Hello folks, took way too long to be back, but here I am again.  Spent the most of past spring and summer in Italy and Seoul, Korea, narrowly avoided contracting swine flu (but nonethelss suffering from a whole variety of other ailments), and unfortunately did not quite have enough time to dig into newest film music coming out of Korea, Japan and the rest of Asia. The good film music still remains few and far in between in South Korea, where the flourishing film industry is now undergoin

The Winter quarter’s long final weeks are finally over and we are back to the exploration of Kawai Kenji’s amazing career as Japan’s top animé-SF-horror film composer.

Continuing our discussion of Kawai Kenji’s music score for the Japanese anime/feature films, we now turn to what I, and many others, consider Kawai’s magnum opus, his score for Oshii Mamoru’s theatrical feature adaptation of the comic book artist Masamune Shiro’s Ghost in the Shell. 

CD Reviews: Joint Security Area and Great Science Fiction Blockbusters

Joint Security Area *** 1/2

BANG JUN-SEOK

JIVE ZKPD-0016.

Joint Security Area (2000) broke the domestic box office record in South Korea and greatly contributed to the emergence of Korean cinema as the next "Asian wave," (following the decline of Hong Kong cinema in late- '90s). The film's title refers to a narrow strip of lands inside the demilitarize

CD Reviews: In the Mood for Love and Taboo/Gohatto

In the Mood for Love ****

MICHAEL GALASSO

Rock ROD5223 (Asian release)

25 tracks - 47:12

Wong Kar-wei, the renegade auteur Hong Kong director, made many underground, low-budget movies before he was embraced by the world cinema community after winning the best director's prize at Cannes for Happy Together. He's been compared to Quentin Tarentino and Oliver Stone, and this is c