Wannabe artistic shots of Hachiko statue

I've written about the sad and tragic tale of Faithful Dog Hachiko last year. The Hachiko movie starring Richard Gere is also coming out next month, (But I'm not sure whether to see it since... I already knew that Richard Gere's going to die in it :(:(:( )

Now armed with a new camera, I decided to take some artsy shots of its statue.

Summer Fair of Zoshigaya Kishibojin Temple

Yesterday, before I was about to break Steven's mind by bringing him to Harajuku and Shibuya (photos will come in next post), we dropped by at the Zoshigaya Kishibojin Temple for its summer fair.

Mutsumi the late-night singer

It was already around 11pm when I was heading home after taking all these photos of Shinjuku from the previous post. But as I walked out of the Shinjuku South East exit, I found a young woman sitting on the floor, preparing to perform. A scattered few were gathered before her. She was the one and only musician I saw last night.

The view of Shinjuku twilight from the top of Takashimaya

Despite having gone countless times to the Takashimaya in Shinjuku, I have never really bothered to go to the top few floors because I thought there aren't anything there but restaurants. So when an acquaintance from Malaysia came and I was showing him around, we went up and I was surprised by what I saw.

There was a nice garden for people to take walks.

Visiting the old lighthouse at Miura Kaigan

Yesterday afternoon I headed off to Miura (a seaside city situated at Tokyo Bay) with dorm mate Tristan, to check out an old lighthouse. Along with Tristan were Pong, whom I met a day earlier when we went to see the Gundam statue, and Jack, whom I've never met prior to the trip.

Life-size Gundam in Odaiba and its adoring visitors

After hearing so much about the life-size Gundam statue in Odaiba, I finally decided to visit it. It was the evening of the 4th of July, which is more than a week before its official unveiling. But already many have gathered over there to take photos of it.

The Chinese lady with a shotgun

This is my friend, Zhu Dan, from China. She's really nice and friendly.


But she's slightly intimidating because she carries a shotgun with her all the time.

Night cruise on the Himiko waterbus

It seems that we have reached the second half of 2009. After completing '3PM', my third short film in six months yesterday afternoon, I can't help but feel a little wistful, a little melancholic, the familiar condition known as post-creativity depression is back.

So despite having finished my film, I actually chose to remain in the editing lab, and finally at night, I took out snippets of videos I shot more than a week ago with my own camera and looked through them, just so I could edit them and give myself something to do.

On the 20th of June, Lia the Artist told me and Niklas about the futuristic-looking waterbus "Himiko", designed by famed Japanese animator Reiji (or Leiji) Matsumoto ("Captain Harlock", "Spaceship Yamato", "Galaxy Express 999").

Yakitori is yummy

On Saturday night I went to a Yakitori restaurant at Shin-Okubu with Eric (my friend, not my dad).


(Eric and I at the Shinjuku Station East Exit, before making our way to Shin-Okubo)

And dammit, the food's so bloody good!

TRANSFORMERS 2 will be the biggest film in Malaysia

On a lighter note, Sebastian had been pretty depressed about the unanimous love my beloved home country had for TRANSFORMERS 2.

Reflecting on Michael Jackson (1958-2009)

When I woke up this morning and saw the news of Michael Jackson's death, I was quite affected by it. I grew up as a fan. As a child I listened to all the cassette tapes I had with me then, OFF THE WALL, THRILLER and BAD. I didn't know how it all started, I can't remember. The King of Pop then was at the pinnacle of his popularity, television was often dominated by his electrifying performances, or the music videos.

In kindergarten I drew pictures of men grabbing their crotches because that's the pose I remember most from Michael Jackson's dances, to the consternation of teachers.

Short interview with me on BMW Shorties website

Did a quick email interview with the peeps at BMW Shorties two days ago, and the interview was immediately up on their page yesterday. Good job using the cast and crew photo from 3PM too!

An excerpt.

Filmmaking has been around for decades, how do you innovate and make your film different?

Actually, I don’t self-consciously try to be ‘innovative’ and do things ‘people had never done before’. Normally I just find a story I really like to do, and hope that my personal filmmaking sensibilities can do justice to the story, enough to make it unique. I’m not sure whether I am original, it’s really up to my audiences to decide that.

Read the rest here.

A very sweet gesture from the 3PM cast and crew

So I've wrapped up the shoot for my newest Japanese short film, 3PM last Friday. And had am now editing it.

Here's a photo of the cast and crew sent to me by main actress Yumiko Kitazawa (you can also read about the shoot from her blog, but it's only in Japanese).


