8 posts tagged “nino”

From Tokyograph's website,

Ninomiya promotes New Year's cards for Japan Post

Thu, October 18, 2007 (4:31pm EDT)

Arashi member Kazunari Ninomiya has been chosen as an image character for an ad campaign by the recently privatized Japan Post. The tradition of sending out New Year's cards has been fading away in favor of e-mail, but the post office is hoping that Ninomiya can help persuade consumers to use its services. He will appear in commercials starting on the 25th.

The company also recently announced that it has teamed up with KDDI to offer a new service that lets users create New Year's cards through text messaging.

Source: Sankei Sports

Our Nino has such a great character that he was chosen as the image character???
Nino's image to me is more towards 'sarcastic' and 'annoying' though.
(But you all know I still love him)

If Nino have been so effective with the Soup commercials,
until they've reached their first time of the soup being Out Of Stock,

Then I see no problem Nino nailing this ad campaign!

I'm cutting down on my Arashi diet.
It's way too addictive.
Thus, no active posts until I finish SPM (which will be around the end of November)

My cousin got a 'Letters From Iwo Jima' DVD.
I've just finished watching it.

I-don't-like-blood.
That's why I didn't take Biology as a subject in the first place.

And like most war movies,
'Letters From Iwo Jima' was gory.
Real gory.

I wince EACH TIME someone died.

Especially when the whole group committed suicide with grenades.

This movie have got people complimenting on Nino's acting skills.
To tell you the truth, I wasn't concentrating on Nino.

Ken Watanabe caught my eye the whole time.
And I was more awed with Clint Eastwood's directing.
Almost everything was just right for the movie.

From the cinematography, camera angles, sound effects...
Everything was just right for the movie.

I have never watched fully any other of Eastwood's movie.
This is the first time.
Though he didn't win any directing award for this (as far as I know),
I do think that this masterpiece is superb.

I've learned about the Japanese soldiers in my History syllabus.
From how violent and strict they were... General Tojo... and even about the Kempetai.

I was learning it from the point of view of the soldiers who fought for my country when they were at war with Japan.
As a student, I learned that the Japanese army in those days were fierce and heartless.

From this movie, it just reminds me of how they would feel from the other side.
They were just the same as us.
Most of them hate wars, afraid of death.
We do think that "Dying in honor for your country" is just a piece of crap.

But what choices do they have?
The ruler of their countries wanted to dominate the other countries.

The soldiers didn't asked for it. They don't want anything to do with war.
But they are forced to go to battlefield. And forced to face their own death in front of their faces.

If you are a soldier, and you know that your troop have hopes of winning the war, then things would have been better for you.
But what if you are on the other side, and you know that there is no way that your troop can even survive the war- let alone win it?

My teacher told me a story before.
When his mother was young, she was playing in front of her house and she sees jeeps of Malay soldiers going out to battle the Japanese.
We all know that we'll lose the war.
The only reason the British put up Malay soldiers there was only to slow down the Japanese.

So there was one Malay soldier who came up to her,
"(Smiling) Selamat tinggal, dik. Abang nak pergi mati ni."
[Bye. I'm going to my grave/death now.]

That was one of the most memorable lines in my book.

But really, that was how the movie was a success.
After watching the movie, I thought more about the soldiers than I do about the story.

My mind don't really focus on the story anymore.
It was more of "What all of the soldiers have went through"
For both my country's and all the other country's soldiers.

One of it was the time when the whole troop committed suicide with hand grenades,
and it's just left Nino and that Kempetai guy.

I hate that scene! Because it was so gory!
You see body parts flying around!!!
But this is the scene that really got me sympathized with the characters the most.

You can see it from their eyes that the soldiers didn't want to suicide.
But they have no other choice. they're going to die anyway.

Then there was also the scene where that Olympic guy saved the American soldier.
(Sorry, I'm pretty terrible with memorizing Japanese names)

It's a nice scene where you can see kindness even in the midst of a war.
You don't usually get that in this movie- as most of it was about honor and death.

He told the soldiers that he will extract some information from the American soldier.
But instead he was having casual talk about interests.

