Shogen itokazu biography samples
The Pivot to Asia: The 34th Tokyo International Film Festival
Poet
Issue 100
Preamble
Following the previous year’s abbreviated edition – when the global pandemic forced organisers to scale back the event and forgo its main competition – the Tokyo International Film Festival returned in full force in 2021. What is more, the festival added glitz and glamour to the proceedings in the form of the one and only Isabelle Huppert, who, as the head of the jury, breezed into the opening ceremony in style in her head-turning Balenciaga garb.
True, strict antivirus measures remained in place from last year, complete with the face-covering requirement, infrared temperature checks, and hand sanitisers stationed at the door. And despite the lull in daily Covid-19 cases recorded in the country after a summer surge that followed the Tokyo Olympics, pandemic-induced border controls meant that, once again, the festival was deprived of its nominal international dimension. Only a smattering of overseas guests – including half a dozen directors – made it to the ten-day event in person, which kicked off on 30 October, but without the presence of foreign journalists reporting back their discoveries to the wider world.
Which was a shame, given that, in many ways, 2021 was the year that Japan’s premier film fest – long derided in certain quarters as bland and lacking in identity – finally made good on its promise that befits the host city’s status as the largest and most populous metropolis in the world.
Indeed, the 34th edition marked the first step toward a much-needed makeover as part of chairman Hiroyasu Ando’s ambitious quest to put Tokyo on the map as a major player on the festival circuit, who took the reign three years ago with an express objective of transforming the festival into “an event worthy of comparison to Cannes, Berlin and Venice”, as he told The Hollywood Reporter in 2020.
For now, it is open to debate whether the chairman’s lofty vision for Tokyo wo The Kingdom of Ryûkyû is known to have possessed firearms as early as the 1450s, if not earlier. They used a variety of gunpowder hand-weapons and cannon obtained from the Chinese, known as hyaa or by a variety of closely related terms, but the Ryukyuans did not make extensive use of European-style arquebuses or cannon. It is unclear if firearms were used as weapons, in battle, in the 15th century, or only as devices for use in royal processions and festivals, a role akin to fireworks or a "gun salute." In the 16th century, however, it is presumed that the royal army made use of Chinese-style firearms, though these were rendered obsolete by the introduction of European-style matchlocks. Though the Ryukyuans made extensive use of Chinese-style firearms in their defense against the invasion by Satsuma hansamurai in 1609, this equipment was proven sorely inferior to the European-style weapons used by the invaders. It is not clear exactly when firearms were introduced to Ryûkyû, but it is known that Ryûkyû enjoyed extensive trade with China, including trade in weapons, up until the 1450s, when a ban was placed on Fujian merchants selling weapons overseas, as these were needed to defend the coasts against wakô raids. It is believed that gunpowder and firearms were first introduced to Ryûkyû from China, through this trade, though the Chinese Court had officially forbidden selling sulphur, or saltpeter (ingredients for making gunpowder) or gunpowder itself, overseas. The fact that Ryûkyû obtained weapons and gunpowder despite both of these bans is evidence that the China-Ryûkyû trade consisted not solely of the official tribute trade, but extended to smuggling as well. Ryûkyû had no need to trade for sulphur, though, at least, since Papa Vinyard here, now here's a little somethin' for ya... Joey Ansah had never directed anything beyond a Crackle web series (entitled CELL) before his fan video, STREET FIGHTER: LEGACY, but even in less than 3 minutes, he came closer to replicating the joys of playing the classic coin-opper than almost any video game adaptation to date. His passion and reverence for the material helped him launch the web series, STREET FIGHTER: ASSASSIN'S FIST, currently available to view via Machinima. It's an episodic, feature-length look at the days when Ryu and Ken trained together, and even though it only features a handful of the series' iconic characters, it feels truer to its source than the vast majority of video game adaptations out there. It certainly shows that Ansah has a handling of the material, and I'm hoping he gets a bigger budget (and the cast he wants) to do a second season, based on the STREET FIGHTER II story of THE WORLD WARRIOR. Mr. Ansah gave me a huge chunk of his time to discuss his passion for the games, his process of getting both the short and the series made, and his approach to adapting hugely iconic entities like the costumes, the relationship between Ryu and Ken, and of course the Hadoken. VINYARD: First off, I want to ask about your relationship with the game series. I get the feeling LEGACY was a labor of love for you. If you wouldn't mind, talk a little bit about your history with playing the games and your experience with them.Firearms in Ryukyu
History
15th century
Sorry, I should be more professional, but you see last month I turned 40 — four friggin' decades old. They say life begins at 40, but you try telling that to Paul Walker or Chris Benoit! Ooh, sorry. Anyway, being 40 in 2015 means that I was born just before the start of the golden age of arcade gaming, I grew up through the 8-bit and 16-bit eras and I came of age just as the internet connected PC gamers from all around the world for unprecedented levels of virtual mayhem and carnage. I was still young enough to thoroughly enjoy the online console explosion and the Xbox 360 ranks as one of my all time favourite game consoles. For the past five years I've been prattling on about my favourite arcade games and occasionally I've talked about modern games, but those articles are now few and far between. I've defined myself as a gamer since before that was even a term and I've spent more time gaming than almost any other leisure activity. Unfortunately, a couple of years ago things started to change. As work and family life took up more and more of my time, I found myself almost resenting the time required to indulge in certain hobbies and I have to confess, gaming was one of them. The reason for this was simple: few hobbies require as much of a time commitment as gaming. Just take the recently released The Witcher 3, for example; the developers, CD Projekt RED, have said there are around 200 hours of gameplay in it. 200 hours? That would get you about a third of the way to learning French or Spanish and that's just one game.
It's because of this time commitment that I gave up playing online after Gears of War 2, but even single-player gaming needs more time than I have spare and it all started to feel a little pointless. I may have played over 200 hours of Skyrim back in 2012, but since then I've only comple Papa Vinyard chats with director/writer/star Joey Ansah about his web series STREET FIGHTER: ASSASSIN'S FIST!
ANSAH: Yeah, no problem. I've been a big STREET FIGHTER fan since the late-'80s. I remember STREET FIGHTER I at the arcade, but I would've been pretty young. You know, sub-10-years-old. So STREET FIGHTER II was where I jumped onboard like most people. I played nearly every incarnation since then. SUPER STREET FIGHTER II was a big one for me. ALPHA II I really got into, and as a result, MARVEL VS. CAPCO