Pride [J-Drama] (Kimura Takuya, Takeuchi Yuko)
[requested]
- Title: プライド
- Title (English): Pride
- Genre: Sports, Human drama
- Episodes: 11
- Viewership ratings: 25.1
- Broadcasted network: Fuji TV
- Broadcast period: 2004-Jan-12 to 2004-Mar-22
- Theme song: I Was Born To Love You by Queen
Synopsis
Halu (Kimura Takuya) is the captain and star player of an ice hockey team, who is greatly respected by his teammates. For him, hockey is serious business that fully occupies his mind, while he treats romance as if it were a game.
Aki (Takeuchi Yuko) is a typical OL (office lady), and is waiting for her boyfriend to return from studying architecture abroad. At this point in time however, he shows no sign of coming back. One day, Aki’s friends who are determined to find her a new boyfriend, invite her to watch an ice hockey game. There she sees Halu for the first time.
After the game, Aki and her friends join the players for a party celebrating their victory. Yuko, however, is not so excited to be there. When she leaves the party, she bumps into Halu, who was slightly injured from a fight. They exchange e-mail addresses and part.
The sparks of mutual attraction are ignited in a second encounter between Aki and Halu, arranged with the help of her friends shortly after a party.
Hyodo (Sato Koichi) has come as a replacement for the team’s coach who has been hospitalized. Halu has a lot of respect for the hospitalized coach. Unfortunately, he can’t stand Hyodo’s way of doing things. Bringing with him a lot of coaching experience from overseas, Hyodo criticizes the former coach’s strategies. Whenever Halu and Hyodo see each other, they get into a quarrel; consequently influencing Halu’s behavior during games.
Seeing that his game ended in a brawl, Aki visits Halu to comfort him. But he tells her that she is being too friendly with him.
Aki is hurt, Halu is irritated, and his teammate Hotta (Sakaguchi Kenji) can’t stand seeing Kimura like this…
Cast
- Kimura Takuya as Satonaka Halu
- Takeuchi Yuko as Murase Aki
- Sakaguchi Kenji as Hotta Yamato
- Ichikawa Somegoro as Ikegawa Tomonori
- Sato Ryuta as Shimamura Makoto
- Nakagoshi Noriko as Aizawa Yuri
- Megumi as Ishikawa Chika
- Ishida Yuriko as Yoko
- Sato Koichi as Hyodo Yuichiro
- Takizawa Saori as Sonoda Saeko
- Namioka Kazuki as Nishida Naritoshi
- Tokito Saburo as Anzai (ep1)
- Mizukawa Asami (ep4)
- Kazama Morio (ep5)
- Yamaguchi Miyako (ep5)
- Matsuzaka Keiko as Halu’s mom (ep6)
- Tanihara Shosuke (ep7-11)
- Arai Hirofumi
Snowy Love Fallin’ in Spring [J-Movie] (Satoru Tsumabuki, Yuko Takeuchi)
Japanese Title: Haru no Yuki
Release Year in Japan: 2005
Director: Isao Yukisada
Casts: Satoru Tsumabuki (Kiyoaki Matsueda), Yuko Takeuchi (Satoko Ayakura)
Based on Yukio Mishima’s classic novel, “Snowy Love” depicts a tragic romance between a high-society young man and a young woman who is already engaged with a royal family member in Taisho era. It is often classified as an art-oriented literature film, but also can be considered as another “pure-love” film, popular genre in Japan that was brought to the main stream by “Crying Out for Love, in the Center of the World” of the same director.
The film is nominated in 9 categories in Japan Academy Awards 2006.
Midnight Eagle [J-Movie] (Takeuchi Yuko, Takao Osawa)
Midnight Eagle (ミッドナイト・イーグル Middonaito Iiguru) is a 2007 action film directed by Izuru Narushima and written by Yasuo Hasegawa and Kenzaburo Iida, based on the novel by Tetsuo Takashima. Midnight Eagle is the third film directed by Izuru Narushima.
The film opened in the United States on October 2, 2007 in Los Angeles. It was also shown October 20, 2007 at the Tokyo International Film Festival.[2] The film opened in limited release in the United States in New York City on November 23, 2007, and opened in Los Angeles on December 7, 2007.
Cast
- Takao Osawa as Yuji Nishizaki
- Yuko Takeuchi as Keiko Arisawa
- Hiroshi Tamaki as Shinichiro Ochiai
- A-Saku Yoshida as Major Akihiko Saeki
- Yoshihiko Hakamada as Toshimitsu Fuyuki
- Nao Omori as Major Kensuke Saito
- Ken Ishiguro as Tadao Miyata
- Tatsuya Fuji as Prime Minister Watarase
Plot
A top secret American forces strategic bomber known as “Midnight Eagle” suddenly vanishes in the Northern Alps. Its payload is a specialized nuclear warhead. If it were to explode, the entire nation of Japan would be hurled into an unprecedented calamity. Prime Minister Takafumi Watarase convenes an emergency meeting of the Security Council of Japan. An elite squad from the Self-Defense Force able to operate in severe mountains conditions is formed, and heads off to try and recover the fuselage. Amidst the violent barrage of gunfire from agents of an enemy nation, an actual war is about to begin in the heart of Japan, 62 years after the end of World War II.
