Rurouni Kenshin

[doug maverick]

i think i may have mentioned this on some thread somewhere ill look for some ink to go with this trailer but for now.............bask in it!!!!


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObdlL...&feature=share


sorry i somehow posted the wrong trailer.

[RenDaHai]

That trailer is fake, contains scenes from Zatoichi amongst others.

Although I did hear about a live action Kenshin movie. That would be cool.

FOr those who don't know Kenshin, watch the first 5 mins;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZkrsZ9geeFc

[doug maverick]

i somehow post the wrong trailer...i corrected it..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObdlL...&feature=share


idk how that fake trailer was posted..

[Lucas]

Oh snap, I've wanted to see live action hitokiri bottousai for a long time now. Thanks for posting that. Looks very promising!!

[RenDaHai]

Ok, I see it now, Awesome!

[GeneChing]

[GeneChing]

All-female Takarazuka Revue set to perform Rurouni Kenshin musical early next year
Krista Rogers
2 days ago



In early 2016, the beloved Rurouni Kenshin series will be getting its first musical adaptation by the Takarazuka Revue, Japan’s all-female musical theater troupe! If you’re a fan of the manga and singing, check out when and where the musical will be performed and start planning accordingly.

Nobuhiro Watsuki’s original Rurouni Kenshin: Meiji Swordsman Romantic Story manga ran in the pages of Shuiesha’s Weekly Shonen Jump magazine between 1994-1999. The story spawned a hit anime series, critically acclaimed OVAs, and, more recently, a live-action film trilogy that starred heart-throb Takeru Satoh and concluded last fall.

The musical production will be performed by the Takarazuka Revue at both the Takarazuka Grand Theater in Takarazuka, Hyogo Prefecture and at the Tokyo Takarazuka Theater in the capital’s Yurakucho district. The Takarazuka Grand Theater run will be from February 5 to March 14, 2016 (advance tickets will go on sale January 9) and the Tokyo Takarazuka Theater run will be from April 1 to May 8, 2016 (advance tickets will go on sale February 28).


One of the unique characteristics of the Takarazuka Revue, besides its all-female ensemble cast, which is famous for staging such productions as The Rose of Versailles, is the division of its members into five different troupes, each of which specializes in a signature style and/or element. The Rurouni Kenshin musical will be performed by the Revue’s Snow Troupe, which is considered “the upholder of traditional dance and opera for the whole company” — fitting for a work of historical fiction such as Kenshin, which is set after Japan’s Meiji Restoration in 1868.

Along with the announcement come some details regarding the main cast members involved in the production. The Snow Troupe’s top otokoyaku (“male role” actor) Seina Sagiri (早霧せいな) and top musumeyaku (“female role” actor) Miyu Sakihi (咲妃みゆ) will presumably portray main characters Kenshin Himura and Kaoru Kamiya in the musical. Shuichiro Koike will be in charge of the script and production.

▼ Top otokoyaku Seina Sagiri



▼ Top musumeyaku Miyu Sakihi



It’s been almost 16 years since the manga concluded, so it’s been a pleasure to see the Rurouni Kenshin revival over the past few years in the form of live-action movies, new manga spin-offs by the original author, and now this new musical production. Since Kenshin‘s fellow Shonen Jump megahit Dragon Ball is also currently experiencing a revival of sorts with two new animated films and an upcoming anime TV series slated to begin on July 5, is it too much to hope that Dragon Ball will also get its own Takarazuka adaptation? We’d just love to see Vegeta played by a no-nonsense, badass female actor!

I must confess that I would totally watch this. I'd even buy tickets for it.

[GeneChing]

3 days starting today. Only playing in one theater in S.F., the Kabuki in Japantown appropriately.

From the Funimation site:

The classic samurai manga hits the big screen in a riveting live-action film trilogy. Rurouni Kenshin: The Legend Ends – in select theaters October 3, 4 & 5 with English subtitles.

