2022 starts (quite literally!) with a BANG!!!
I've just finished watching this superb drama and...WHOA!!! Seriously, guys, WOW, just WOW!!!I've seen this described as "Groundhog Day meets Speed", and that's true to some extent, but also totally insufficient to correctly define all its innumerable qualities. It's gripping, moving, bittersweetly realistic and at the same time fascinatingly fictional, and ultimately, extremely entertaining without ever being shallow or silly.
The script was very close to being perfect; not a single scene was redundant, and apart from a coupla very minor characters (the headphones-wearing muscular guy and the wig-wearing female police bigshot) who felt a tad too caricatural to this humble reviewer, all the rest were imho very well written and tridimensional; the premise is as interesting as they come, and its intricate, thought-provoking development absolutely rock-solid.
The whole cast (except for the two characters mentioned above, but then again, I'm willing to "blame" the script there ) deserved a standing ovation, period. Even "minor" characters as the older passengers and the younger cop were brilliantly portrayed. But as far as I'm concerned, Captain Zhang really earned himself a special mention! Chapeau!
Direction, photography, editing and music are all top-notch and add greatly to the overall quality.
And the cherry on top is, for me, represented by the deep, humane messages that the drama managed to convey.
Perfect 10!!!
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Cinema at its best!
One of the best movies I've ever watched, period.Okay, further elaborating on that...what should I name first?
Perhaps the absolutely perfect script, portraying a beautiful, delicate, poetic story of friendship?
Or maybe the fabulous cinematography, which makes it feel almost as if an endless collection of wonderful paintings were seamlessly flowing one after the other in front of the viewers' delighted eyes?
Or maybe again, the superb performance delivered by the whole cast, with a virtual standing ovation for Matsumoto Honoka?
And why not the lovely music, or the marvelous dishes, or any other element of this magnificent production?
Seriously, cinema at its best. Wow, just wow!
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What a nice surprise! ^___^
Once again, personal expectations ended up having a huge impact on my grade...in the case of this "Make a Wish", though, I must confess I started watching it only out of my love for the 2nd FL, Chen Hao Lan, all while honestly thinking that I would probably drop it after a coupla episodes, as it had been the case of another C-drama sharing a very similar premise, "Falling in Love with Cats".But I couldn't have been more wrong, LOL, 'cause I really, really loved this drama! ^_______^
Beautifully scripted, directed, photographed, and last but certainly not least acted by the whole cast (with particular praises, apart from the afore-mentioned Chen Hao Lan, for the adorable leads, Ren You Lun and Gia Ge, and for the very funny 2nd ML, Wang Tian Yu. They were really very good and added greatly to the drama's value. Oh, and let's not forget to mention the lovely OST/score, another very nice detail indeed!
If you are (like I was) a bit skeptical about the premise, give this title a try anyway, it'll probably surprise you like it surprised me, with its great quality and interesting script tastefully mixing so many different ingredients (comedy, drama, romance, SF, suspense, etc. etc.).
I literally enjoyed it from the very first minute to the very last! Perfect 10 as far as I'm concerned! ^__-
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The script is simply marvelous, the direction and photography absolutely top notch (I normally am wary of special effects, as I don't like how they've come to monopolize Western cinematography; but when they solely serve the script, as they do here, they're welcome ^__-), the acting fantastic (Tong Li Ya, whom I had previously admired - alas, too briefly, as her role there was important storywise, but minor as for screentime - in the drama "Waiting For You In The Future", is the very definition of "gorgeous"; and Lei Jia Yin manages to accomplish the not-so-easy feat of portraying two "different" characters and *actually* making it seem like they're different)...last but not least, the music is lovely and contributes greatly to give this lil' gem a kind of "Amélie" feeling.
Perfect 10! ^____^
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Lovely regional dorama
It's the first time I actually appreciated Kanjiya Shihori's acting! Since I couldn't honestly ascribe that to my getting softer with age (leveling with y'all, I'm afraid it's more like the opposite and I'm getting grumpier, LOL), this means she actually WAS good in this dorama SP! And so was Endo Kenichi! Also thanks to a beautifully written script which managed, in such a short time, to touch some big issues like the neverending love/hate relationship between city and countryside, the different approaches people may have to work and work ethics, and more in general, the respect we should always have for others in order to fully function as a society. Once again I ended up totally loving a "regional dorama" - gee, I wish there were, like, a list of those somewhere, so as to make it easier for us fans to find these lil' gems!Was this review helpful to you?