From left to right: Yumiko the lead actress, Ko the sound guy, Kabayama the camera assistant turned lead actor, me, Erika the cinematographer and Yuiko the producer/ assistant director

Like I said, I've immediately started work on editing the film the night when I finished the shoot, and things seem encouraging thus far.

Happy Father's Day, dad

As I look out through my window right now, the world is absolutely grey, and obscured by the rain. Perhaps I'm going to be stuck in my room the whole day. On the other hand, I checked the weather forecast in Kuala Lumpur and it seems cloudy, and there will be rain too in the afternoon, but the rains of tropical Malaysia are ferocious, but fleeting, often ending in mere hours, while the rain of Tokyo often drag on for days. So rain or not, I doubt it will do much to affect Father's Day for dad.

Completed the shoot of my new short, 3PM, edited a rough cut too

Just got back from the editing lab moments ago. Managed to wrap up the shoot for my new Japanese short film, 3PM. It was a fun shoot, exhausting it was. It's been a while since I've actually made a comedy (though many argued that CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY is just some some film with some comedic moments, and not really a comedy), I needed to do once since I've been making three consecutive depressing films (four, if you count my little-seen experimental video, FLEETING IMAGES).

Like I said, 3PM is a zero-budget film much smaller in scale than KINGYO, and set mostly in one location. I only had a skeleton crew (Me, Kou-san the sound guy, Erika the director of photography, Yuiko the producer/assistant director) , but just as I've always believed, as long as everyone's passionate, things can run pretty smoothly. That was the case of the 3PM shoot.

Even though we had some cute Waseda University cheerleaders briefly interrupting the shoot with their practice session at our location, but that lasted barely more than half an hour, and although they did their best to distract me, I managed to valiantly relocate the shoot to somewhere nearby.

Spirits were still so high that I immediately started work on putting together a rough cut of the short film in the evening, and worked on it til just now. Things look quite promising, I managed to try some stuff I never tried in previous works, yet I'm a little surprised by its length. The whole thing is nearly 16 minutes. I thought it'll be 10 to 12 minutes. Whoa. I might have some snipping to do.

Here are some stills.

LOVE SUICIDES in competition at the Paris Cinema International Film Festival

Love Suicides

I have mentioned this briefly back in April, but I'll mention it again since I've gotten more details now that the official line-up of next month's Paris Cinema International Film Festival is out. So yup, LOVE SUICIDES, my first ever Yasunari Kawabata adaptation before I made KINGYO, is one of the 17 short films around the world selected for competition at the Paris Cinema International Film Fest.

Roppongi Hills at Night

After finishing dinner yesterday evening, I was gripped by a sudden urge to catch a film. I thought of seeing Ahn Hung Tran's I COME WITH THE RAIN, starring Josh Harnett, Lee Byung-hun, Takuya Kimura and Shawn Yue.

I rushed off to take the train to Roppongi, but despite my best efforts, the film had already started when I reached Roppongi Hills. Even though I told the lady that I didn't mind about missing the first 5 minutes of the film, she told me that only the first two rows of seats were available. I didn't want to subject myself to such exertion of effort when seeing a film, thus I decided not to bother in the end.

Left in Roppongi without anything to do, I decided to take some photos instead.

Street musicians of Shinjuku on Friday night

I went out to Shinjuku last Friday night because I thought it's depressing to stay at home on Friday nights. I had managed to shoot some inserts for my new short film, 3PM, and had an encouraging line-reading session with my new actress Yumiko (read more about the production here) Some self-celebration was a welcome.

So bringing my new and beloved camera, I ran off to Shinjuku to snap photos of its night scenery.

CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY airing on Astro Citra tonight

Was more than a little surprised when Nico of Fleishman-Hillard (organizer of BMW Shorties) told me yesterday that CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY will be airing on Astro Citra tonight at 8:30pm.

Abura Soba is a dangerous addiction

Hello. My name is Edmund Yeo and I think I'm addicted to Abura Soba.

Shooting another Japanese short film, "3PM"

No, it's unlikely that I'll pull off what Tan Chui Mui did last year by making 7 short films in 7 months, but I'm trying to shoot at least one short film every 2-3 months. January I shot KINGYO (which you should know by now, is a Japanese production), April I shot AFTERNOON RIVER (Malaysian), and now, in June, I shoot my newest short film called 3PM at Waseda University.

