Word: brits
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...fascination with Japan's perceived strangeness stretches from the beginning of films - when actor Sessue Hayakawa was one of the first Hollywood stars - to today. In the new Brit comedy Bridget Jones's Diary the heroine's mum blithely describes the Japanese as a "very cruel race." And if you think the Japanese cannot portray themselves as very cruel, check out Teruo Ishii's Joy of Torture films. In these two gore classics from the '60s, victims of feudal lords are roasted, splayed, beheaded, crucified and otherwise inconvenienced. These are not the only examples of cinematic exploitation and self-criticism...
...Phil Spector's girl groups, a huge Beatles and Brit invasion fan, an intense radio listener who absorbed everything in the AM Top 40 between 1963 and 1969. Before the Ramones he was a glam-rocker, another New York Dolls fan. He would hitch rides on Queens Boulevard in a custom pink jumpsuit and thigh-high boots to play with a band called Sniper, finally getting his ass kicked one night like everyone who knew him was afraid would happen. Even after becoming a Ramone he always wore '60s-style elliptical specs, hiding what I always imagined to be pink...
...diary form, established by Helen Fielding in an Independent column and then two blithe best sellers, is smartly adapted in the script by Fielding, Andrew Davies (BBC's Pride and Prejudice) and Richard Curtis (Blackadder, Notting Hill) --a virtual conglomerate of middle-class Brit humor. It gives good lines and cunning motives to the stars, especially the newly gaunt Grant, who's irresistible as a randy cad. And, except for a catastrophic third act that comprises about 14 endings, two transatlantic flights and a long, clumsy fight scene, director Sharon Maguire nicely juggles the slapstick and heartbreak...
ONLY A MATTER OF TIME Orlando Montagu, descendant of the fourth Earl of Sandwich (the 18th century Brit who first wed beef to bread), has opened a sandwich service in London. On the menu: beef with grated horseradish and creme fraiche; char-grilled tiger prawns in chili jam. Said he: "We have tremendous pressure on us to get this right...
BILLY ELLIOT Miramax-hyped Chocolat gets Oscar nomination over sugarcoated Brit flick...