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Iyashi no Otonari-san ni wa Himitsu ga Aru
6 people found this review helpful
This review may contain spoilers
I must confess I started watching this "Iyashi no Otonari-san ni wa Himitsu ga aru" only out of my love for Tanabe Momoko, who's my #1 fave of the current generation of Japanese actresses (and considering that she has some fierce competition there, that's saying quite a lot, isn't it?). And indeed she was once again perfect to a "T", gorgeous and tremendously talented as always.On the other hand, I didn't have any expectation at all about the drama itself: I was actually expecting the Nth crappy hollywoodian story of "the good guy next door seems nice but actually is a psycho, so beware of other people, stay alone and unhappy 'cause that's how we want you to be"...but it ended up being, much to my surprise, quite the other way around!
The writers aren't keeping from us that the ML is a "psycho"; I mean, seriously, they portray him right from the beginning with a demented grin on his face, and on top of that, humming the European Union anthem! Hard to be crazier than that, right? >___<
(...yeah, I know it's Beethoven's "Ode to the Joy", but the EU using it has ruined that completely for me, sorry...)
Back to what I was saying (and more seriously!), what the writers did here was to actually orchestrate an intricate "double play": on the surface, we have the FL finding out, slowly but surely, that the ML ain't what he seems...but on a deeper level, we viewers take just the opposite path, finding out precisely that he's not as crazy (nor as "stalkerish") as we initially thought him to be! So in the end the message is a completely non-hollywoodian "the next person might be a lot better than you think, so open up and be happy", which is pretty damn nice, coming to think about it!
The music is good, the "packaging" too, the scenography great (I want an apartment like that! Of course as long as I could share the balcony with Momoko-chan, LOL).
But the absolute best part is the acting. ALL the cast did marvelously, with virtual standing ovations for both leads!
The only reason I'm not grading this as a "Perfect 10" (SPOILER ahead) is that I've found the stabbing scene with the subsequent endless monologue really forced and overall annoyingly clichéd; had they done that more nicely, it would've been perfect. But it got close.
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1) Motokariya Yuika, whom I must confess having developed an instant crush for ever since her cute "majime" character in the beautiful movie "Swing Girls" ^__^;
2) Narumi Yui, whom I deeply appreciated as the ML's daughter in the recent "Mushoboke".
And neither of them let me down, the former is simply gorgeous and the latter is imho a very promising young actress, who showed in "Mushoboke" her drama skills, and here her comedic talent (alas, too briefly, as her character doesn't get much screentime).
Unfortunately, not only is this drama still unsubbed, but neither could I find Japanese subtitles so that I could run them through a machine-translator, retime them and use them to help me understand more (as I've learned to do so as to better appreciate otherwise RAW J-dramas ^__-). Anyway, the story is pretty straightforward, the rhythm quite slow and the dialogues rather simple, which means that even my little more than basic knowledge of Japanese was enough to get most of it.
The script seems pretty well done to me (not a big surprise, considering that Aso Kumiko is responsible for it - and I've learned to appreciate her writing just as much as her acting skills); without going into details so as not to spoiler anything, the romance is mild and a bit more realistic than usual (hence the slightly bitter aftertaste it may have given to some viewers), and although it still contains a few of the clichés typical of the genre, it doesn't indulge too much on those (something I really appreciated!).
The acting performance is pretty solid from the whole cast, and although the production value isn't anything to call home about, it's still okay. The music commentary instead is *really* very nice, imho! ^___^
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Once again a SP episode ends up being...nothing special! :/
I tend to be a little wary of SPs done after successful dramas, as in the past I've noticed many of those being way below their respective main series' level (and more generally, way below par!)...and this "Tokyo Tarareba Musume 2020" was no exception, unfortunately.Whereas with the original series I had liked more or less everything but the last episode(s), here I kinda like the last 50' or so, but on the other hand I couldn't help but finding the first 45' terribly boring (the definition "yawnfest" comes to mind) and borderline annoying.