"Edmund Yeo: Hot young Malaysian filmmaker tackles classic Japanese literature" - Interview with Toronto J-Film Pow Wow

After returning from last Saturday's Fuyajo Cinema Festival in the morning, I had a quick nap before getting up for an interview with Chris Magee of Toronto J-Film Pow Wow.

You'll get to read about a childhood incident that might have started my filmmaking dream.

it was how his parents approached the films that set Yeo on the path he's on today. "There was a time when I went to watch "Tremors" with my parents in the cinema when I was really young," Yeo remembers, "I was freaking out. Mom thought the best way to calm me down was to totally deconstruct the illusion of films, like pointing out how some stuff was just props, how they were just acting, how the guy didn't really die, how the monster was just a construct. Perhaps that deconstruction led to the whole discussion about how films were made." Yeo's mother explained that the person in charge of the props, actors and the monster worms in "Tremors" was called a "director". The lightbulb went on for Yeo.

You can read the full article here.

Thanks, Chris.

(I assume the 'hot' in 'hot young Malaysian filmmaker' is a reference to my physical attractiveness, which had long been overlooked. Hah.)

The 4th Foreigner's Traditional Japanese Dance Exhibition

The 4th Annual Foreigner's Traditional Japanese Dance Exhibition (第四回外国人日本舞踊大会) was held in my university earlier this evening. I didn't know a thing about it until the night before when Niklas showed me a website.

I was curious, so I decided to tag along, immerse myself more into Japanese traditions! I will remain an ignorant foreigner no more!

Picnic in Yoyogi Park

After spending an entirely sleepless night at Shinjuku, I caught a few hours of sleep before Maiko's call woke me up. (read more about it on my previous blog post) After that I got ready and headed off to Yoyogi Park for a picnic with Niklas, Lia The Artist and her friends: Jennifer and Yuu The Installation Artist.

Not a fan of summer afternoons, as the weather had turned a little too hot for my liking. Yet being at Yoyogi Park, bathed in the glow of the glorious summer sunlight would have been great for me to test my new camera.

Happily I took out my new and very beloved Panasonic DMC-LX3 and wanted to see what sort of masterful photography I could conjure in such an environment.

... then I realized that I forgot to bring the batteries.

"Eeeeeyaaaaaaargh!" I eeyargh'd in shock.

I decided to go back to my roots and snap photos with my cellphone instead.

Testing my new camera on the second night of Fuyajo Cinema Festival

After having complained endlessly about my old camera, and also NOT having a camcorder for the past 6 months, I've decided to rectify all these issues by buying a new camera that could serve as both. So I went off to buy myself a Panasonic DMC-LX3. As I was buying it, I realized how outdated I've been, I was offered to buy a 16GB memory card, and all these while I've been stuck with a 1GB one.

With the new camera, I headed off to Shinjuku Wald 9 again for the Fuyajo (Sleepless City) Cinema Festival, preparing for another sleepless night, and hopefully to catch some other films, and also visit my friends from my uni lab, who had offered to look after the cup noodles booth (free cup noodles were given to everyone who came for the festival).

When I arrived, they were watching the football match between Japan and Uzbekistan of the World Cup qualifiers. Japan had already scored, so they were happy.

Kingyo's test screening at Fuyajo Cinema Festival in Shinjuku Wald 9

The work-in-progress version of Kingyo finally had its test screening at the Fuyajo Cinema Festival in Wald 9 last night (or technically, this morning, since it was screened at 12am)

A couple of the cast and crew came.

I was happy to see main actress Luchino Fujisaki again. We just ran into each other at the elevator.

Here's a photo of her with Maiko the Producer and I.





(Luchino also had a brief blog entry about her thoughts just before the screening. It's in Japanese though)

We then took a group photo, this time with Lia the Artist/ Asst Director/ Production Designer's much nicer camera.

R. I. P. David Carradine and Shih Kien (Shek Kin)

It's a little sad that I learned of both deaths within minutes of each other. David Carradine was found hanging in his hotel room at Bangkok (article here, either it was suicide or a sex game gone wrong). He was 72.

Piano virtuoso in Bic Camera Yurakucho

I was taking a walk around Bic Camera Yurakucho, checking out cameras and stuff when something in the distance caught my eye. I saw an old man sitting before one of the electronic pianos, pounding the keyboard relentlessly, and some shop assistants were looking at him.

Really tiny car

I was on my way to catch Star Trek in Shinjuku two days ago when I saw an unbelievably tiny car passing by.

Immediately I took out my cellphone to snap a photo. (I wasn't the only one)





On the other hand, Star Trek's pretty entertaining. Don't think the ending matched up with the intense intro though.