As former war photographer Yuji Nishizaki spends time in the mountains taking pictures of the skies, he is startled by gunfire, and notices the freshly spilled blood of soldiers on the snow. Aware that his country is under attack, Nishizaki seizes his camera and heads for the battlefield.
In Tokyo we encounter Keiko Arisawa, the only sister of Nishizaki’s wife, who has died of illness. As Nishizaki never fully acknowledged his wife’s condition, Keiko is extremely resentful of Nishizaki. Two years have passed since her sister’s death, but Keiko still cannot forgive Nishizaki. While continuing to work as a magazine reporter, she has taken over custody of her sister and Nishizaki’s son.
Nishizaki, his high school friend, the newspaper journalist Shinichiro Ochiai, and Major Akihiko Saeki of the Self-Defense Forces, find themselves In the midst of a terrible blizzard as they are desperately heading towards Midnight Eagle. Simultaneously in Tokyo, Keiko contacts an agent who might shed light on an accident she has become privy to. The agent reveals to her the situation going on in the Northern Alps.
Each protagonist is driven by a different set of motivations. Nishizaki risks his life in a battle to protect the life of the one he loves; Ochiai doesn’t flinch from the onslaught of the enemy, his journalistic instinct driving him to record reality; Saeki risks all to protect his country and fulfill his professional duty as a member of the Self-Defense Forces. As to Takafumi Watarase, the anguished Prime Minister, he has no choice but to entrust the future of Japan to these three men. At last, Keiko finds the ﾒkeyﾓ to the incident that will determine everyone’s fate.
With only two and a half hours remaining until the specialized warhead is to explode, will Keiko save Nishizaki, Ochiai and Saeki, and bring to a halt the crisis, which could change the fate of Japan?
Closed Notes [Jmovie] (Sawajiri Erika, Yusuke Iseya, Yuko Takeuchi)
Title: クローズド・ノート
English: “Closed Note”
(Kurozudo noto)
Release: September 29, 2007 (nationwide cinema release)
Production Company: Toho
Cast:
Sawajiri Erika
Yusuke Iseya (Casshern, Memories of Matsuko, Honey & Clover, …)
Yuko Takeuchi (The Ring (Ringu), Be with You, Spring Snow, …)
Director:
Isao Yukisada (”Crying Out Love, in the Center of the World”, …)
Like the drama ? Try the soundtrack CD to support the artist and nhatkyviet.com
Synopsis
Kae, a college student who dreams of becoming a teacher, discovers a notebook in the house she has just moved into. The notebook turns out to be the diary of a woman, Mano Ibuki, who had just started teaching in primary school. Kae becomes absorbed by the woman’s pure heart, reading about her life and love. She falls for a painter, Ishitobi, while working at her part time job. As time passes, she finds out an unexpected sad truth.
Theme Song: Love & Truth (By YUI.)
Heaven Bookstore [Jmovie] (Yuko Takeuchi)
Heaven’s Bookstore (天国の本屋 ‘Tengoku no honya) is a 2004 Japanese film directed by Tetsuo Shinohara about a struggling classical pianist who is sent to heaven to work in a bookstore. It is based on two novels, written by Atsushi Matsuhisa and Wataru Tanaka.
Plot
Kenta (Tetsuji Tamayama), a classical pianist, is fired from his orchestra, and gets drunk in a bar. He wakes up the following morning in what turns out to be a bookstore in heaven. The owner of the bookstore had brought him there, and explains that people live to be 100; people who die before this age go to heaven to live out the rest of their allotted time, before they are reborn on earth.
In heaven he meets Shoko (Yuko Takeuchi), a pianist who he had admired on earth. Together, they start work on a special composition that she had started writing but not finished on earth.
Meanwhile, on earth, Shoko’s niece Natsuko (also played by Yuko Takeuchi) wants to organise a fireworks display that was discontinued twelve years ago. It turns out that Shoko had been engaged to Takimoto (Teruyuki Kagawa), a talented firework maker, but her hearing had been damaged by a firework accident he caused. As a result she stopped playing music, he stopped making fireworks, they split up, and later she died.
Natsuko wants Takimoto to make his special ‘loving fireworks’ for the fireworks display. These are the special fireworks that inspired Shoko to compose her special composition, uncompleted when Takimoto stopped making them. He is vehnemently opposed to making fireworks again.
However, at the end of the firework display ‘loving fireworks’ unexpectedly appear in the sky, set-off by Takimoto. Kenta returns to earth and plays Shoko’s now completed composition to accompany them. Natsuko and Kenta meet. They run off laughing into the dark.
Like the movie ? Buy the DVD to support the artists and nhatkyviet.com
Funniest and Saddest films by Japanese viewers
Survey by Oricon.
Funniest
1. The Uchoten Hotel.
2. Maiko Haaaan!!!
3. Trick.
4. Home Alone.
5. The Mask.
Saddest
1. Titanic.
2. Crying Out Love, In the Center of the World.
3. Armageddon.
4. Ima, Ai ni Yukimasu.
5. Always: Sanchome no Yuhi.
5. Koizora.
7. Grave of the Fireflies.
8. The Green Mile.
8. Taiyou no Uta.
10. Nada Sousou