piggyback rides. They often allow audience members on stage to join in on the fun, and often dive into the audience or hang from a balcony as part of their act.

They were last in Pittsburgh in September.

Original Godzilla film at Regent Square Theater, May 5 through May 8.

Via Wikipedia.

The original version of the 1954 Japanese movie Godzilla will play at the Regent Square Theater (map) from May 5 through May 8. From the Pittsburgh Filmmakers website:

It spawned 60 years of sequels, remakes, and rip-offs, but the original over-sized sea creature is as thrilling as ever. The US version was not only badly dubbed, it was revised, re-cut, and re-arranged to add scenes with Raymond Burr as a reporter. To make room (and to excise the strong anti-nuclear subtext) 40 minutes were deleted. This is the restored original: the monster, awakened after millennia by hydrogen bomb testing – and impervious to repeated shelling by the Japanese army – wreaks havoc on Tokyo. With subtitles.

Short Peace (ショート・ピース) at Hollywood Theater, May 3 and 4.

The 2013 Japanese animated anthology film, Short Peace (ショート・ピース), is coming to the Hollywood Theater in Dormont (map) this weekend, and tickets for the two showings, May 3 at 1:00 pm and May 4 at 7:00 pm, are available online.

This omnibus film called Short Peace, which consists of 4 short animated films. One of the films from Short Peace was nominated for this year's Academy Awards. Short Peace is also from the creator of AKIRA, Katsuhiro Otomo. in Japanse language with English subtitles

That nominee, Possessions, was in Pittsburgh earlier in the year. The complete film will have a nationwide release from April 18.

The theater is located at 1449 Potomac Ave. in Dormont, and is accessible by Pittsburgh's subway/LRT at a block south of Potomac Station.

2014 Korean Food Bazaar, May 3 in Shadyside.

The Korean Central Church of Pittsburgh (피츠버그한인중앙교회) will hold their 19th annual Korean Food Bazaar (바자회) on Saturday, May 3, from 10:30 am to 4:00 pm. The church is located at 821 South Aiken Ave. in Shadyside (map).

We went in 2012; it was good.

A few movies of note from the 2014 Silk Screen Asian-American Film Festival, April 26 through May 4.

The 2014 Silk Screen Asian-American Film Festival schedule was announced on March 26, with times and locations on the Silk Screen website. The annual festival runs from April 26 through May 4, with screenings at four local theaters. Here's a quick look at the festival's movies and short films from East Asia and thus of most relevance to this blog:






A Time in Quchi (暑假作业), Taiwan; Bunta, China; Cheong, South Korea; Confession of Murder (내가 살인범이다), South Korea; The Garden of Words (言の葉の庭), Japan; Hide and Seek (숨바꼭질), South Korea; Mourning Recipe (四十九日のレシピ), Japan; Norte, End of History (Norte, hangganan ng kasaysayan); Philippines; Touch of the Light (逆光飛翔), Taiwan; Trap Street, China; Unforgiven (許されざる者), Japan; Why Don't You Play in Hell? (地獄でなぜ悪い), Japan.

Chinese-Korean film Dooman River (두만강) at IUP, April 27.

The IUP 2014 Foreign Film Festival concludes on April 27 with Dooman River (두만강). From The Global Film Initiative:

Writer-director Zhang Lu’s fascinating window into a rarely seen corner of rural China revolves around 12-year-old Chang-ho, living with his grandfather and mute sister along the frozen river-border with North Korea. Although fraught with unemployment and other tensions, his community seems sympathetic toward the Korean refugees fleeing famine and misery; Chang-ho even bonds over soccer with one young border-crosser who comes scavenging food for a sibling. But he soon turns on his new friend as suspicions mount against the illegal immigrants and his sister reels from unexpected aggression, provoking a quandary over his loyalties in an exquisitely detailed story of compassion and strife across an uneasy geopolitical border.

Dooman River will be shown in McVitty Auditorium, Sprowls Hall (campus map) at 5:30 pm and 8:00 pm, and is free and open to the public.