Write-up of KINGYO on Twitch

Machine Girl of TWITCH had a very nice write-up of KINGYO.

Waseda High School parade

I took these photos back on the 23rd, more than a week ago. I was on my way back to the lab when I saw a parade of school clubs from the nearby Waseda High School (which is separated to Junior and Senior high, I assume the ones I saw were from Junior High)

Not something you'll see everyday, so I whipped out my phone and started snapping.

Review of KINGYO at Toronto J-Film Pow-Wow

Marc Saint-Cyr (you can check out his blog here) had posted a review of KINGYO on Toronto J-Film Pow-Wow. (one of my favourite blogs on J-films! I gave them a nearly-completed version of the film for the 1st anniversary celebration party they held last week)

Here's an excerpt.

What especially makes "Kingyo" a success is how its experimentation never reduces it to a chilly or pretentious aesthetic exercise, but instead remains constantly in service to its characters and their emotional states. Often, the professor and the young woman will inhabit the same space, yet they are nonetheless isolated through the split screen. There is also the scene on a bridge overlooking Akihabara, with special attention given to the two characters’ hands resting close to each other on a railing. Through such moments in the film, Yeo clearly focuses on the distance that can grow between two people, be it in the case of the man and his wife or him and his mistress.

Read the full review.

Remember, if you live in Tokyo, you can catch a test screening of Kingyo at Shinjuku Wald 9 next Friday.

Additional photos from the Sagamiko haikyo adventure

Just to expand upon my previous post about my ruins-exploring adventure at Sagamiko, here are some additional photos.

Exploring the ruins in Sagamiko

Ruins of buildings and abandoned places, known as 廃墟　haikyo in Japanese, are ripe for exploration and photography among enthusiasts. There are many blogs and websites dedicated to them, books published as well. Tokyo Times, for example, has a lot of wonderful photos of these tragic, lonely places.

Early this morning, Niklas, me and a mysterious lady friend embarked upon our own ruins-exploring adventure, which, come to think of it, is almost like treasure-hunting in a console role-playing game, but without the treasure, or leveling up. We headed off to Sagamiko, a town at the Kanagawa Prefecture, the train ride lasts an hour from our place.

New short film, AFTERNOON RIVER, follow-up to KINGYO

So yes, I have completed KINGYO last week, and gearing up for its screening at the FUYAJO CINEMA FESTIVAL in Shinjuku Wald 9 on the 5th of June.

Time to rest? Barely. After taking a breather for a couple of days, I began work on my latest short film, AFTERNOON RIVER.

Where are they now? The cast of SUMMER VACATION 1999

Last Friday when I was sitting in a class taught by the Director of Photography, Kenji Takama (the second DEATH NOTE film, WELCOME BACK, MR MCDONALD), he showed us a couple of his earlier films. One of them was a 1988 film called SUMMER VACATION 1999 (1999年の夏休み), directed by Shusuke Kaneko (the two DEATH NOTE films, AZUMI 2) The film is an adaptation of a shounen-ai (boy love) manga called Tōma no Shinzō トーマの心臓 (Heart of Thomas, or Thomas' Heart) by Moto Hagio.

Here's the synopsis from IMDB.

The Saddest T-Shirt In The World

I was hanging out at the Nakano Broadway shopping center when I saw this T-shirt.

My short film, KINGYO, screening at Fuyajo Cinema Festival (Shinjuku Wald 9) on 5th of June

Amane Kudo in KINGYO

An unfinished cut of my 25-minute Japanese short film, KINGYO, will be screened at the Shinjuku Wald 9 for the Fuyajo Cinema Festival (click to their site for more info) on the 5th of June. Fuyajo (不夜城, translated as 'city without night') is an all-night event that runs from 10pm to 6am the next day. It's running on the 5th of June, and then the 6th of June.

Kingyo is completed. Goodbye, Toho Studios

The Maid (Luchino Fujisaki) in Kingyo

And so it's finally done. After an occasionally tedious post-production process that lasted for five weeks, I have completed my first attempt at a Japanese-language short film, KINGYO.

Sanja Matsuri 2009 at Asakusa

After hanging about at the Rei Ayanami-invaded Akihabara, I made my move to Asakusa. In truth, Asakusa was my primary destination, Akihabara was just a detour for me to buy my FireWire.

