Why "Backyard" Asia?Because everybody else writes about kung fu films, J-horror, new Korean cinema, and not to mention Japanese monster movies.
When you read about Asian films on other online sites you kind of get the impression that there's nothing new to discover. A lot of these sites and blogs seem happy to only write more about the same old stuff and/or the new popular stuff. What's the point?
I've been watching weird, cool, and awesome (and sometimes very violent) Asian movies since 1990 and when I decided to start this blog I had no desire to merely confirm how awesome GODZILLA is and that it's really, really cool that we don't need to settle for the "King of the Monsters" edit anymore.
I love the same popular Asian cinema that everyone else and his ugly cousin loves but is it really necessary to write blog post number three billion about it? Where's the fun in that!? I'd rather write about some obscure/forgotten/never discovered/lost/maybe awful/maybe wonderful weird movies from the outskirts of Asia. Now, that's where the fun is at! Now, there is a purpose for a blog! Now, that is needed! Why? Because nobody else* does it!
Anyway, enough babble. Welcome to BACKYARD ASIA!
/Jack J
*I'm slightly exaggerating there, of course. Fortunately, I'm not entirely alone, although we sure are few and far between, there is a handful of like-minded fans into Asian worldweird cinema - check out my blog roll on this page.
PS: Please notice - I often get emails from people asking where they can download the films that I write about. Sorry, but I can't help you as I don't download from torrent sites or anywhere else. I might find the odd rare film on YouTube but that's about it. I have absolutely no idea of how and where you can download from (other than YouTube). And I do not have an interest in uploading my films to anywhere in Cyberspace – so save your time asking! I collect original video tapes, dvd's, video-cd's, laserdiscs, and I even still tape stuff off telly. Yeah, I'm old-skool. ^_^
PS.PS: to learn more about the author of this blog here's an interview that the spiffy Kwaidan Klub did with yours truly.
Hi there Jack, A very interesting blog.I haven't seen any of the movies you've posted so far. Sorry to hear about your friend passing away. I see you've got a turkish section too ! You must of spent a lot of dough to get all those dvds,tapes,vcds,laser discs etc. I'm having trouble just keeping up with the turkish vcd & dvd releases just another 15 or so came out in the last month and also there's a backlog of about 60 vcds that I still haven't got. Anyway good luck with this new blog and all the others you've got. Cheers
ReplyDeleteI use to record off the telly too alot but nowadays they've got station identity watermarks,pop-up ads,lotto results and in some cases blurring of sensitive material ie cigarettes,nudity,product placement etc..
ReplyDeleteI've got a lot of atuff on tape that I haven't transferred to disc yet, mainly 50s rock n roll movies,sci-fi and some tv shows and music clips. There's nothing good to record off the free to air telly here !!
So that's how you look without the paperbag over your head !!! HAHA..... THE DARKTOWN PIC WITH THE GORY ZOMBIE HEAD, IS THAT YOU AS WELL ??
ReplyDeleteThanks, Anonymous!
ReplyDelete(I'm not quite sure if the three entries are from tree different people or just the same but thanks for the replies in any case!)
About Nick Nicholsen; Thanks. He had been ill for a long time and it didn't help he lived in a place where there's no safety net (i.e. health care). Although he starred in many films in the 80s it didn't mean he was loaded. He hardly had any money.
About the dough (LOL); Thru out the years I have spent quite a bit of money on films but do keep in mind I don't keep up with all the new releases! I don't. A lot of the rare stuff that I find is on old vhs tapes (which doesn't necessarily make it cheaper but it means it's stuff I've found somewhere along the way and not bought in one big purchase when it came out). So it's not like I spend a lot of money ALL the time. For instance, I'm without a job at the moment so I don't actually buy much right now; this month I've only bought ONE old video tape (but then again WHADDA TAPE!! I scooped up the uber rare Swedish vhs release of "The Impossible Kid" [the "For Your Height Only" sequel] for around 15 bucks!).
Gee, I'm sorry to hear about all the censoring and watermarking and shit! State TV here is pretty good. Law enforced TV regulations prevent ad breaks on commercial stations and state TV doesn't have ads at all. And we have no censorship board to cut films so horror etc. is shown uncut.
