The Magic Hour

My wife and I watched a Japanese comedy movie called The Magic Hour on July 1st. We needed only 1,000yen for each ticket because the theater had Movie Day on that day; we usually have to pay 1,800yen for each one.
When we arrived at the theater, the ticket counter had long lines of women. I thought we would miss out on seats but I was wrong. The long lines were for another Japanese film, Hana Yori Dango, which was based on a TV show that was popular with various ages of Japanese women.
My wife likes the director of the movie, Koki Mitani, so she was looking forward to watching the film for a long time.
While the movie was playing, the theater was filled with laughing voices and we highly enjoyed watching it. I couldn't stop laughing with tears in my eyes many times.
The movie reminded me of an American movie, The Sting, which is my most favorite movie I have ever watched. The Sting was set in old Chicago and The Magic Hour was in Sucago, which looked like a 50's American town. I think it is obvious that the locale of the Japanese movie would refer to old Chicago.
Anyway, I would grade the movie as four stars out of five and I really recommend watching the comedy.

Hairspray

I watched an American musical movie called Hairspray last year. It was the first time I had ever watched a musical movie.

Before I watched the movie, I did not expect any musical would be fun but I really enjoyed it.

The story was about a chubby teenager, Tracy and her friends in 1962 in Baltimore. The city was beautiful on the screen. I was involved with the musical from the opening scene in which Tracy was singing and hopping around in Baltimore with joy. She had the great power of making people feel positive and I also felt the same power from her.

In the film we could see many people using hairspray in their hair as the signature of the movie. That reminds me of my mother. I was familiar with the smell of her hairsprays when I was little. It was probably in the late 60s when my mother would spray it in her hair before going out for something special. I did not like the smell then but now I sometimes remember it with nostalgia.

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Where are The DVDs?

A series of Japanese comedy movies, Otoko wa turaiyo, It's tough being a man, is one of the most popular movies in Japan. I love the movies very much too. In fact I have watched all of the stories, amazingly the forty-eight films is a Guinness book record, on DVDs. It took a year to watch the whole of the DVDs and it cost about 15,000yen for rent. I would dream of having the DVD set.

A few months ago I found the complete DVD set at a used DVD shop. I needed to pay120,000yen for a new one. At that time I could see 68,000yen on the price card and I realized it used to say 80,000yen initially. I was eager to buy them but they were too expensive for me. I thought no one would buy them because of such a high price so they would cut down the price soon.

I decided to wait to buy them. I waited for two weeks. They were still there. Another two weeks, oh, they were gone! I shoud have bought them immediately!