My friend Niklas had told me that a Matsuri (festival) was going on, so I wanted to take a look at it. I arrived at Asakusa at 3pm and already I could hear faint sounds of drums from above. The station was crowded with people moving to the exit, and as I tried to wade through the chaotic sea of humanity, initial curiosity giving way to excitement, I finally made my way out of the underground station and saw the parade.

I will now copy and paste Wikipedia's explanation of Sanja Matsuri.

Rei Ayanami invades Akihabara

I went to Akihabara earlier this afternoon to buy myself a firewire cable. As I walked out of the station, I saw a large crowd gathering nearby.

It was because of the Rei Ayanami cosplayer.

Running into Takuya Kimura at Toho Studios

Yes, my Japanese film, Kingyo's pretty much done

For the third day of the week, Maiko and I were at the Toho Studios, this time with coursemate Linto, who was helping to transfer KINGYO into HDCAM for a public screening at Shinjuku Wald 9 next month (will tell you guys about it when I have more info)

I never realized that making a transfer like this is such a long and tedious affair. Initially I thought it would just be a 3-4 hour affair, at most, I ended up in the studio for nearly nine hours. And no, the transfer still isn't complete.

As we waited for Linto to do the transfer, Maiko and I headed to the Toho cafetaria for lunch. It was just at the building opposite ours, but as we were on the way, I noticed a couple of production crew members walking about. And then when we reached the cafetaria, a Toho Studios employee (they all wear a black jacket with the white words Toho Studios written on the back) was speaking to a man by the entrance.

I couldn't see his face until I was entering the building. Then I saw his face, he was pretty tanned... Louis Koo-level tan, slightly taller than I am, and had a ridiculously familiar face.

A dream of a love story from my past, and the girl who went to Yokohama

I seem to dream a lot lately. Yesterday was strange. I woke up from a dream, and when I dozed off again later in the evening, I had another dream again.

Photos from the ONE LOVE JAMAICA FESTIVAL 09

At around half past 3 on Sunday afternoon, I went with Eric (my friend, not my dad), to Yoyogi Park for the One Love Jamaica Festival 2009. (additional photos of the festival can be found in Glen's blog and Neil's blog... which, at least, were taken with a real camera)

As I met up with him at the bridge near the Harajuku station, I saw a couple of guys offering free hugs.

Sweet Success - Interview with The Star

Just found out that I was on The Star today when Kien Keong told me about it via Facebook chat. Last week Sandra Low conducted an email interview with me, being one of the winners of last year's BMW Shorties with Chicken Rice Mystery. It's a great article worth a read because not just me, but Grand Prize winner Nazim, Audience Award winner Moe and co-Honourable Mention winner Maha were interviewed as well. Click the link below:

SWEET SUCCESS

My excerpt is here:

Happy Mother's Day, mom

For the four time in five years, I'm not around to celebrate Mother's Day with my mom. Of course, I usually say that I don't need a special day to shower my mom with affection or gratitude when I do that everyday with understated grace and subtlety.

Spotting a sumo wrestler in Italian restaurant

I was having dinner with my friend, Niklas, at an Italian restaurant in Takadanobaba (all-you-can-eat for 1500 yen, pretty good deal, had lots of pizza and pasta) yesterday evening. Then one particular customer heading towards the counter after his meal caught my eye.

The physique! The top knot! It was a sumo wrestler! More than a year in Japan and that was the first time I saw a sumo wrestler in the flesh! So I whipped out my mobile phone (which is much more reliable than my camera these days) and started snapping a photo... from the distance, because I was too intimidated to approach him and take a photo.

So you have to look closely at the photo (or click for larger version), behind Niklas and the two waitresses, there's the sumo wrestler!

Guy lying on the streets, wasted

Nearly a year ago (May 8th, to be exact), I had all-you-can-eat Shabu Shabu with two of my old Japanese friends, Ai and Iyo, whom I knew from my Perth days. I even have it on video.

Last night, another old friend of mine, Noriko, came all the way from Kyoto for a visit. (As I've mentioned, it's Golden Week) So I brought them (Ai, Iyo and Noriko) to all-you-can-eat Korean BBQ at Takadanobaba instead.

With my camcorder dead, I could only snap some blurry pictures.

How I spent the night at Toho Studios

As mentioned before, I've been doing the rest of the post-production of my Japanese film, KINGYO, at the famed Toho Studios.

Colonel Sanders dressed up as Neon Genesis Evangelion's Eva-01

Taken at the KFC restaurant near the Seijogakuen-Mae Station 成城学園前駅 when I was on the way to Toho Studios yesterday.

Tags: japan, tokyo, neon genesis evangelion, colonel sanders, anime,