Also, state TV opened a new culture channel last year which broadcast 1 or 2 new Bollywood movies every week + quite a few of the French new wave films I've never seen before. So around here it's quite good (there's no Turkish stuff nor Filipino war trash though, LOL).
Yes, that's all me!! And yes, the zombie is me too, haha. It's my 15 minutes of fame (or rather THREE minutes!) from when I played a zombie in a Danish amateur zombie movie called "Raadden Kaerlighed" [trans: "rotten love"].
YEP ALL THREE ENTRIES WERE FROM ME,YOU MIGHT'VE guessed it's me Tombei,I've ditched the mizuki joe blog, got sick of constantly editing the 40 or so threads i had as drafts that i was going to post.Taking those snapshots and cover scans off the dvds was time consuming. I've got 90 days before that blog is gone for good. I prefer talking on other people's blogs like on this one and the other one you have the hitman looks back in anger or something or rather.
ReplyDeleteHaha, I kinda figured it was you. Too bad you're closing the blog. It might be an idea to keep it (it's a free blog anyway isn't it?) and just post text when you've actually got something to say or that you feel you want to share with people. Or if you've got info on music or a hint about a rare bootleg or something you wanna share with collectors.
ReplyDeleteForget about the cover scans and the screen grabs!! (yes they are bothersome, I copy most of mine off the web) just concentrate on the text and post just one picture with each post (and get it off the net).
PS: this new blog is basically to re-post world-weird stuff from the Hitman blog so I'd rather that comments to particular posts on this blog are about the topics (well, except for this thread, LOL). So let's use the Hitman blog for all the other non-topic talks, LOL.
that des mangan cult movie show on sbs use to show a lot of asian movies with english subs, i remember watching the chinese ghost story on that program and some martial arts ones too.He showed a few turkish films too but nothing special. Australia doesn't go out of it's way to promote anything turkish only if it's something negative,that's why the turkish video stores thrived here in the 80s and 90s before satellite tv came into play.
ReplyDeleteI've undeleted my blog for the second time in a week !!!! LOL
ReplyDeleteHaha, that's alright. Even if you don't want to continue with the blog you ought to keep the old stuff afloat so people can find it. Like a book in the library.
ReplyDeleteNice one, Jack! I just did discover this awesome blog about two weeks ago and read a post or two already. This has inspired me to do a post at my site that I'm sure you will dig!
ReplyDeleteAhh, you're too kind. Thanks! However, I should point out that people who follow my Lejemorder blog won't really get much out of this new one!
ReplyDeleteThe thing is I post a fair bit about Asian worldweird films on the Lejemorder blog but I also post a lot of YouTube videos, music, crappy junk, stuff about myself, and what have you. So I figured there were probably people who miss the cool Asian film posts because it gets buried in all the other (sometimes silly) stuff. And so I decided to create this blog where I can re-post my stuff about the Asian films exclusively. I'm trying to make this blog as easy to use as possible whereas the other one is one messy pile of stuff. LOL.
Cool, I'll check it out!
Brian, I read your SEVEN WOMEN FROM HELL post. Good stuff! (argh, and one more film I'll need now!)
ReplyDeleteHello Jack,
ReplyDeleteHope this message finds you well.
I'm a Malaysian film director currently residing in Beijing, China. I've got a directorial micro short (The Tattooist) which I would like to share with you. It's currently making its round at the horror film festival circuit and has been winning a number of accolades worldwide.
Screener: www.vimeo.com/274119385/
It features stellar performances from Troy's Team Action and amazing music by Found In The Attic. Further info regarding the film can be found in the press kit link below. Additional images such as poster, cover photo and screengrabs are available.
Press kit: www.michaelwongcc.com/TheTattooist-PressKit.pdf
IMDb page: www.imdb.com/title/tt9020554/
Poster, Cover Photo & Screengrabs: www.michaelwongcc.com/TheTattooist.zip
Promotional Print: www.michaelwongcc.com/TheTattooist-PromoPrint.zip
Behind-the-scene Videos and Photos: www.michaelwongcc.com/TheTattooist-BTS.zip
Hope you liked the film and perhaps review it on your blog and/or at the film's IMDb page. Thank you.
Hi Michael,
DeleteAlmost 18 months later and I finally get to see your ultra micro short film. I liked it! Well show and looks good. You need to do a real feature length horror film! (if you haven't already)
PS: your other links aren't working any longer.