5 beautiful Japanese travel movies
That noted font of all wisdom, Madonna Louise Ciccone, once claimed that, “just one day out of life” constitutes a holiday. Ludicrous, obviously, but if a day is all you have, why not book a first-class seat on your sofa and check out these five fab flicks shot in some of the most scenic parts of Japan?
1. "Sekai No Chuushin De, Ai Wo Sakebu"
(“Crying Out Love, In The Center Of The World”)
Setting: Shikoku
Year: 2004
Director: Isao Yukisada
English-subtitled version available: Yes
Set around the island of Shikoku -- mostly Takamatsu and Aji -- “Sekai No Chuushin De, Ai Wo Sakebu” is an adaptation of the successful manga by Kyoichi Katayama, himself born up the road in Ehime.
The movie was a smash hit, making a star of teenage lead actress Masami Nagasawa, and is a tear-jerking tale of young love in the face of impending doom.
Aji is a sentimental old coastal town, perfect for the film’s 1980s setting. Its sleepy streets yawn wide, pocked with suspended power lines and rickety wooden buildings that hug the tarmac. There’s even a streetcar.
A constant background (and sometimes foreground) fixture in the movie is the Seto Inland Sea, which stretches to meet an expansive blue sky smeared only lightly with fluffy white clouds.
From the quaint harbor, whose jetties are lined with speedboats and small fishing trawlers, lead couple Sakutaro (Takao Osawa) and Aki (Nagasawa) take a ride to Yume Island (which as far as we can work out doesn’t really exist; there are plenty of very real desert islands though), where sandy beaches, imposing cliffs and a lush forest hide a dilapidated abandoned resort hotel.
And with this film you even get a bonus trip to Ayers Rock/Uluru in Australia -- talk about jet-set. Just remember to have a pack of tissues handy -- “Sekai No Chuushin De, Ai Wo Sakebu” is the kind of weepy movie that makes you want to cling tightly to the ones you love in case they disappear forever.
2. “Shimotsuma Monogatari”
(“Kamikaze Girls”)
Setting: Ibaraki Prefecture
Year: 2004
Director: Tetsuya Nakashima
English-subtitled version available: Yes
Directed by an ad-director-turned-filmmaker and based on a book by 18th-century-France obsessive Novala Takemoto, "Shimotsuma Monogatari" is an amazing film on many levels.
You want Lolita fashion, girl biker gangs, heavily saturated shots of wide-open landscapes and a smattering of comedy and fight scenes? Look no further.
Released abroad as “Kamikaze Girls,” the Japanese title means “Shimotsuma Story,” and the film was shot on location in the countryside town of the same name.
Loner Momoko (Kyoko Fukada) loves nothing better than to escape to Tokyo on shopping trips, so Shimotsuma Station seems to be where she gets a lot of her thinking done; she also has a heart-to-heart with unlikely new best friend, yankii (delinquent) Ichigo (Anna Tsuchiya), at Tobanoe Station, a popular haunt among train-spotters, FYI.
Then there’s a showdown at Pachinko Slot MGM, a den of wretched souls (in the film, anyway) that lies a 15-minute walk east of Shimotsuma Station on National Route 125. Another 20 minutes takes you to Jusco, the value hypermarket where Ichigo proudly announces she’d bought her terrible biker outfit.
The cluttered kitsch cafe with French-maid waitresses where Momoko and Ichigo chat is Mori No Yakata (Forest Mansion -- though its name at the time of shooting was the more fitting Kizoku No Mori, or Forest of the Aristocrats).
Many homes in Shimotsuma sustained structural damage in the earthquake of March 11 and lost electricity and water for a while. The annual cherry blossom was cancelled, as is this August’s fireworks display.
Some scenes were also shot in Ushiku, on the other side of Tsukuba. The jaw-dropping 120-meter-tall Buddha statue is at Ushiku Daibutsu. Visitors can climb up to the statue’s fourth floor, take in the zoo and botanical gardens or the pond just behind the statue, where the film’s final fight takes place.