[GeneChing]

Real-life Rurouni Kenshin reverse-blade sword to be displayed in Tokyo
Casey Baseel days ago



The sakabato’s journey brings it to Japan’s eastern capital, just like the anime swordsman’s did.

Himura Kenshin, protagonist of the Rurouni Kenshin anime/manga, famously wields a reverse-edged sword called a sakabato. The reason why is pretty easy to see from a storytelling perspective: Being unsharpened along the regular cutting edge for a katana lets Kenshin swing his sakabato with speed and strength in duels without drawing blood or killing his opponent. Having the inner edge sharpened, though, also provides a constant temptation to resort to deadly violence, and a means by which to show Kenshin’s honorable resolution in overcoming it as part of his path to redemption after years as a feared killer.

In real life 19th-century Japan, however, people in the market for a sword didn’t have the luxury of choosing a weapon that sacrificed sharpness in order to accentuate their troubled personal backstory, and so no real-world sakabato existed. Well, at least none existed until recently, when Japanese swordsmith Kanekuni Ogawa created one, called the Sakabato Shinuchi (meaning “Sakabato Truly Forged”)

▼ Kanekuni Ogawa


Based in the town of Seki, which has been known for its swordsmiths for centuries, Ogawa is so talented that he, personally, has been awarded the title of “important tangible cultural property” by the city. Upon the sword’s completion, it was exhibited in the Meijimura historical building park in Aichi Prefecture, in connection with Rurouni Kenshin being set in the Meiji period of Japanese history.

Now, though, just as the emperor of Japan moved from Kyoto to Tokyo in the Meiji period, so too is the Sakabato Shinuchi coming to the capital, where it will be displayed from April 24.

Even for those who’ve never read the manga or watched the anime (Ogawa himself had never seen either before taking on the project), the Sakabato Shinuchi is a striking piece, and has a singular beauty among Japanese swords. Because its blade is on the other side of where it would be on a normal katana, the real-life sakabato also has completely unique hamon (tempering marks), with the undulation being more prevalent along the inner curve of the flat.

▼ Sakabato Shinuchi, during its display at Meijimura



As is customary for swords in Japan, the Sakabato Shinuchi will be displayed without a handle. This is done because the nakago (the part of the hilt that extends into the handle) is where Japanese swordsmiths inscribe their names, though in the case of the Sakabato Shinuchi, Ogawa has instead carved the death poem of Arai Shakku, the smith who forged Kenshin’s sakabato in the anime, since that’s what’s on the nakago in the source material.



The sword will be displayed as part of the travelling Ruruni Kenshin Exhibition, celebrating the franchise’s 25th anniversary. The Tokyo exhibition will take place from April 24 to June 7 at Gallery AaMo, part of the Tokyo Dome City complex adjacent to Tokyo Dome, with tickets available online here.

Event information
Rurouni Kenshin Exhibition / るろうに剣心展
Venue: Gallery AaMo / ギャラリー アーモ
Address: Tokyo-to, Bunkyo-ku, Koraku 1-3-61
東京都文京区後楽１丁目３−６１
website

THREADS
Katana
Arms & Armor Museum Exhibits
Rurouni Kenshin

[GeneChing]

Jun 7, 2021 10:16pm PT
Shanghai Film Festival Ticket Prices Exceed $550 as Demand Soars

By Rebecca Davis


Rurouni Kenshin The Final
Warner Bros. Japan
At a time when viewers around the world remain wary of returning to cinemas, the Shanghai International Film Festival (SIFF) once again can’t keep up with local audiences. Demand is so high that viewers are paying enormous sums to get hold of scalped tickets, including more than $300 to see an art house film released more than two decades ago.

The festival sparks an annual online crush as film lovers vie Black Friday-style for its limited tickets the moment they’re released for sale. SIFF sold nearly 150,000 tickets within five minutes on the first day of sales in 2019, and more than 100,000 tickets in ten minutes last year, despite occurring as an in-person event just weeks after cinemas reopened for the first time post-COVID-19.

