Baby Animals: White lion cubs (via
ariss_tenoh)Photography: Street photographer's body of work discovered after her death
Fan Art: Star Wars pin-ups (Linking to this particular write-up for being the only blog that didn't whine about being 'sooooooo confused'.)
Steampunk: Steampunk Tron
Me: Vote for my sunrise photograph? (Click '+1' if you feel moved enough to do so)
Anime: Code Geass: Boukoku no Akito key visuals revealed (Title is still provisional...)
Anime: 'C' (Airing in the Noitamina slot, trailer looks interesting.)
Anime: NO.6 (Also airing in the Noitamina slot.)
Anime: Usagi Drop (Another anime for the Noitamina slot, about a man who attempts to raise a relative's illegitimate daughter. Doesn't sound like my kind of thing, but I bet that somebody reading this is interested.)
On Thursday, I went to see A Clockwork Orange, starring Oguri Shun. It was a matinee performance on a weekday, but the theatre was only a few seats from sold-out -- I attempted to get toujitsuken and chose a standing ticket, which meant I stood at the back on the first floor and leaned on a railing. I don't know if sitting-seats were still available when I bought my ticket -- all I know is that I bought the cheapest at 5,000 yen and I wasn't prepared to go higher than that.
Anyway, I was surprised by how shocking it was -- equivalent to the movie version in ultra-violence. I was not expecting that in Japan, where mainstream entertainment is fairly bland and Oguri Shun is well-known for his female fans. I noticed one walkout during a particularly violent scene near the start.
Having said that, I enjoyed it very much. I'm a fan of the book and this was a fascinating, very stylised musical take on it. I checked Wikipedia, and this "Punk Opera" seems to be a new version that isn't merely a translation of an English-language original. Probably a translation of Anthony Burgess' stageplay with new songs and scenery changes. But that's just my guess based on the fact that it uses the book's original ending.
Will probably do a more thorough review for my blog and probably include more info on toujitsuken. Do I recommend it? Kind of -- but most of my friends wouldn't be able to tolerate the violence, I think.
Yesterday, I decided to go to the mountains for a bit of hiking and -- on a whim -- chose Takatori-san. Don't judge me, okay? If it makes me look less weird, my thoughts were that not many people would choose to hike up an otherwise unremarkable mountain. I was right about this -- we only saw one couple for the entire two hour-or-so hike. And it was a fantastic mountain too, being about as tough a hike as it gets without calling it 'climbing'. We also went to a nearby river and saw a couple of birds of prey circling overhead. I'm fairly certain they weren't tobi and it seems reasonable to guess they were taka.
I'm about to sort through the photos -- hopefully there will be enough to make a blog post.
