The turn from late September to early October is a transitional period: the matters of graduate recommendation, grant papers, and so on have all come to a close, and a new era is about to unfold.
At the same time, it also happens to be anime season-change time. Japanese anime is generally broadcast by the season, and many series are one season or two seasons long—around 13 episodes or 26 episodes. During this stretch from late September to early October, I happened to catch the endings of various new shows I was watching in sequence; for about a week before that I watched more than a dozen finales back to back, and then the next week I watched even more openings. It felt quite magical. If I still feel like it in a couple of days, perhaps I’ll pick a few anime I’ve just finished and write some comments on them. Although this batch of anime doesn’t include any especially outstanding classics, since I did watch them all the way through from beginning to end—and even watched so many finales in a row—it inevitably leaves quite a few impressions…
I’m posting the ED (ending theme) of one of them, Heroic Age. Whatever the quality of the anime itself may be—I don’t especially recommend it—this ED is still rather impressive. But somehow it always feels to me that listening to the full version of the ED music isn’t quite as moving as hearing the excerpt at the end of the anime…
Latest Comments
Yiwu
2007-10-10 20:57:50 [Reply]
These past few days, under Baozi’s leadership, our whole class watched a Japanese film together—Tokyo Story, 1953, black-and-white, directed by Ozu Yasujiro.
http://so.youku.com/search_video/q_%E4%B8%9C%E4%BA%AC%E7%89%A9%E8%AF%AD
It’s worth a look. Maybe the younger you are, the more you should watch it.
My biggest impression after watching it was
Life is serious
Human life is serious
Yiwu
2007-10-10 21:10:24 [Reply]
By the way, congratulations on succeeding in the graduate recommendation process~
I wish you an even better place in the post-recommendation era.
Gu Bi
2007-10-10 21:38:17 [Reply]
Life is serious
Human life is serious?
…I’m afraid that isn’t what Japanese culture tends to express. The spirit of bushidō says that life is like a game, and human life is like a game; of course, games are serious.
There is a tension of wild laughter and seriousness in Japanese culture. Perhaps you see more of the serious side, but to me Japanese culture is ultimately summed up by one character: “wild.” Of course, the cultural spirit embodied in Japanese anime today is already somewhat removed from bushidō, but there is still a profound expression of it—I call it the spirit of “wild laughter.”
Yiwu
2007-10-10 21:52:07 [Reply]
Didn’t you say you were pluralistic?
Why must you insist on seeing it in that style you call Japanese?
Some things are common to all humanity. They are so fundamental that even Japan’s particular style may fade away.
What you’re watching are all contemporary works, or at least works from within the last 30 years. In 1952, World War II had just ended. It was a very good time for reflection; of course, by then Japan had already begun massive economic development, so perhaps there was no time for that anymore.
But film is film.
This film is this film.
At the very least, take a look at the introduction.
Gu Bi
2007-10-10 22:09:14 [Reply]
Because you emphasized that it was a “Japanese film,” and within the context where I was talking about Japanese anime, of course I have to connect it to Japanese culture.
Yiwu
2007-10-10 22:11:47 [Reply]
After I finished writing the above, I thought of that.
Translated from the Chinese original with AI assistance. The original text is authoritative.
Leave a Reply