DON'T LAUGH AT MY ROMANCE (2007)

Mirume (played by Ken'ichi Matsuyama from the DEATH NOTE series) is a normal college student. He goes to school, but doesn't seem to be into it too much. One day a new Art teacher, Yuri (Hiromi Nagasaku), shows up and Mirume instantly falls for her, much to the concern of his friend En-chan (Yu Aoi). En-chan is secretly in love with Mirume (and probably has been her entire life), but she's too shy to ever tell him. Mirume appears to consider En-chan as a little sister or maybe even less than that. Either way, he's definitely not into her romantically.

Most viewers would probably be turned off by length of the film (137 minutes) compounded with the fact that pretty much the entire film is made up of long, extended shots where the camera never moves, but I loved every second of it. Was director Nami Iguchi channeling Yasujiro Ozu? The direct cut transition shots to static objects like buildings and roads, the limited use of music (including music heard by the characters), the minimalist camerawork, the character driven story and the lack of tracking shots makes me believe the answer would be yes, but we'll probably never know since I can barely find any information online about this film and she hasn't released another film in over 5 years. I find that to be very depressing because I really admired this film and I found myself thinking about it so much afterwards that I actually sat down and watched it again.

Favorite scenes: Yuri getting a drink out of the refrigerator; Mirume blowing up an inflatable mattress; Mirume showing Yuri how to add oil to the space heater; the fountain shot and every single scene with Yu Aoi. She was amazing. I rented this film because I'm a fan of Ken'ichi Matsuyama and ended up becoming a fan of Yu Aoi also. Well there's another 40 or so movies I'm gonna have to watch! =)

Highly recommended.

I like how the title is written on the screen in English but yet the subtitles are still wrong.

KAIJI: THE ULTIMATE GAMBLER (2009)

[Update 03/09/2021: Need to redo this review completely. Fix the screenshots also.]

I might not be the best person to review this movie since I've never read the manga or seen the anime, but then again that didn't stop me from falling madly in love with DEATH NOTE. I heard about KAIJI because the two stars of DEATH NOTE (Tatsuya Fujiwara and Ken'ichi Matsuyama) reunite in this film and that sounded exciting! And it was, but it was also disappointing because Tatsuya is the main star (and he's great), but Ken'ichi only has a very minor part with probably less then two minutes of actual screen time!

The story is about this dude who has a crappy job with no fucking future. One day he's hard pressed by these evil dudes into going on this cruise ship where he's suppose to gamble away his debt to them (whether or not his debt was actually real I never figured out). So he gambles and ends up as a slave for these people and spends 15 years(?) working on some underground construction. Finally one day he get the chance to gamble his way out if slavery and all kinds of wild shit happens.

I liked the story a lot and enjoyed the movie, but it felt like they were just cramming too much into the movie and skipping right over some important shit. My recommendation is to read the manga first then watch the movie. Personally I liked the story enough that I'm going to try and read them myself before I watch Part 2.

Part 2 - Kaiji 2: The Ultimate Gambler (2011)
Part 3 - Kaiji: Final Game (2020)

DEATH NOTE: L CHANGE THE WORLD (2008)

Yawn. This entire movie is about L. Now I like L, but without his nemesis, Light, he's kinda boring. As you remember from the end of Part 2 L wrote his own name in the Death Note saying that he would die peacefully in 23 days. This is the story of what happens during that time.

It's entertaining, but without Light or Misa (my god she was hot!) or Ryuk the whole thing is disappointing. It's like if there was an episode of "Buffy" starring only Giles. Honestly, if you're a big DEATH NOTE fan I would just skip this film, it's just going to disappoint you. As a stand alone film it's OK, but still boring. Skip it.

I guess I could tell you the plot: L has to stop some terrorist from releasing a deadly virus that will kill everybody on the planet. Of course, if he didn't burn the Death Note at the beginning of the movie he could just kill them. Then again that would be against L's morals.

Part 1
Part 2

DEATH NOTE: THE LAST NAME (2006)

What's up with that Red Hot Chili Peppers song?!  It seemed completely out of place during the closing credits of the first film, but now, not only is it in the closing titles of this second film, but it's played during the opening of the film as well!  It doesn't make any sense.  This is a Japanese language film about death and murder and they start the film with some upbeat California rock song?  It's completely out of place, but it does bring to mind a great movie game: Most Inappropriate Closing Credit Songs (that would completely ruin the mood).  A few examples:

The B-52's - "Love Shack", THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT

The Monkees - (Theme from) The Monkees, PLANET OF THE APES

DMX - "Party Up (Up In Here)", ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST

Bruce Springsteen - "Glory Days", BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN (2005)

Ghostemane - "Venom", AN AMERICAN TAIL: FIEVEL GOES WEST

The Proclaimers - "I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)" - THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE III (FINAL SEQUENCE)

$uicideBoy$ - "My Flaws Burn Through My Skin Like Demonic Flames from Hell, AMERICAN PIE

Papa Roach - "Last Resort", THE HOURS

Three 6 Mafia - "Who the Crunkest", LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL
They Might Be Giants - "Istanbul (Not Constantinople)", MIDSOMMAR

100 gecs - “money machine”, SAVING PRIVATE RYAN

100 gecs - “stupid horse”, THE GODFATHER

100 gecs - sympathy 4 the grinch, MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET

The J. Geils Band - “Centerfold”, HEREDITARY

Elvis Presley - “Jailhouse Rock”, THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION
Alphaville - "Forever Young", SALO, OR THE 120 DAYS OF SODOM (1975)

GFOTY - “Tongue”, FATAL ATTRACTION

The B-52's - "Rock Lobster", JAWS

Celine Dion - "My Heart Will Go On", A SERBIAN FILM
"Weird Al" Yankovic - "Eat It", LA GRANDE BOUFFE (1973)
Fleetwood Mac - "Second Hand News", THE PERFECT STORM

...the list is endless really.

Anyway, this second Death Note film starts out strong as fuck.  As you remember, the first film ended on a cliffhanger that left the viewer going "Ohhh, shit!!!", but then the second film takes the excitement even further with the introduction of a second Kira!  "Ohhh, double-shit!!!"  It's awesome.  I was on the edge of my seat for the first half of the film, but then things get overly complicated and the ending drags on forever.  It was disappointing.

I still really like this film and watch it occasionally, but usually stop about 3/4 of the way through.

Part 1 - Death Note (2006)
Part 3 - Death Note: L Change the World (2008)