pash

Nature in all its majesty - and with no sugarcoating whatsoever, LOL

Maybe it's because half of the blood running through my veins comes from an alpine valley, and I'm no stranger to the sight of steep slopes all covered with coniferous forests. Or maybe it's 'cause I just really like Japanese rural settings, which I consider way more authentic and interesting than the more usual urban ones. And then again, maybe it's simply because this is indeed a great movie, period.
Whatever the reason, I deeply enjoyed this "Wood Job"!
Such a pure, straightforward story, mixed with some very funny scenes, some deep moments, some great acting (Ito Hideaki in particular steals the scene more than once), some nice music....and last but totally not least, some breathtaking scenery!
Perfect 10! ^___-

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The 1st season was perfect, and this is just as good!

There's an old Italian saying (of course, soccer-related - pardon, calcio-related ^__^) that goes like this: "squadra vincente non si cambia". That is, "never change a winning team" - meaning, when a formula works, there's no reason to modify it!
That phrase fits perfectly to this second season of the acclaimed dorama "Furuhata Ninzaburo": the first season had been basically perfect, so why should they go and modify anything for the following season?
Luckily they didn't, and the result is just as good as the original!
As always in series with an episodic structure, some episodes are better than the rest; if I were to name a personal top3, I'd say first #10 - a real masterpiece! - and right next #9 and #4 ^____^

Note: Due to the continuous numbering adopted by this series (episodes are numbered progressively, regardless of seasons/SP etc.; therefore the 1st season has 12 episodes, then comes the 1st SP - episode 13 - then the 10 episodes of this 2nd season - episodes 14 to 23 - and so on), 2nd season's eps. 10, 9 and 4 are, respectively, episode 23, 22 and 17

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I must confess I had such great expectations for this "Kioku ni Gozaimasen!" aka "Hit Me, Anyone, One More Time!", given the stellar cast and particularly the presence of Koike Eiko and Nakai Kiichi (two of my all-time faves, who were BTW both as great as always!). Unfortunately it wasn't such a brilliant, fast-paced comedy as, say, "The Uchoten Hotel", but just a (too) light comedy. It had its moments, but I ended up laughing a lot less than I had expected I would.
It's still an enjoyable movie that will provide a coupla hours of relax, only not the masterpiece I had expected.

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Being the old socialist that I am (though much less old and much more socialist than Bernie Sanders, LOL), you might understand I would've never watched anything with such a classist title, hadn't it been for a friend who wholeheartedly suggested it. And when, upon watching the first episode, I got so angry at the male lead for his behavior and actually thought about dropping this dorama, it was that same friend who managed to convince me not to do so. This is why, now that I've watched the dorama till the end, I feel the need to publicly thank that friend of mine. Hadn't it been for him, I wouldn't have watched this dorama that, albeit not being the best of all time, still has one of the best characters ever (namely, the female lead, masterfully portrayed by Ishihara Satomi, who managed to make me laugh one moment, and move me to tears just a few minutes later). The lovely message conveyed by this drama, in a nutshell, could be that love and goodness can change even the worst people and make decent human beings out of them. A lovely message indeed, albeit maybe not such a realistic one, let's admit. Anyway not in the big business world (where I have the strong impression only the scum rises to the top) and not in this Kali Yuga we're living in! Anyway, a great performance by the whole cast - and particularly by the leads - and the afore-mentioned message get this dorama a well-deserved 8/10 ^___^

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Being a sucker for some good Japanese horror story (what with the whole "let's give some closure to the spirits of the deceased so that they might rest in peace / proceed to their next life" and "let's scare the viewers with the atmosphere" concepts, rather than their Western counterparts of "let's shoot whatever's moving" and "let's throw in gallons of blood and teradecibels worth of screams"), of course I liked this. True, some episodes were better than others (#7 is wonderful; #3 extremely nice; #6 also very good; #2 and 4 not bad at all; only #1 and #5 are sub-par, imho) but it's still totally worth watching if you also like Japanese Horror. If you'd rather have those afore-mentioned gallons of blood and teradecibels worth of screams, instead...well...go to H....ollywood, you'll find plenty of stuff to your liking there, LOL ^_^;;;

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Great acting - as usual! - by the always superb Wakui Emi. Unfortunately, there's little else here. The plot is annoyingly trite (the Nth retelling of Cinderella's tale - which I don't care for at all, btw; I'll never understand how anyone can actually consider even remotely romantic a story which could be summed up as "she's poor, he's loaded". Materialistic much?!?!?). The dialogues aren't memorable, and neither is the rest of the cast (actually, Tsuruta Mayu is good; Kishitani Goro's clownish antics are somehow funny, but seem out of place 90% of the time here; as for Karasawa Toshiaki, he's as expressive as...a fish!!!). Forgettable.

