The premiere of Rashomon was a watershed moment for Japanese cinema, but what was the appeal of this tale of unreliable narrators set in the far distant past? And how did the peculiarities of its initial screenings affect the way Kurosawa’s masterpiece was interpreted?
In A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, Henry David Thoreau described friendship: “They cherish each other’s hopes. They are kind to each other’s dreams.” So much beautiful music has come to the world through the mutual encouragement of friends. In this post, we will explore some historic friendships in classical music, when great.
Cannon Busters creator LaSean Thomas and Netflix, I thought of the scene in
Moonlight where Mahershala Ali’s Juan tells young Chiron that there will always be Black people everywhere, and because of that, nothing is impossible or beyond him.
Yasuke, which stars LaKeith Stanfield as the first Black samurai,
feels like an embodiment of that statement even in feudal Japan, there is a warrior who looks like Chiron. The series introduces audiences to an unapologetically Black protagonist whose history and personality hearkens to the expansive multiplicity of the Black experience as a whole.
It’s just as significant that this story has manifested through anime. Japan’s animated exports are beloved by Black audiences, but only a precious few series and films that portray Black people or Black life have been able to avoid regressive characterizations. As a Black-led Japanese anime production focused on a multi-dimensional, drawn-from-history protagonist,