The cast did well though, all things considered, particularly Yoshitaka Yuriko and Oshima Yuko (who's been nothing short of brilliant in everything I've seen her in so far!).
If you asked me about the music - despite the fact that I've watched this, like, less than 24 hours ago! - I'd have to reply that I don't even remember the music in it (which means it wasn't terrible, but also not very good).
All in all, once again a SP episode ends up being...nothing special! :/
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And I'm happy to be able to say that it's been an extremely satisfying journey from the very first minute to the very last!
The plot is very intricate but the writer(s) managed to wrap everything up nicely, all doubts were resolved, all questions answered - which is a lot more that can be said of many such dramas which instead tend to lack dramatically in that aspect.
The cast did a pretty good job, as a whole.
The "packaging" (production value, music etc.) is top-notch, period.
Perfect 10 as far as I'm concerned!
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Worst to First: A Teen Baseball Miracle
5 people found this review helpful
"Supokon" at its best!!!
As I've already confessed in a previous review, my favorite sport is baseball.Of all different sorts of baseball, Japanese "yakyuu" is my favorite (in a nutshell: no doping - or at least much much less than in the MLB; less muscles and more brains; nobody munching tobacco and spitting it on the field, etc. etc.).
And of all different types of Japanese "yakyuu", my favorite is precisely high school baseball.
Why? Because it's poetic, pure, epic...it's Sport with a capital "s", sport as it *should* be.
Now, the Japanese have a whole genre dedicated to sports-related stories, called "supokon", and since baseball is (one of) the national sport(s), you can guess that the vast majority of "supokon" are about baseball, and particularly about high school baseball, 'cause Japanese *love* it and the Koushien's final game is basically the Japanese equivalent of the Superbowl in the States!
So does all that mean that there's nothing really new in this story? Could be, yeah.
Does that make it any less fabulous? Hell no!
A good recipe doesn't necessarily need any fancy ingredients to make for a delicious dish; more often than not, it's precisely the simple, good old ones that are the best of the lot!
As is the case with this "Gekokujo Kyuji": all the tropes of the genre are there, but still, you can't help but enjoying *every single minute* of it! Marvelously written, acted, directed. Production value reached Himalayan heights. The message conveyed was simply beautiful.
Jeez, I finished watching it before Christmas, but I'm still getting goosebumps thinking about it now, so good it was!!! ^______^;;;
Highly and wholeheartedly recommended! Perfect 10 all the way!!!
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Back in the Golden Age of J-dramas it was possible to make a drama with such a politically incorrect title (it roughly translates as "Badmouthing the Wives" - but don't get it wrong, at least 80% of the times - if not more - the badmouthing husbands aren't portrayed as being right at all in doing so!) and with such tridimensional characters, so full of faults and yet - or rather, precisely because of that! - so tremendously humane.
The script doesn't take sides "a priori" (OK, today it's Latin Day, bear with me, please), but rather shows two main characters who are right or wrong depending on the situation. They argue, they fight, they yell, but at the end of the day - and that's the lovely message conveyed by this old comedy - both are made better people by being together and learning from each other and from their mistakes, day in and day out. There are no *perfect* couples, but rather *functioning* ones, that are so exactly because they know that they're not perfect and *accept* it! (compare that with the current trend of demanding nothing short of *perfection* from your partner, and any failure to comply to that impossibly unrealistic demand leading to a divorce...>_____<).
Back to the drama: the script is wonderful, managing to be at the same time hilarious and thought-provoking. The acting is top-notch, with virtual standing ovations for both leads. The "packaging" might feel dated to younger viewers, but those who appreciate "oldiesbutgoldies" won't have any problem with that.
No surprise it was so successful it got a second season (alas, not yet subbed, if I'm not mistaken...?), not really a common occurrence for comedies.
Oh, a last side-note for my countrymates - who'll get the reference: this is basically the Japanese version of "Casa Vianello", LOL! ^_^;;;
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