With theater capacity still capped at 75%, the event’s 2021 iteration set to run from June 11-20 has proved just as popular, despite the full line-up being announced just two days before sales began. More than 400 films will screen at SIFF this year, among them 73 world premieres, 42 international premieres, 89 Asian premieres and 99 Chinese premieres, totaling 303 premieres in all.

Ticket sales on the ticketing platform Taopiaopiao, the festival’s sole official online retailer, opened at 8AM local time last Friday. Frantic buyers crashed the platform’s app within the first minute of sales. By 8:05AM, the platform issued a public apology for technical difficulties and a related hashtag became a top 20 most searched term on China’s Twitter-like Weibo platform.

The rush for tickets even ensnared a reporter for the government-run CCTV 6 movie channel doing a live demo of the ticket-buying process.

“It’s 8:01AM, and the Taopiaopiao app has already collapsed. Film fans across the entire country are all on here right now,” he said with a tinge of both hilarity and dejection as he repeatedly refreshed purchase pages for “Silence of the Lambs,” “The Godfather 3,” and “The Legend of 1900,” to no avail.

Sky-High Prices
Beyond the technical difficulties thwarting regular movie-goers are cabals of organized scalpers, who fall primarily into two categories: professionals snatching up spots for profitable resale, and passionate fans willing to do whatever it takes to secure a chance to watch their obsessions on the big screen.

Their combined efforts this year propelled tickets on the secondary market to upwards of 20 times their original price, despite efforts from players like Taopiaopiao to stamp out scalping channels such as the eBay-like secondhand sales Xianyu.

For example, while the original ticket price for the restored 4K version of Lee Chang-dong’s “Peppermint Candy” was $17 (RMB110) — already much higher than the national average of around $6 (RMB38) — scalped tickets sold for as much as $313 (RMB2,000).

“At RMB2,000 a ticket, do I get Lee Chang-dong sitting next to me as I watch?” one incredulous film fan joked on Weibo.

Japan Fever
For fans of Japanese content, SIFF screenings can offer a rare opportunity to interact with Japanese idols who rarely do publicity in China, such as Katayose Ryota, who hit the Shanghai red carpet in his first overseas festival appearance in 2019 to promote the animation “Ride Your Wave.”


This year, the most sought-after titles were again Japanese.

Leading the pack were screenings for the five live-action film adaptations of the popular manga “Rurouni Kenshin,” the first non-Hollywood blockbuster franchise to be invited to appear in SIFF’s film franchise section. Most hotly anticipated are the series’ latest two installments, “Rurouni Kenshin: The Final” and “Rurouni Kenshin: The Beginning” — new releases that just debuted in Japan on April 23 and June 4, respectively, selling via scalpers at Shanghai for $280 (RMB1,800) a ticket.

Fans were also eager to get tickets to the world premiere of concert film “ARASHI Anniversary Tour 5 x 20 Film – Record of Memories.” It chronicles one of the last concerts of the 2018-2019 “5×20” tour of long-standing Japanese mega-group Arashi, now on an indefinite hiatus.

Tickets were available on Xianyu for up to $313 (RMB2,000), while at least one sold via a fan group went for a whopping $548 (RMB3,500). Even that is not yet the ceiling: a super-fan in Shenzhen put out a desperate plea over the weekend offering $1,560 (RMB10,000) for a ticket.

The film isn’t even subtitled in Chinese.

Many viewers end up hiring an intermediary team of professional ticket grabbers to nab spots on their behalf for fees that can hit over $100 per seat.

One group that stockpiled popular tickets sent interested buyers a menu of titles and prices between $188 and $282 (RMB1,200-RMB1,800).

“You can’t select a screening time for these tickets – you have to take whatever we give you,” the service explained. “If you can accept these prices, please contact us in two hours. Currently there are so many people asking that we don’t have time to respond.”

threads
Asian-Film-Festivals-and-Awards
Rurouni-Kenshin