What we have here is a failure to communicate. Above is a poster for Tatsumi Kumashiro’s pinku Akai kami no onna, aka Woman with Red Hair, starring Junko Miyashita and Renji Ishabashi. How to explain this one? Well, it’s a sexual melodrama about a man and woman who embark on an obsessive affair, with a subplot about a gang raped girl who develops an attachment to one of her attackers. It’s supposed to be a commentary on misogyny and abuse, but despite the noble intent, beautiful cinematography and rain-drenched atmosphere, it didn’t do much for us. However, Miyashita won awards for her performance, and the film was well-received when released, so we’re willing to concede that it’s a piece of art that is firmly of its time (i.e., before our time) and can perhaps only be understood in that temporal and cultural context. As to the latter, we checked out some reviews and a theme that ran through them was that this is a film so Japanese in nature that it doesn’t translate well for westerners. So you know what we did? We watched it again without subtitles. Since it’s only seventy-three minutes long, we weren’t sacrificing a lot of time. And guess what happened? We understood and liked it a lot better. So take that for what it's worth. And while you’re at it, take the lovely Junko Miyashita promo poster below. It's another rare find of ours, never before seen online. Akai kami no onna premiered in Japan today in 1979.
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The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
1967—First Space Program Casualty Occurs
Soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov dies in Soyuz 1 when, during re-entry into Earth's atmosphere after more than ten successful orbits, the capsule's main parachute fails to deploy properly, and the backup chute becomes entangled in the first. The capsule's descent is slowed, but it still hits the ground at about 90 mph, at which point it bursts into flames. Komarov is the first human to die during a space mission. 1986—Otto Preminger Dies
Austro–Hungarian film director Otto Preminger, who directed such eternal classics as Laura, Anatomy of a Murder, Carmen Jones, The Man with the Golden Arm, and Stalag 17, and for his efforts earned a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame, dies in New York City, aged 80, from cancer and Alzheimer's disease. 1998—James Earl Ray Dies
The convicted assassin of American civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., petty criminal James Earl Ray, dies in prison of hepatitis aged 70, protesting his innocence as he had for decades. Members of the King family who supported Ray's fight to clear his name believed the U.S. Government had been involved in Dr. King's killing, but with Ray's death such questions became moot. 1912—Pravda Is Founded
The newspaper Pravda, or Truth, known as the voice of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, begins publication in Saint Petersburg. It is one of the country's leading newspapers until 1991, when it is closed down by decree of then-President Boris Yeltsin. A number of other Pravdas appear afterward, including an internet site and a tabloid. 1983—Hitler's Diaries Found
The German magazine Der Stern claims that Adolf Hitler's diaries had been found in wreckage in East Germany. The magazine had paid 10 million German marks for the sixty small books, plus a volume about Rudolf Hess's flight to the United Kingdom, covering the period from 1932 to 1945. But the diaries are subsequently revealed to be fakes written by Konrad Kujau, a notorious Stuttgart forger. Both he and Stern journalist Gerd Heidemann go to trial in 1985 and are each sentenced to 42 months in prison.
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