I am well aware of the not-so-good connotation that the world “fangirl” brings to many people. And I don’t blame them. That does not mean, however, that I will completely wash my hands clean of the name. I won’t. I am a fangirl, and I realized that one way to show how much I embrace that identity is by starting a ‘FANgirl friday’ series of posts on this blog. And what better way to start things off on an official footing, than with a post related to my most cherished fandom? Let me talk about the time I watched a movie in Japan, and it so happened to be “Miracle“, which starred Aiba, 1/5 of my favorite group of all time, Arashi.
But first, let me dissect my fangirl identity a bit.
UrbanDictionary’s definition, I must admit, has a bit of truth into it.
A rabid breed of human female who is obsessed with either a fictional character or an actor. Similar to the breed of fanboy. Fangirls congregate at anime conventions and livejournal. Have been known to glomp, grope, and tackle when encountering said obsessions.
Hmmmm.
- I like, adore and watch for some artists and groups and their works. I can’t say I have “obsessed” over them yet.
- I tend to be a fan of fictional characters, too. And actors. And actresses. Yes, fangirls like girls, too. *rolls eyes*
- I haven’t been to any anime convention yet.
- Yes, I used to actively congregate with other fans at Livejournal. Which I missed. But I can’t seem to get my footing back there, so I gave up.
- I haven’t encountered any yet within glomping, groping, or tackling distance, so I can’t say what I’ll do. I think I’ll freeze to the spot, though, so no glomping, groping or tackling is gonna happen.
And here’s a definition that I feel is more on point. It’s by Merriam-Webster.
a girl or woman who is an extremely or overly enthusiastic fan of someone or something
I think I prefer the latter definition.
So let’s get to it. FF in the title is not for Final Fantasy (sorry, not a fangirl of that franchise), but for Fangirling Fridays. This will be a series of posts published on Fridays, although I can’t assure that it will be every Friday. It will cover stuff related to my fangirl persona. *does a series of stretches to warm things up* I’m dead serious about this.
Watching MIRACLE in Japan
The movie is entitled “MIRACLE: Debikuro-kun no Koi to Mahou” or “MIRACLE: Devil Claus’ Love and Magic”, and it stars Aiba Masaki, one of the five members of (dare I say it again?) my all-time favorite group, Arashi.
It was not really part of our plan to watch the movie, but we saw that we had an entire afternoon free before our flight back to the Philippines. So we checked the local listings where the film will be shown, saw that it will be at the Midland Square, near the Nagoya Station, and we decided to “DO IT”!
So we checked out of our hotel in Sakae, brought all our luggage to the Nagoya Station and stowed them in the rental lockers, then proceeded to Midland Square.
The building is massive, and if we were of a mind to go (window)shopping, it’s a good place to do so. However, that’s not what we were there for, and we didn’t have a lot of time before the scheduled screening we were after, so we proceeded straight up to the floor where the Midland Square Cinema is in.
A standee of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were there to point the way.
And across the turtles is this wall of the movie MIRACLE. Only, it’s not a wall, but the sliding doors leading to the Cinemas. 🙂 I think Peach and I spent around close to ten minutes trying to take a photo with the sliding doors. You see, when you step too close, it will slide open, so there goes the photo opp. So we had to be real stealthy as we approached the door, and take photos before it slides open!
Lots of funny moments though, when we were taking photos, and then it opens because someone is coming out from the other side. Tee-hee!
Finally, we decided to stop with the photo-taking and just go in.
They have their own way of scheduling, unlike our usual way here where a film will be screened for a week straight. So we counted ourselves lucky that there was a schedule for MIRACLE on the afternoon before our evening flight.
And we also liked how they do not follow the SRO way of accommodating customers. When the seats are full, ticketing is closed. So everyone is comfortable.
So we purchased the tickets (I kinda forgot how much it costs now, sorry) and hung around while waiting for them to let us in. We were catching the 11:05am showing.
Saw this poster of Vancouver no Asahi…. I think I just saw the subtitles for this released. OOOOOH, TIME TO HUNT! XDD
Come on, just look at that cast. Tsumabuki Satoshi, Kamenashi Kazuya, Miyazaki Aoi, Katsuji Ryo… and it looks like a real positive movie, too!
Also spotted this poster for Miura Haruma’s “Five Minutes to Tomorrow” or Mayonaka no Gofun Mae. I wanna watch this, I wonder if subbed version is out now.
Now we come to question about the movie.
Well, I won’t talk in great length about it. Because it has a simple plot, really, and the story is already predictable. Two childhood friends growing up together, with the girl harboring a secret crush on the boy, who falls for a Korean girl and gets romance tips from a cartoon called Devil Claus. You know how it’ll end, right?
But Aiba is typically Aiba in how he acts, although I daresay he has much improved. Eikura Nana was stronger in this role than I’ve ever seen her before (not that I’ve seen everything, but.). Han Hyo-joo is a solid actress, although I think she’s stronger when she’s in a Korean production, acting purely in Korean. Ikuta Toma… MAN, HE’S REALLY GROWN, HASN’T HE. He’s manlier now, I’m having trouble thinking he’s the same guy who danced around with a lacy female underwear around his head in Hanazakari no Kimitachi e.
Let me talk about how I felt while watching the movie, though.
The cinema is posh. Very clean, very well-maintained, you definitely get what you pay for. Lots of legroom, plush seats, you can sit back and go to sleep.
Although I would not recommend that if you are the type that snores. You see, it was verrrrry quiet.
Even in the parts that were funny, all you could hear are muffled laughter and slight chuckles. And they don’t even rate decibels. There were a couple of quiet transitions in the film, where one scene fades out quietly into another, and it was so quiet you could HEAR. A. PIN. DROP.
I remember holding my breath at one point, as if the sound of me exhaling might disturb the girl seated to my right.
My throat felt dry halfway through the movie so I reached into my pocket for some of the hard candy I snagged off a resto earlier, and even the small rustling made by removing the plastic wrapper sounded SO LOUD. That’s how quiet it was. I could just close my eyes and think that I’m all alone inside the cinema with the movie playing on the big screen.
When the movie was over, I just watched, struck dumb, as the other moviegoers stood up quietly, and filed out of the cinema. Like, they weren’t even talking to their companions, to say “that was fun~”. (Or maybe they did but I was already deafened by the silence and I could no longer hear them).
It was quite an experience. And an eye-opener. I am guessing this is not something that happens everywhere. I bet people would have been noisier if the film was, say GANTZ or the Rurouni Kenshin ones. I could tell, however, that they like to truly savor what they are watching. They are even well-behaved in concerts, and incidents of shrieking and blood-curdling screams are very few and far in between.
Now, whenever I go watch a movie in the cinema here in my country, and the people behind me are chatting loudly, or someone is talking to someone on the phone, or the person in front of me is munching loudly on popcorn, and the one beside him is loudly cracking open a bag of chips, I wish for that silence while watching Miracle. 🙂