And then there was the scene where Saigo gave away his belt to the dead Kempetai guy.

You were told, that if you surrender, you will survive. They will only take you in as a prisoner.
But when the Kempetai guy surrendered, he was killed.

And it was just because that American soldier was too lazy to keep watch of him.

When Saigo found him dead, he left his belt at the dead body.
The belt means a lot to Saigo, it was supposed to protect him.
But he left it there with the Kempetai guy's dead body.

I find the scene when Ken Watanabe' character wanted to die in his own homeland- very touching.

Ken: (Dying) Is this still Japan's soil?
Nino: Yes, this is still Japan's soil.

-- Ken shoots himself while Nino just looked straight ahead.

Another part of the story I like is how Saigo didn't burn the letters.
Instead he buried them nicely.
And when the future generations found it... the feeling must have been unexplainable.

The scene that got me into tears-
When they heard the Iwo Jima national song from the radio.

There won't be anymore Iwo Jima after the Americans take over it.
So there will be no more need of Iwo Jima's national song.

The soldiers were the last group of people to hear the song for real then.

Ah, Saigo was the last man standing then...
or was it that stupid officer who offered himself for suicidal bombing at the enemy's tank?

I wasn't impressed with Nino's performance here.

As a fan, I've always known Nino as a great actor.
But when you've watched Nino in 'Ao No Honoo' (The Blue Light),
no other Nino's characters could really get past that.

I would watch the movie with a confused teenager, murderer repeatedly
when compared to the movie of a soldier.

But there was really no question to Nino's acting skills in this movie, is there?
It's still superb in here.

I like it how he was still able to be sarcastic in this movie.
I would smile at his sarcastic remarks.

Kempetai guy: It's an honor to die for the country!
Saigo: Yeah, my friend, who died from food poisoning just now, also died in honor, right?

I haven't read the review yet.

Which review?
The review about Nino being too short for his role... maybe.

I don't know.
No one provided a link of it yet.
And I haven't had an encounter with it yet.

So I don't really know what the full review is all about.

But there are statements in blogs stating that the review includes the fact that
Nino was too short to play the role of Yamada Tarou.

Ever since the time when the rumor of Nino playing Yamada Tarou was up on Arashi@vox,
I do anticipate this review.

Yamada Tarou is a very handsome man. He's athletic, tall, talented...
Taro is pretty much a perfect guy.

BUT Nino is NOT tall.
And I know Nino is NOT handsome in the eyes of many people.

As much as I really really really like Nino to act out that part (plus he's my ichiban),
I do accept this truth.

But another fangirl somewhat comforted me saying,

He might not be handsome or tall.
But he is very talented.
He can surely carry that character!

To which my thoughts immediately went,

That's right!
Nino ain't got the handsome/macho face like Sho!
He ain't got the height too!

BUT-HE-GOT-TALENT!

And what do you know!
The girl was right!
Nino brought so much life to the character!

I can imagine a lot of other Tarou-look-alike hot guys acting out the role
but I don't think any of them can make a cartoon character so alive!

So really, does it matter that Nino did not bring out the character as a handsome guy?
Instead he portrayed it as a very sweet guy, who is very much human, but yet very much real.

Wouldn't you have preferred THAT over the first option?

Well, it's all a question of personal preferences.

For Nino have talent,
I'm pretty confident that he'll be fine with almost any characters.

Which leads me to a pretty unique character in mind...
Domyouji Tsukasa.

What if he is to play that character?
The adorably stupid, sarcastic, egoistic, snotty character?

Could Nino have pulled it off?
Can he do it better than Jun, despite the fact that he is not as good looking?

And can he perm his hair drastically to the point of extreme?!

Ahh, temperature of my forehead is rising...
My brain is heating up....

Cause of this?
Subbing non-stop for 3 days!

Short clips are fine.
My first few subs are for clips less than 10 minutes.

And I've just attempted to sub a 17 minutes clip (Ohno's Interview- Zoom In).

I've finally finished it in 2 days!
My brain got heavy after that.

