• Thu. Apr 25th, 2024

Japan Subculture Research Center

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  • A Farewell To Japan’s King of Toxic Masculinity: Shintaro Ishihara

A Farewell To Japan’s King of Toxic Masculinity: Shintaro Ishihara

Ishihara hated outspoken women and liberal men; he had no kind feelings for the US and refused to be enthralled or intimidated by western culture. Ishihara reserved his most acidic…

Love In The Time Of Coronavirus

Hatsukoi is filmmaker Takashii Miike's latest, and the cute title is a foil for the utterly sinister events that unfold on screen. This stands to reason - Takashi Miike has…

Bloodshed, Firecrackers and Tears–The Best Japanese Movies Of The Heisei

Yakuza. Samurai. Monsters. NoFace. Lost face. Here's a guide to take you through the most memorable movies (including the bad, the good and the ugly) that adorned the Heisei era…

The high price of cocaine in Japan (metaphorically & literally)

Pierre Taki may not be so lucky. Compared to kakuseizai, cocaine constitutes a serious offense and it's much more difficult to buy in Japan. Taki has never cultivated a squeaky…

TRUTH is better than fiction. Nominate the Best Journalism in Japan For the True Story Award.

Today, submissions open for the True Story Award, the first global award for reporters writing for newspapers, magazines and online publications. The prize recognises written reportage from all countries and…

Abe-Japan’s Time Machine Back To The Nazi Era

In the summer of 2013, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Taro Aso, famous for his verbal gaffes declared in a speech to his political supporters, “Germany’s Weimar Constitution was…

6 murderers are paroled in a small Japanese town. Will they bring the place back to life or bring more death? See “The Scythian Lamb”

Rumor has it that since the early nineties, rural towns have been recruiting parolees to become part of the local populace. This information cannot be verified. The people involved will…

The Yakuza That Stole Halloween: They tricked cops, rival gangs, the media & treated the kids.

It was a grisly grim and horrific Halloween in Japan but it wasn’t all bad news–there was a yakuza Halloween, after all. After the Yamaguchi-gumi, Japan's largest organized crime group…

Some parting words from Yakuza movie icon Takakura Ken on yakuza films, his favourite movies, and acting

But I think that the reason the general public identified with the roles I played, was that they were struck by my stance as a man who unrelentingly stands up…

Aliens Versus Yakuza: 宇宙人対極道: A Masterpiece Of Bad Genre Films

I wouldn't want to spoil the rest of the film for our readers but it does solve the ancient question: in a battle between an alien and a yakuza, who…