Jun 20, 2025
This week: we take a look at the genre of the yakuza movie, or ninkyo eiga, which started off as a branch of the samurai film genre before becoming very much its own thing--and, for a decade or so in the 1960s and 1970s, dominating the Japanese box office.
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Jun 13, 2025
This week: we take a look at postwar samurai film/jidaigeki in order to understand better the trajectory of the most influential genre in the history of Japanese film. Why did jidaigeki, a staple of pre-1945 film, storm back with a vengeance to the big screen after the end of World War II? What makes post-1945 samurai...
Jun 6, 2025
This week, we're starting a history of the most famous genre in the history of Japanese film: the jidaigeki, and its related genre of the ninkyo eiga. This week: what do we know about early jidaigeki, and how do they fit into the wider history of early Japanese film?
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May 30, 2025
This week: we wrap up the miniseries with the end of Akebono's career, as the first gaijin yokozuna takes his post-dohyo trajectory in a very different direction from the other yokozuna before him (or at least, from most of the other yokozuna before him). Plus some final thoughts on sumo today.
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May 23, 2025
This week: Akebono becomes a yokozuna, and finds himself burdened with new expectations on and off the dohyo. Plus, a brief foray into pay and compensation for rikishi, and a final section on one of the most infamous moments of the 64th yokozuna's career.
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