I'm still gonna continue subbing though (probably not as active as now).
Mainly because it's Arashi Arashi!

Here's a hardsub of Sho Cam Bonus.

Nino plays around with the camera and recorded Ohno.

DISCLAIMER: Translations are by Say-It-Again LJ!

Just a short post.

From LuckyPurple's LJ post,
she said that she watched 'E!'s Asia's A-List' and she saw Nino featured!

The one I watched before only have a snapshot of Nino on the red carpet.

But this time,
LuckyPurple said that Nino got a chance to talk in E!

He was talking a bit about Arashi and they showed the ONE album cover.

For those who have ASTRO,
watch 'E!'s Asia's A-List' (Ch 76)

I know that this might be old news for some of you ,
(who have watched 'We Can Make It' performance in Music Station)

but I just have to blog about this!
*fangirl squeals*

This hot hairstyle made it's debut during Arashi's 'We Can Make It' performance in Music Station.

Nino doesn't look so simple now does he?
(Like when he had his Haikei's haircut)

Here's a YouTube link to the performance uploaded by jennlyy

I've just watched E!: Asia's A-List.

Now that ASTRO got E! Channel (Ch 76),
I got to watch E!'s take on Asia's internationally rising star.

This show (or episode) showcases Asian stars that are now making BIG names internationally.
Some of the artist featured is Mika Nakashima, Edison Chen, Rain Bi, Zhang Zi Yi, Takeshi Kaneshiro, Jung Ji-Hyun, Lee Joon-Ki and many others.

Kazunari Ninomiya was not featured.
I don't expect him to be featured either.
He has only done 1 Hollywood movie (Letters From Iwo Jima) so far.
And this episode was probably a month old already (considering how not-so-up-to-date ASTRO shows are), which was  around when Letters From Iwo Jima is still new in premiere.

But you know how E! edits their shows to make it less boring and more interesting.
There will always be snapshots or footages of various stars while they are presenting information.

So for this show, towards the end,
while the host was concluding the show, "Asian stars are now making their way to Hollywood and nothing is stopping them..." (or something like that),
they had snapshots of Edison Chen signing his posters, Asian stars in red carpet and such.

Then suddenly, I screamed out "NINO!!!"
(to which it shocked my mom who was relaxing behind)

    As I have referred from Oxford Dictionary, honour means high respect and reputation. In other words,honour is also considered as a sort of distinction. But really, how important is honour? Or at least, how important is honour to me? What would you do for honour? What would you sacrifice for honour? And why would you make sacrifices just for a mark of respect?
    When I was told to write an essay based on the word 'honour', the first thing that came to my mind are soldiers. This thought led me to Clint Eastwood's latest movie, "Letters From Iwo Jima." I have not watched the movie yet, but based on a short synopsis, this movie depicts the story of the Japanese's soldiers who went to battle at Iwo Jima during the World War 2,despite knowing that they are only going there to die.
    Their case is quite similar to our history of the battle in Bukit Kepong. One of the main character in this story is Saigou. He was a baker with a loving wife who is pregnant before he went to war. However, he was forced to be involved in the war as a minor soldier. He does not really care about the war. Neither does he care whether his
country wins the batle or not.If he gets the chance, he will run away from war without hesitating! All he cares about is to survive and be back home with his wife and their newborn baby. 
    This is where the word 'honour' comes in. There he is in the middle of a battlefield, fighting for his country. THIS to me, is honour. To fight for your country! But Saigou does not want honour. He just wants to live together with his family. He sounds foolish and cowardly, right? 
    But as much as I am ashamed to admit it, I would have felt the same way! I would have done the same thing and fled from war. This made me realized that I am as foolish and cowardly as Saigou! I don't think I would have the courage and bravery to face a war. Moreover, knowing that it is a just a thin, fine line towards death when you are fighting in a bloody war. I would value my life more than to be respected by people. 
    Now, after I thought more and more about the word 'honour', it leads me to a series of neverending questions: Why is honour so important? Would I make the sacrifice of dying in suffering and pain but with honour? Or
would I rather live a happy, stable life but with shame?