NANA, a live-action film based on the ever so popular manga of the same title by Ai Yazawa will be released theatrically on 9-3-2005 in Japan. The story of the film is about two identically-named girls (you guessed it, Nanas) with very different personalities. Nana (portrayed by Aoi Miyazaki) is a girl unlucky in love, while the other Nana (portrayed by Mika Nakashima) is a independent young musician. Both girls meet under unusual circumstances and end up living and growing up together. The manga is extremely popular among Japanese young adults mainly female, selling over 17,000,000 copies. There is no doubt that almost every single female age between 17-25 will go see the film. So all you geeks out there, if you wanna pick up a Japanese girl, go see the film.  Here is the official website , there are three teaser trailer as well as lots of info about the film.

This year’s Anime Fest will be hotter than ever! Well, Anime Fest is a Convention and Association for fans of Anime, Music, Manga, and Japanese Pop Culture. Basically everything to do with Jap craziness. It will be held at Hyatt Regency in downtown Dallas, TX during Labor day weekend. Why it will be hot? Well, Maaya Sakamoto will be performing! In case you don’t know who she is, she started her career at age of 15, she performed the opening song for the hit anime series VISION of ESCAFLOWNE written by the legendary composer Yoko Kanno(COWBOY BEBOP, WOLF"S RAIN, TOKYO.SORA). Ever since then she has continued to work with Yoko Kanno. The most notably they did a opening song for the series and theme song for the film RAHXEPHON. How great is she? check it out yourself!
and you can also check info on Anime Fest 2005 here

According to Yahoo, John Woo is going to Beijing to shoot a yet to be titled neo-noir thriller. Bristol Bay Productions. The story of this English-language project involves an American visiting China who becomes entangled in a clash between the communist government and the underworld that is fueling the underground economy.

John Woo is prepping “THE WAR OF THE RED CLIFF,” which will be his first movie shot in China and in the Chinese language since the Hong Kong action director broke into Hollywood in 1993 with “Hard Target.” His U.S. films includes fun “BROKEN ARROW”, good “FACE/OFF” and fun “MI: 2” as well as not so fun “PAYCHECK” and horrible “WINDTALKERS.” Just like Tsui Hark, he really needs to get back on track. and we hope he will.

New Anime series Guyver will be airing in Japan on WOWOW starting 8-6-2005. It will contain 26 episodes and will be aired weekely. This based on a manga series is another re-vision of the title. There were OVA, and live action films starring Luke Skywalker himself Mark Hamill. Hope Mark doesn’t get too excited. Just because there is a new version of anime seriees doesn’t mean there will be a remake of live action as well. 

Artsmagic announced the upcoming release of EM-Embalming for the 28th of June 2005. “Cannes award-winning director Shinji Aoyama bloodies his arthouse hands in this extremely gory investigation into the illusions that make up society.” It is presented in Anamorphic Widescreen and the original Japanese 5.1 Dolby Surround with English subtitles. My review of the DVD will be up soon. Very soon.