Japan

The ten oldest wooden buildings in East Asia are in Japan, four of them at the monastery Horyuji. Less well-known and less well-documented than Japan’s buildings of the sixth and seventh centuries are China’s ten earliest wooden buildings, dated late eighth to early tenth century. Even less is known about Korea’s first centuries of Buddhist architecture. This talk explores extant architecture, archaeological evidence, and literary descriptions to determine what we really know about the first centuries of Buddhist architecture in East Asia and if longstanding notions of its major monuments...

Fantastic Realms in Japanese FilmThe Sinners of Hell (Jigoku)Directed by Nakagawa Nobuo, 1960 (101 min, English subtitles) A cult classic of Japanese horror movies, set in that most horrible of places. Free and open to the public.

Meike will present his film “The Glamorous Life of Hanai Sachiko (Hanai Sachiko no kare ina shogai” and engage in discussion afterwards. Hanai Sachiko, which will be featured in the Nippon Connections film festival in Germany in April, is a sly take on contemporary international politics with a Yale connection. The film will be shown on video without English subtitles, but a subtitle text will be distributed in photocopy form. “Pink films” are technically adult films in Japan, but given Japanese censorship codes, most would only get an R-17 in the USA. They have been extremely important in...

at the Associate for Asian Studies Annual Meeting in Chicago, Illinois

Aoyama’s Film ScreeningAoyama Shinji’s first theatrical film, Helpless (1996), will be screened on DVD for the seminar. Readings in Japanese Film Theory. For More Information 20050407springjapanfilm_aoyamabio.pdf Program

Aoyama’s Special Film ScreeningThe theatrical version of Aoyama’s episode from the ambitious Mike Hama detective series. Combining genre cinema with a rigorous critique of postwar Japanese society, Aoyama Shinji is one of the leading figures of contemporary Japanese culture, directing award-winning films such as Eureka (which the Los Angeles Times said “will become one of the landmarks of the world cinema of the first decade of the 21st century”), writing prize-winning novels, and becoming an intellectual force with his criticism and theory. Yale University is pleased to have Aoyama visit...

Aoyama’s Film ScreeningWiLd LIFe (1997, English subtitles). Aoyama’s third theatrical film about a punctilious ex-boxer in search of his missing boss. Combining genre cinema with a rigorous critique of postwar Japanese society, Aoyama Shinji is one of the leading figures of contemporary Japanese culture, directing award-winning films such as Eureka (which the Los Angeles Times said “will become one of the landmarks of the world cinema of the first decade of the 21st century”), writing prize-winning novels, and becoming an intellectual force with his criticism and theory. Yale University is...