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Abe Hiroshi's performance is simply excellent: at the same time funny, convincing and even moving, here and there. The same can be said about the absolutely gorgeous Natsukawa Yui. Kuninaka Ryoko is also good, though her character lacks depth....as a matter of fact, I don't give this a full 10/10 right 'cause I feel the whole thing could have been better developed. But anyway, it's still a very good dorama! 9/10 p.s. Kuwano-san has a great taste in music (it reminded me of Nodame Cantabile, LOL), as Hayasaka-sensei in manga (Tezuka, Golgo13, etc.)! Oh, and of course the Great Kaneda (that guy's just too funny, ROFL) has an impeccable taste in cars! 1970s Opel GT, one of my all-time faves! ^___^

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Weaker than the first season

This second season of "Yuru Camp" was in my humble opinion much weaker than both the first season and the in-between special episode. Fukuhara Haruka's screentime was drastically shrinked here, while most of the focus went to the supporting actresses - but that per se wouldn't have been such a big problem, as they're all decent actresses (even though not as good as Fukuhara - anyway, thumbs up to Ohara Yuno for her always contagious chuckle ^__^). The real problem is that the focus was also mostly switched from actual "yurucamping" to silly comedy, alas without much success. As a consequence, also the scenery, which had been an important detail previously, got a bit neglected here (don't expect loads of spectacular views, but rather just the occasional glimpse).
I have no idea how much covid-related restrictions could have been the cause of these changes for the worse, though...therefore my not-too-low grade.

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I picked up this drama both for the intriguing plot and for my beloved Sun Qian, and I'm happy to say I wasn't let down. Quite the opposite, the series exceeded my expectations, and although perhaps not absolutely perfect, it's still one I can wholeheartedly recommend!
The premise was nicely developed, the setting very nice, and the production value pretty high.
The whole cast did a marvelous job, seriously. My hat goes off to all of them! Honorable mentions for Sun Qian, for Luo Yu Tong (who grew on me so much that by the end of the drama I was liking her even more than the FL - and that's saying quite a lot!!!) and for Tao Hai.
The script was very good and I particularly appreciated how well they accomplished character development and how nicely they managed to convey a wonderfully positive, ethical message.
The only reasons I'm not giving this a perfect 10 are, on the one hand, that I really didn't like how they set things up for a potential second season (I'm talking about the very last scene with the never seen before character - totally unrelated to the rest of the series), and on the other hand, that I found a coupla scenes a bit weak/forced. But then again, perhaps the machine-translated subs (that at times one had to *interpret*, rather than simply *read*) are to blame for that? Whatever, beggars can't be choosers and machine-translated subs are still a whole lot better than no subs at all, of course. 9/10

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For once, I'll jump to the conclusion: this is a M-A-S-T-E-R-P-I-E-C-E !!!
First of all, the message is so deep that it simply humbles at least 90% of other dramas (and basically every Western series ever - but well, that's easier).
The script works like a Swiss clockwork, seriously; and seeing how this drama consists of 40 episodes of around 45' each, that alone is quite a feat! You laugh, you cry, you learn, etc....the whole nine yards! Or rather, Yin & Yang and all 24 solar terms!
The characters are so well-written and tridimensional that when you finish watching the series, you feel like you're saying goodbye to a group of friends!
The acting is simply superb. At this point I usually give three "honorable mentions" but here it's hard to name just three, one would want to praise *all* of them with a virtual standing ovation! Anyway, traditions must be kept, so let's say I'll stand a little longer for Jiang Shan, Zhao Lu Si and my beloved Dai Lu Wa.
The music is just lovely and adds greatly to the viewing pleasure.
As for the "packaging" (direction, editing, photography, etc.), that's top-notch too.
What's not to like? Perfect 10! Goes instantly into my top-5 of all times! ^_____^

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"Forrest Gump" meets "Shomuni", with lousy results

I must confess not being a big fan of those - tremendously popular - oversimplifications of movies or dramas that could be formulized as "A = B + C" (I've recently noticed one of those, for example, in relation to the fabulous C-drama "Reset", labeled by some as "Speed meets Groundhog Day"), but this time I myself can't resist the temptaion of summing up this "Ii Hito" as "Forrest Gump meets Shomuni"! ^_^;
The problem is that whereas the latter was often hilarious, this one was mostly just ridiculous; and as for the former, they shared indeed a "definition" of "good person" that I happen to just totally disagree with. In fact, if you'll pardon my "hegelian dialectic", I really don't think that a good person is someone so naive and immature that doesn't even know what evil is ("Thesis"), but rather, someone who knows very well ("Antithesis") and decides to renounce evil and be good instead ("Synthesis"). Adults with the minds of a 5 years old kid aren't "good people", but the very definition of "simpletons" if you wanna be polite (or "retards" if you don't - and as annoying as I've found this ML who could only repeat, like a parrot, the same trite sentences throughout the whole drama, and the rest of the time just ran and shouted, rinse and repeat - well, I'm not so sure I wanna be polite in his case! =__=)
So, as you by now I'm sure have already guessed from my loooong introduction, I've found this drama's script to be reeeally bad. The "good guys" were annoying, the villains ridiculous (compared to the sneezing manager and his minion with the horrible haircut, even Dick Dastardly from "Wacky Races" was a credible, realistic and sober villain!), the plot almost non.existent, the dialogues and the message both trite and silly.
The cast's performance was also mostly abysmal (no surprise, given the material they had to work with) and only a coupla managed to do somehow well regardless (namely, Ito Shiro and Kanno Miho).
The production value was also nothing special, and the directing, instead, specially annoying - what with the constant zooming-in-and-out and the characters taking turns to stand in front of the camera and recite their lines (seriously, it felt like something a lousy high school club might do - and it'd still be annoying, but at least they'd have the excuse of being young and inexperienced; what was this director's excuse? .\___/.)
The only thing I was completely satisfied with was the OST, which was really marvelous (and the only reason why this doesn't get an even lower rating from me!!!)
So, 10/10 to the music, and extremely low ratings for the other categories.
My suggestion is: steer clear of the dorama and simply buy the OST! ^___-

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